Obadiah 1:16

1:1-16 This prophecy is against Edom. Its destruction seems to have been typical, as their father Esau's rejection; and to refer to the destruction of the enemies of the gospel church. See the prediction of the success of that war; Edom shall be spoiled, and brought down. All the enemies of God's church shall be disappointed in the things they stay themselves on. God can easily lay those low who magnify and exalt themselves; and will do it. Carnal security ripens men for ruin, and makes the ruin worse when it comes. Treasures on earth cannot be so safely laid up but that thieves may break through and steal; it is therefore our wisdom to lay up for ourselves treasures in heaven. Those that make flesh their trust, arm it against themselves. The God of our covenant will never deceive us: but if we trust men with whom we join ourselves, it may prove to us a wound and dishonour. God will justly deny those understanding to keep out of danger, who will not use their understandings to keep out of sin. All violence, all unrighteousness, is sin; but it makes the violence far worse, if it be done against any of God's people. Their barbarous conduct towards Judah and Jerusalem, is charged upon them. In reflecting on ourselves, it is good to consider what we should have done; to compare our practice with the Scripture rule. Sin, thus looked upon in the glass of the commandment, will appear exceedingly sinful.

Those have a great deal to answer for, who are idle spectators of the troubles of their neighbours, when able to be active helpers. Those make themselves poor, who think to make themselves rich by the ruin of the people of God; and those deceive themselves, who call all that their own on which they can lay their hands in a day of calamity. Though judgment begins at the house of God, it shall not end there. Let sorrowful believers and insolent oppressors know, that the troubles of the righteous will soon end, but those of the wicked will be eternal.

For as ye have drunk upon my holy mountain, so shall all the Heathen drink continually,.... Which is either spoken to the Edomites; and the sense be, according to the Targum, "as ye have rejoiced at the blow (given unto or at the subversion and destruction) of the mountain of my holiness, all people shall drink the cup of their vengeance;'' or punishment; and to the same sense Jarchi and Japhet interpret it; and so Kimchi, "as ye have made a feast, rejoicing at the destruction of my holy mountain, so thou and all nations shall drink of the cup of trembling;'' but Aben Ezra thinks the words are spoken to the Israelites, "as ye have drank the cup, so shall all nations;'' the cup of vengeance began with them, and so went round the nations, according to the prophecy in Jeremiah 25:17, &c. for, if judgment begins at the house and people of God, it may be expected it will reach to others; wherefore Edom had no reason to rejoice at the destruction of the Jews, since they might be assured by that the same would be their case before long; and with this difference, that whereas the Jews only drank this cup for a while, during the seventy years' captivity, these nations, and the Edomites among the rest, should be "continually" drinking it: yea, they shall drink, and they shall swallow down; not only drink of the cup, but drink it up; not only take it into their mouths, but swallow it down their throats; not only sip at it, but "sup it up" (a), as it may be rendered.

The phrase denotes the fulness of their punishment, and their utter and entire ruin and destruction, which the next clause confirms: and they shall be as though they had not been; as now are the Philistines, Moabites, Ammonites, and so the Edomites; their names are not heard of in the world, only as they are read in the Bible; and thus it shall be with mystical Babylon or Edom, it shall be thrown down, and found no more, Revelation 18:21. (a) "absorbebunt", V. L. Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; "deglutient", Montanus, Mercerus. Gussetius renders it "absorbebantur".

For as ye have {l} drunk upon my holy mountain, so shall all the heathen drink continually, yea, they shall drink, and they shall swallow down, and they shall be {m} as though they had not been. (l) That is, rejoiced and triumphed. (m) The Edomites will be utterly destroyed, and yet in spite of all the enemies I will reserve my Church and restore it.

This, with some, is a confirmation of what is threatened against Edom, yet others make this verse the beginning of the consolatory sermon to Judah, and either suits well with the context. As ye, O Edomites, or ye, O Jews. Have drunk: if you interpret this drinking as feasting, revelling, and carousing, it is to be applied to the Edomites and others, who triumphed first by their arms, next in their cups, over conquered Judah. Upon my holy mountain; either the whole land, or Jerusalem, or the temple, for all these are called by this name; and here these proud and insolent conquerors did drink confusion to the Jews. All the heathen; the nations, enemies to Edom, shall on Mount Esau conquer first, and then triumph in their revelling feasts, and drink continually, till they have swallowed up Edom. And they, Edomites, shall be as though they had not been; shall by this means perish utterly, and their memory cease with them; so it suits with Ezekiel 35:14,15 , which see. Others refer the words to the Jews, thus: Ye have drunk the cup of astonishment in your land, and in Jerusalem, my holy mountain; so now ere long the nations which afflicted you shall drink of the cup of astonishment long, yea, drink the dregs of it, so that they shall perish, and be no more, when your day of dark affliction shall end in a day of light and salvation; and when other nations do this, Edom shall much more, because most deeply guilty above others’ see Jeremiah 49:17,18,21,22 .

