(17) Why hast thou made us to err . . .—The prophet identifies himself with his people, and speaks as in their name. Have their sins led God to abandon them, and to harden their hearts as He hardened Pharaoh’s? (Comp. Romans 9:17-22.) Are they given over as to a reprobate mind? Against that thought he finds refuge, where only men can find it, in prayer, and in pleading God’s promise and the “election of grace,” to which He at least remains faithful, though men are faithless. Conscious that they have no power without Him to return to Him, they can ask Him to return to them.

Isaiah 63:17-19. O Lord, why hast thou made us to err — Suffered us to err; from thy ways — Thy commandments. And hardened our heart from thy fear — That is, the fear of thee? Why hast thou withdrawn thy grace, and left us to our own hardness of heart? See on Isaiah 6:10. Return for thy servants’ sake — Be reconciled to us for the sake of our godly progenitors, Abraham, Isaac, &c.; namely, for the sake of thy promises made to them; or rather, for our sakes, that little remnant who are thy servants: see Psalm 90:13. The tribes of thine inheritance — What will thine enemies say if thou suffer us, thy people, to perish, or thine inheritance, the land of Canaan, to remain an eternal desolation? The people of thy holiness — The people set apart for thy service, distinguished from other people, and consecrated to thee; have possessed it — Namely, thine inheritance, mentioned in the former clause; but a little while — In comparison of the time promised, which was for ever. So the Jews commonly understood the grant made them of the land of Canaan. They had, however, possessed it about fourteen hundred years, but this they thought a little while. Our adversaries have trodden down thy sanctuary — The temple, called the sanctuary, from its being dedicated to God. This their adversaries, the Babylonians, had trodden down, or rather, as the prophet foresaw, would tread down. “If we understand this of the devastations made by the Romans under Titus, and by the Mohammedans since, the phrase is exactly parallel to the words of Christ, Luke 21:24, Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles.” We are thine — We continue so; we are in covenant with thee, which they never were, and thus it is an argument they use to induce God to have compassion upon them. Thou never barest rule over them — Not in that manner thou didst over us. They were not called by thy name — Neither owned thee, nor were owned by thee. Some translate this last verse thus: “We have been for a long time as those over whom thou didst not bear rule, and who were not called by thy name.” “Thou hast rejected us altogether, and dost disregard us as if we had never had any relation to thee, nor ever were called thy people; which sense agrees very well with the present condition of the Jewish nation, that hath continued for many ages without king, or prince, or sacrifice, as the Prophet Hosea foretold, Hosea 3:4.” — Lowth. “There is no doubt,” says Vitringa, “but that the calamity of the external state of the Jewish people is here described. If you compare this description with the repetition of the same calamity, Isaiah 63:10-11 of the next chapter, you will have no doubt that these words pertain to the Jewish people, banished as they are, and have been for a long time, from the land which, in comparison of this tedious exile, they possessed but a little while; their sanctuary and holy city being possessed and trodden down by their bitterest enemies; so that they are in such a state as to seem like people who never were the chosen and peculiar people of God.”

63:15-19 They beseech him to look down on the abject condition of their once-favoured nation. Would it not be glorious to his name to remove the veil from their hearts, to return to the tribes of his inheritance? The Babylonish captivity, and the after-deliverance of the Jews, were shadows of the events here foretold. The Lord looks down upon us in tenderness and mercy. Spiritual judgments are more to be dreaded than any other calamities; and we should most carefully avoid those sins which justly provoke the Lord to leave men to themselves and to their deceiver. Our Redeemer from everlasting is thy name; thy people have always looked upon thee as the God to whom they might appeal. The Lord will hear the prayers of those who belong to him, and deliver them from those not called by his name.O Lord, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways? - Lowth and Noyes render this, 'Why dost thou suffer us to wander from thy way?' Calvin remarks on the passage, 'The prophet uses a common form of speaking, for it is usual in the Scriptures to say that God gives the wicked over to a reprobate mind, and hardens their hearts. But when the pious thus speak, they do not intend to make God the author of error or sin, as if they were innocent - nolunt Deum erroris aut sceleris facere auctorem, quasi sint innoxii - or to take away their own blameworthiness. But they rather look deeper, and confess themselves, by their own fault, to be alienated from God, and destitute of his Spirit; and hence it happens that they are precipitated into all manner of evils. God is said to harden and blind when he delivers those who are to be blinded to Satan (Satanae excaecandos tradit), who is the minister and the executor of his wrath.' (Commentary in loc.) This seems to be a fair account of this difficult subject.

At all events, this is the doctrine which was held by the father of the system of Calvinism; and nothing more should be charged on that system, in regard to blinding and hardening people, than is thus avowed (compare the notes at Isaiah 6:9-10; Matthew 13:14-15). It is not to be supposed that this result took place by direct divine agency. It is not by positive power exerted to harden people and turn them away from God. No man who has any just views of God can suppose that he exerts a positive agency to make them sin, and then punishes them for it; no one who has any just views of man, and of the operations of his own mind, can doubt that a sinner is voluntary in his transgression. It is true, at the same time, that God foresaw it, and that he did not interpose to prevent it. Nay, it is true that the wickedness of people may be favored by his abused providence - as a pirate may take advantage of a fair breeze that God sends, to capture a merchant-man; and true, also, that God foresaw it would be so, and yet chose, on the whole, that the events of his providence should be so ordered.

