Ezra 10:2. We have trespassed against our God — He says we, in the name of the people, and their several families, and his own among the rest. For this man’s name is not in the following catalogue, but there we have his father Jehiel, and his father’s brethren, five other sons of his grandfather Elam, Ezra 10:26. It was therefore an evidence of his great courage and disinterested faithfulness, that he durst so freely discharge his duty, whereby he showed that he honoured God more than his nearest and dearest relations, and set an admirable example of zealous integrity. And have taken strange wives — Into conjugal society with ourselves. Yet now there is hope in Israel concerning this thing — The case is sad, but not desperate: the disease threatening, but not incurable. Our ruin may yet be prevented by repentance and reformation. And there is hope that the people may be reformed, the guilty reclaimed, a stop put to the spreading of the contagion, and so the judgments which the sin deserves may be prevented. Therefore, let us not sorrow like persons without hope, or sit down in despair, but let us fall upon action, and amend our errors, and then trust to God’s mercy.

10:1-5 Shechaniah owned the national guilt. The case is sad, but it is not desperate; the disease threatening, but not incurable. Now that the people begin to lament, a spirit of repentance seems to be poured out; now there is hope that God will forgive, and have mercy. The sin that rightly troubles us, shall not ruin us. In melancholy times we must observe what makes for us, as well as against us. And there may be good hopes through grace, even where there is the sense of great guilt before God. The case is plain; what has been done amiss, must be undone again as far as possible; nothing less than this is true repentance. Sin must be put away, with a resolution never to have any thing more to do with it. What has been unjustly got, must be restored. Arise, be of good courage. Weeping, in this case, is good, but reforming is better. As to being unequally yoked with unbelievers, such marriages, it is certain, are sinful, and ought not to be made; but now they are not null, as they were before the gospel did away the separation between Jews and Gentiles.Jehiel was one of those who had taken an idolatrous wife Ezra 10:26; and Shechaniah had therefore had the evil brought home to him. 2-4. Shechaniah … answered and said unto Ezra, We have trespassed—This was one of the leading men, who was not himself a delinquent in the matter, for his name does not occur in the following list. He spoke in the general name of the people, and his conduct evinced a tender conscience, as well as no small fortitude in making such a proposal; for as his father and five paternal uncles (Ezr 10:26) were involved in the guilt of unlawful marriages, he showed, by the measure he recommended, that he deemed it better to obey God than to please his nearest relatives.

yet now there is hope in Israel concerning this thing—This hope, however, depended on timely measures of reformation, and therefore, instead of surrendering themselves to despair or despondency, he counselled them to amend their error without delay, relying on God's mercy for the past. Though the proposal may seem harsh and cruel, yet in the peculiar circumstances of the Jews it was just as well as necessary; and he urged the duty of seeing it executed on Ezra, as the only person competent to carry it into effect, being possessed of skill and address for so delicate and difficult a work, and invested by God, and under Him by the Persian king (Ezr 7:23-28), with the requisite authority to enforce it.

He saith

we, either,

1. Because he was guilty in this matter. Or rather,

2. In the name of the people, and their several families, and his own amongst the rest. For this man’s name is not in the following catalogue, but there we have his father, Jehiel, and his father’s brethren, five other sons of his grandfather Elam, Ezra 10:26. It was therefore an evidence of his great courage, and good conscience, that he durst so freely and fully discharge his duty, whereby he showed that he honored God more than his nearest and dearest relations.

There is hope concerning this thing, in case of our repentance and reformation. Therefore let us not sorrow like persons without hope, nor sit down in despair, but let us fall upon action, and amend our errors, and then trust to God’s mercy.

And Shechaniah the son of Jehiel, one of the sons of Elam, answered and said unto Ezra,.... This man seems to be one of those that now came with Ezra from Babylon, see Ezra 8:3,

we have trespassed against our God, and have taken strange wives of the people of the land; not that he had taken any himself, being but just come into the land, nor is his name in the list of those that had; but inasmuch as many of the nation, of which he was a part, and his own father, and several of his uncles had, Ezra 10:26, he expresses himself in this manner:

yet now there is hope in Israel concerning this thing; of a reformation of this evil, and of pardon for it.

And Shechaniah the son of Jehiel, one of the sons of Elam, answered and said unto Ezra, We have trespassed against our God, and have taken strange wives of the people of the land: yet now there is {b} hope in Israel concerning this thing.

(b) Meaning, that God would receive them in mercy.