Taken to us horns—i.e., instruments of resistance and aggression, the horn being symbolic of strength (Jeremiah 48:25; Psalm 75:10; Psalm 89:17; Psalm 92:10; 1Samuel 2:10). The sacred historian takes quite a different view of the success of Jeroboam II. (2Kings 14:26-27). These boasters reckoned the success of arms as due to their own ingenuity or “power.” (Comp. the language put into the mouth of Pharaoh by Ezekiel 29:3 : “My river is my own: I made it for myself.”)

Which say - , (as before, "the sayers!" they who have this saying habitually in their month) have we not taken to ourselves horn? The horn is the well-known symbol of strength which repels and tosses away what opposes it, as the bull doth its assailant. Moses, in his blessing, had used this symbol, of the strength of the tribe of Joseph, and as being a blessing, he spoke of it, as the gift of God. "His glory is like the firstling of his bullock, and his horns are like the horns of buffalos; with them he shall push the people together to the ends of the earth; and they are the ten thousands of Ephraim, and they are the thousands of Manasseh" Deuteronomy 33:17. To this blessing, doubtless, Zedekiah the false prophet referred , when he "made him horns of iron, and said" to Ahab, "Thus saith the Lord, with these shalt thou push the Syrians, until thou hast consumed them." The Psalmist said, "through Thee will we push down our enemies," as with a horn Psalm 44:5-7; and adds, "For I will not trust in my bow, neither shall my sword save me. For Thou hast saved us from our enemies." Israel ascribed God's gift to himself. He had been repeatedly and greatly victorious; he had conquered every enemy, with whom he had of old been at strife; he ascribed it to himself, and forfeited it. "By our own strength," he said, instead of, "by the help of God;" as if we were to ascribe our Indian victories to our generals or our armies, and to substitute self-praise for Te Deums on days of thanksgiving.

Lap.: "The sinner rejoiceth in a non-thing. Sin is a 'non-thing':

(1) as being a thing of nought, that is, vain and valueless.

(2) Its pleasure is fleeting; from where the Psalmist says, "all the men, whose hands are mighty, have found nothing" Psalm 76:5.

(3) Sin brings the sinner to nothing, that is, destruction and death, temporal and eternal.

(4) Sin is the privation of good; but privation is a mere negative; that is, nothing.

(5) Sin deprives of God who is All and the Creator of all.

(6) Sin is nothing, because it cleaves to and joys in creatures and opposes them and prefers them to the Creator.

For creatures, compared to the Creator, are shadows of things, not the very things, and so are nothing. For the Being and Name of God is, I am that I am, that is, I am He who alone have true, full, solid, eternal, infinite, Being; but creatures participate from Me a shadow of their true being, for their being is so poor, brief, fleeting, unstable, perishing, that, compared to Mine, they may rather be said, not to be, than to be. So then as creatures have no true being, so neither have they true good, but only a shadow of good. So also as to truth, wisdom, power, justice, holiness and other attributes. These have in God their real being; in creatures a shadow of being only. Whence God is called in Scripture alone wise Romans 16:27, alone mighty 1 Timothy 6:15, alone immortal 1 Timothy 6:16, alone Lord Isaiah 37:20, alone holy Revelation 15:4, alone good Luke 18:19; because He alone has true, full, uncreated and infinite wisdom, power, goodness, etc. But the sinner, in that he delights in creatures not in the Creator, delights in a shadow, a nothing, not in the true Being. But, because these shadows of creatures amid the dimness of this life appear great to man in his blindness, (as the mountains, at sunset, cast broad and deep shadows,) he admires and pursues these shadows, like the dog in the fable, who, seeing the shadow of the meat in the water, magnified in the water, snatched at it, and so lost the meat and did not attain the shadow. O Lord, dispel our darkness, lighten our eyes, that we may love and seek, not the shadows of honors, riches, and pleasures, which, like meteors, (dazzle here on earth our mind's eye, but may with fixed gaze, behold, love, and compass the real honors, riches, pleasures themselves, which Thou hast from eternity laid up and prepared in heaven for those who love Thee."

Have we not taken to us horns—that is, acquired power, so as to conquer our neighbors (2Ki 14:25). Horns are the Hebrew symbol of power, being the instrument of strength in many animals (Ps 75:10).

which say, have we not taken to us horns by our own strength? by which we have pushed our enemies, got victory over them, and obtained power, dominion, and authority; all which horns are an emblem of. So Sanchoniatho (k) says, Astarte put upon her own head a bull's head, as an ensign of royalty, or a mark of sovereignty; by which, as Bishop Cumberland (l) thinks, is plainly meant the bull's horns, since it is certain that a horn, in the eastern languages, is an emblem or expression noting royal power, as in 1 Samuel 2:10; and in other places; see Daniel 7:24; thus the kings of Egypt wore horns, as Diodorus relates; and perhaps for the same reason the Egyptians adorned Isis with horns (m). And all this they ascribed not to God, but to themselves. The Targum interprets "horns" by riches; but it rather signifies victory (n), and power and government, which they took to themselves, and imputed to their own strength, valour, and courage: very probably here is an allusion to their ensigns, banners, shields, or helmets, on which horns might be figured or engraven, being the arms of Ephraim, the son of Joseph, the chief of the ten tribes, who are here spoken of Ephraim is often put for the ten tribes, or the kingdom of Israel; and Joseph, whose son he was, "his glory was like the firstling of a bullock, and his horns" are said to be like "the horns of unicorns: with them", it is promised, "he shall push the people together, to the ends of the earth, and they are the ten thousands of Ephraim, and they are the thousands of Manasseh", Deuteronomy 33:17; and it may be, as the lion seems to be the ensign of the tribe of Judah, to which he is by Jacob compared; so the ox or the unicorn might be the ensign of the tribe of Ephraim: and so the ancient Jews, as Aben Ezra on Numbers 2:2; observes, say, that the form of a man was on the standard of Reuben; and the form of a lion on the standard of Judah; and the form of an ox on the standard of Ephraim, &c. and others (o) of them say that the standard of Joseph was dyed very black, and was figured for the two princes of Ephraim and Manasseh; upon the standard of Ephraim was figured an ox, because "the firstling of a bullock"; and on the standard of Manasseh was figured an unicorn, because "his horns are like the horns of unicorns". Now the Israelites, or those of the ten tribes, at the head of which Ephraim was, set up their banners, not in the name of the Lord, but in their own strength; and attributed their conquests and dominions to their own conduct and courage, the horns of their own strength, and not to God (p). And this also is the language of such persons, who ascribe regeneration and conversion, faith, repentance, the cleansing of a man's heart, and the reformation of his life, yea, his whole salvation, to the power and strength of his free will, when man has no strength at all to effect any of these things; these are all vain boasts, and very disagreeable and offensive to the Lord; and for such like things persons stand here reproved by him, and threatened with woes; for woe must be here supplied from Amos 6:1.

(i) "in non verbo", Montanus. (k) Apud Euseb. Evangel. Prepar. l. 2. p. 38. (l) Sanchoniatho's History, p. 35. (m) Vid. Pignorii Mensa Isiaca, p. 30. (n) "Vieimus, et domitum pedibus calcamus amorem, Venerunt capiti cornua sera meo". Ovid. Amor. l. 3. Eleg. 10. (o) Bemidbar Rabba, sect. 2. fol. 178. 3.((p) Vid. Lydium de Re Militari, l. 4. c. 4. p. 164.

(p) That is, power and glory.