His providential arrangements might be abused to the destruction of a few, but would tend to benefit and save many. The fresh gale that drove on one piratical vessel to crime and bloodshed, might, at the same time, convey many richly freighted ships toward the port. One might suffer; hundreds might rejoice. One pirate might be rendered successful in the commission of crime; hundreds of honest people might be benefited. The providential arrangement is not to compel people to sin, nor is it for the sake of their sinning. It is to do good, and to benefit many - though this may draw along, as a consequence, the hardening and the destruction of a few. He might, by direct agency, prevent it, as he might prevent the growth of the briers and thorns in a field; but the same arrangement, by witcholding suns and dews and rains, would also prevent the growth of flowers and grain and fruit, and turn extended fertile lands into a desert. It is better that the thorns and briers should be suffered to grow, than to convert those fields into a barren waste.

Return - That is, return to bless us.

The tribes of thine inheritance - The Jewish tribes spoken of as the heritage of God on the earth.

17. made us to err—that is, "suffer" us to err and to be hardened in our heart. They do not mean to deny their own blameworthiness, but confess that through their own fault God gave them over to a reprobate mind (Isa 6:9, 10; Ps 119:10; Ro 1:28).

Return—(Nu 10:36; Ps 90:13).

Made us to err from thy ways, commandments. It is the language of the godly among them being troubled, and therefore complaining that so gracious a Father should leave them to such exigences.

Made us to sin by withdrawing thy Spirit and leaving us to ourselves, Psalm 81:12. It is not to be understood as if God did force them to it, but either letting loose their hearts, or by giving occasion to their hearts, being naturally too apt to apostatize by their severe afflictions: see this more cleared in the Latin Synopsis. Or, make us desperate, by leaving us so long under the oppression of the adversary, thereby casting off thy worship.

From thy fear, or fear of time, viz. as the object, Psalm 5:7; or, that we may not fear thee; as seeing, that they may not see, Psalm 69:23; or, thy service, Isaiah 29:13, so as to go after other gods.

Return for thy servants’ sake either our godly forefathers, or particularly to Abraham, Isaac, &c., viz. for the sake of thy promises made to them; or rather, our sakes, that little remnant that are thy servants, be reconciled to us, Psalm 90:13; for the next words seem to be put by apposition to the former.

The tribes of thine inheritance; either,

1. The people themselves, which were divided into tribes; or, rather,

2. The land of Canaan, which God gave them as an inheritance, as appears by the next verse: q.d. What will thine enemies say if thou suffer us to perish, or thine inheritance to be destroyed. Or rods, meaning their rulers, see Isaiah 43:28, or heads of their tribes.

O Lord, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear?.... These are the words, not of wicked men among the Jews, charging all their errors, hardness of heart, and wickedness they were guilty of, upon the Lord, as if he was the author and occasion of them, and led them into them; but of the truly godly, lamenting and confessing their wandering from the ways, commands, and ordinances of God, the hardness of their hearts; their want of devotion and affection for God; and their neglect of his worship; not blaming him for these things, or complaining of him as having done anything amiss or wrong; but expostulating with him, and wondering at it, that he, who was their loving and tender Father, that he should suffer them to err from his ways, and to wander from his worship, by withholding his grace and withdrawing his presence from them; by leaving them to the corruptions and hardness of their hearts; by chastising them sorely, and suffering the enemy to afflict them in such a severe manner as laid them under temptation to desert the worship of God, and cast off the fear of him. The Jews (f) interpret this of their being hardened from the fear of God, and made to err from his ways by seeing the prosperity of the wicked, and their own long captivity, troubles, and distresses:

return for thy servants' sake, the tribes of thine inheritance; or turn (g); turn from thine anger and displeasure to thy people; or, as the Targum,

"return thy Shechinah to thy people;''

thy gracious and glorious presence, which has been so long withdrawn; or "return" thy people from their captivity, the twelve tribes, thy portion and "inheritance"; and do this "for thy servants' sake"; for the sake of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: or because of the covenant made with them; or for the sake of all thy people, who are thy servants, and which also are the tribes of thine inheritance, return unto them.

(f) So Kimchi, Ben Melech, and R. Sol. Urbin. Ohel Moed, fol. 85. 2.((g) "convertere", V. L. Pagninus, Montanus, Calvin, Forerius.

O LORD, why hast {t} thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy {u} servants' sake, the tribes of thy inheritance.

(t) By taking away the Holy Spirit from us, by whom we were governed, and so for our ingratitude delivered us up to our own concupiscence, and punished sin by sin according to your just judgment.

(u) Meaning, for the covenant's sake made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob his servants.