16. ye … upon my holy mountain—a periphrasis for, "ye Jews" [Maurer], whom Obadiah now by a sudden apostrophe addresses. The clause, "upon My holy mountain," expresses the reason of the vengeance to be taken on Judah's foes; namely, that Jerusalem is God's holy mountain, the seat of His temple, and Judah His covenant-people. Jer 49:12, which is copied from Obadiah, establishes this view (compare 1Pe 4:17). as ye have drunk, &c.—namely, the cup of wrath, being dispossessed of your goods and places as a nation, by Edom and all the heathen; so shall all the heathen (Edom included) drink the same cup (Ps 60:3; Isa 51:17, 22; Jer 13:12, 13; 25:15-33; 49:12; 51:7; La 4:21, 22 Na 3:11; Hab 2:16). continually—whereas Judah's calamity shall be temporary (Ob 17). The foes of Judah shall never regain their former position (Ob 18, 19). swallow down—so as not to leave anything in the cup of calamity; not merely "drink" (Ps 75:8). be as though they had not been—not a trace left of their national existence (Job 10:19; Ps 37:36; Eze 26:21).

Verse 16. - As ye have drunk. There are two interpretations of this passage. By the first, the people addressed are considered to be the Jews, and the word "drunk" is taken metaphorically in both clauses (see note on Nahum 3:11). The meaning is then this - As ye Jews, who are upon my holy mountain, the people of election, have not escaped from suffering the wrath of God, so all the nations shell feel the same, and that to a much more terrible extent. Confirmatory of this explanation is the language of Jeremiah, who ( Jeremiah 25:15-29 ) bids all the nations to drink the cup of God's wrath, beginning at Jerusalem and passing on to Edom, and then says, in answer to any who refuse the offered draught, "Lo, I begin to bring evil on the city which is called by my name, and should ye be utterly unpunished?" The same notion is found also in Jeremiah 49:12 and Lamentations 4:21 , etc. But there are objections to this view of the passage. The previous verse enunciated the doctrine of retribution; this verse confirms the former with the words, "for as ye," etc. It would be no proof of the lex talionis on the Edomites to cite what had happened to the Jews.

What is wanted is an assertion that what they had done should be repaid to them in like coin, Besides, the prophecy is nominally addressed to the Edomites, not to the Jews, and it would he most harsh to change the subject suddenly here. "Upon my mountain" cannot be equivalent to "ye who are upon my mountain;" nor is such an expression ever used to signify "Judaeans." It is best, therefore, to take the clause as referring to the Edomites and their comrades, who, after their victory, indulged in unseemly revelry, and profaned the mountain hallowed by God's presence in the temple with their idolatrous festival The "drinking" in this first clause is literal; in the following clause it is figurative. Septuaguint, ἔπιες , "thou didst drink," which makes the connection of the subject here with that in ver. 15 more evident, and it has probably been altered by the translators for that purpose. So shall all the heathen drink continually. The prophet plays on the word "drink." The nations shall drink, not wine, but the wrath of God ( Psalm 75:8 ; Jeremiah 25:15 ). The nations are spoken of here because Edom is taken as a type of all nations hostile to God, and the retribution that falls on him is extended to all who assume his attitude towards God's people (Keil). Continually ; Vulgate , jugiter , perpetually, in uninterrupted succession. The LXX. has οϊνον , by a mistaken reading.

For as ye have drunk - Revelry always followed pagan victory; often, desecration. The Romans bore in triumph the vessels of the second temple, Nebuchadnezzar carried away the sacred vessels of the first. Edom, in its hatred of God's people, doubtless regarded the destruction of Jerusalem, as a victory of polytheism (the gods of the Babylonians, and their own god Coze), over God, as Hyrcanus, in his turn, required them, when conquered, to be circumcised. God's "holy mountain is the hill of Zion," including mount Moriah on which the temple stood. This they desecrated by idolatrous revelry, as, in contrast, it is said that, when the pagan enemy had been destroyed, "mount Zion" should "be holiness" Obadiah 1:17 . Brutal, unfeeling, excess had been one of the sins on which Joel had declared God's sentence Joel 3:3 , "they cast lots on My people; they sold a girl for wine, that they might drink." Pagan tempers remain the same; under like circumstances, they repeat the same circle of sins, ambition, jealousy, cruelty, bloodshed, and, when their work is done, excess, ribaldry, profaneness. The completion of sin is the commencement of punishment. "As ye," he says, pagan yourselves and "as one of" the pagan "have drunk" in profane revelry, on the day of your brother's calamity, "upon My holy mountain," defiling it, "so shall all the pagan drink" continually. But what draught?

a draught which shall never cease, "continually; yea, they shall drink on, and shall swallow down," a full, large, maddening draught, whereby they shall reel and perish, "and they shall be as though they had never been" . "For whoso cleaveth not to Him Who saith, I AM, is not." The two cups of excess and of God's wrath are not altogether distinct. They are joined, as cause and effect, as beginning and end. Whoso drinketh the draught of sinful pleasure, whether excess or other, drinketh there with the cup of God's anger, consuming him. It is said of the Babylon of the world, in words very like to these Revelation 18:3, Revelation 18:6; "All nations have drank of the wine of her fornications - reward her as she has rewarded you; in the cup which she hath filled, fill to her double." "All nations" are in the first instance, all who had been leagued against God's people; but the wide term, "all nations," comprehends all, who, in thee, become like them. It is a rule of God's justice for all times. At each and at all times, God requites them to the uttermost. The continuous drinking is filfilled in each. Each drinketh the cup of God's anger, until death and in death. God employs each nation in turn to give that cup to the other. So Edom drank it at the hand of Babylon, and Babylon from the Medes, and the Medes find Persians from the Macedonians, and the Macedonians from the Romans, and they from the Barbarians.