Ezra 9:5

_AND AT THE EVENING SACRIFICE I AROSE UP FROM MY HEAVINESS; AND HAVING RENT MY GARMENT AND MY MANTLE, I FELL UPON MY KNEES, AND SPREAD OUT MY HANDS UNTO THE LORD MY GOD,_ At the evening sacrifice I arose up from my heaviness х_ QAMTIY_ (H6965) _ MITA`ªNIYTIY_ (H8589)] - I rose up from my humiliation. When fasting, as associated with mourning, the Jews were wont to sit on the ground. I FELL UPON MY KNEES, AND SPREAD OUT MY HANDS UNTO THE LORD MY GOD. The burden of his prayer, which was dictated by a deep sense of the emergency, was, that he was overwhelmed at the flagrant enormity of this sin, and the bold impiety of continuing in it, after having, as a people, so recently experienced the heavy marks of the divine displeasure. God had begun to show returning favour to Israel by the restoration of some. But this only aggravated their sin, that so so

5-15 The sacrifice, especially the evening sacrifice, was a type of the blessed Lamb of God, who in the evening of the world, was to take away sin by the sacrifice of himself. Ezra's address is a penitent confession of sin, the sin of his people. But let this be the comfort of true penitents, that though their sins reach to the heavens, God's mercy is in the heavens. Ezra, speaking of sin, speaks as one much ashamed. Holy shame is as necessary in true repentance as holy sorrow. Ezra speaks as much amazed. The discoveries of guilt cause amazement; the more we think of sin, the worse it looks. Say, God be merciful to me sinner. Ezra speaks as one much afraid. There is not a surer or saddler presage of ruin, than turning to sin, after great judgments, and great deliverances. Every one in the church of God, has to wonder that he has not wearied out the Lord's patience, and brought destructi...

Verse Ezra 9:5. _FELL UPON MY KNEES_] In token of the deepest _humility._ _Spread out my hands_, as if to _lay hold_ on the mercy of God. We have already had occasion to explain these significant acts....

§ 2. REFORMATION OF RELIGION ACCOMPLISHED BY EZRA AT JERUSALEM. EXPOSITION IN the interval between Zerubbabel's rule and the coming of Ezra from Babylon with a special commission appointing him governor of Judaea, the Jews seem to have been left without any strong controlling authority. The civil administration devolved upon a certain number of chiefs or "princes," who maintained order in Jerusalem, collected and remitted the tribute due to the Persian crown, and held courts to decide all causes, criminal and civil, in which only Jews were concerned. Tranquillity and order were sufficiently maintained in this way; but the governing power was weak, and in matters outside the range of the civil and criminal law men did pretty nearly "as it seemed good in their own eyes." During this interval of governmenta

AND AT THE EVENING SACRIFICE I ROSE UP FROM MY HEAVINESS,.... The signs and tokens of it, particularly sitting on the ground; or "from my fasting" n, having eaten nothing that day, it being early in the morning when he was told the above case: AND HAVING RENT MY GARMENT AND MY MANTLE; which he had done before, and still kept them on him in the same case: FELL UPON MY KNEES, AND SPREAD OUT MY HANDS UNTO THE LORD MY GOD; in the posture and with the gesture of an humble supplicant. n מתעניתי "jejunio meo", Michaelis; so Jarchi....

CHAPTER 9 _ 1. Ezra's astonishment and grief (Ezra 9:1)_ 2. Ezra's confession and prayer (Ezra 9:5) Ezra 9:1. When all these things had been done (that are related in chapter 8:33-36) Ezra was confronted by a very sad condition of the people, and even the priests and the Levites. The princes (civil leaders) came to Ezra and told him that the demanded separation according to the law, between God's people and the Canaanitish inhabitants of the land, had not been obeyed. The people had taken of their daughters for themselves and of their sons “so that the holy seed have mingled themselves with the people of the lands; yea the hand of the princes and rulers hath been first in this trespass.” Not alone had they intermarried, b

EZRA'S CONFESSION. Ezra 9:5. at the evening Oblation: therefore in the presence of the assembled worshippers. Ezra 9:7. from the days of our fathers: _i.e._ from the times of the patriarchs onwards. Ezra 9:8. a nail in his holy place: lit. - a tent-peg in, etc.; the rendering in the Greek Ezra is to be preferred, viz.: a root and a name in the place of thy sanctuary. IN OUR BONDAGE: the expression is a strong one; the Jews, though dependents of the Persian king, were not in servitude in the sense that their fathers had been in Egypt. Ezra 9:9. a wall: lit. a fence; _cf._...

HAVING RENT. having already rent. I FEEL UPON MY KNEES. Compare Ezra 10:1; 2 Chronicles 6:13.Daniel 6:10; Luke 22:41.Acts 7:60; Acts 9:40; Acts 20:36. Act :21:5. THE LORD. Hebrew _Jehovah._ App-4....

Ezra's Confession 5. _And at the evening sacrifice_ R.V. AND AT THE EVENING OBLATION, i.e. at the time of its being offered. _I arose up from my heaviness_ R.V. I AROSE UP FROM MY HUMILIATION. Marg. _fasting_. The Hebrew word -Taanith" occurs only here in the O.T.: in later Hebrew it became the accepted for religious fasting. This passage favours the original application to general humiliation rather than to abstinence from food. So the LXX. ταπείωσις. _and having rent my garment and my mantle_ R.V. EVEN WITH MY GARMENT AND MY MANTLE RENT; AND. There is no need to render as the A.V. and most commentators, as if Ezra for a second time rent his clothes. He calls attention to the fact that in the presence of the assembled people he stood before them with these evident signs of his grief and dismay, and thus by a mute appeal united them with him in his act of prayer. fell upon my knees, a...

DISCOURSE: 437 EZRA’S HUMILIATION FOR THE SINS OF HIS PEOPLE Ezra 9:5. _And at the evening sacrifice I arose up from my heaviness; and having rent my garment and my mantle, I fell upon my knees, and spread out my hands unto the Lord my God, and said, O my God, I am ashamed and blush to lift up my face to thee, my God: for our iniquities are increased over our head, and our trespass is grown up unto the heavens_. IT is common both for individuals and Churches to appear hopeful before men, when a nearer acquaintance with them would furnish us with abundant cause of grief and shame. At Ezra’s coming to Jerusalem, about fourscore years after the Babylonish captivity, he found the temple built, and the ordinances of religion statedly performed. But on inquiring more particularly into the state of those who now inhabited the Holy Land, he received such information as filled him with th