Vers. 8. Yet thou heardst them not, neither diddest thou know them; neither yet was thine eare opened of old: for I knew that thou wouldest grieuously trans∣gresse; therfore haue I called thee* 1.1 a trans∣gressor from the wombe.
THe Prophets meaning is,* 1.2 that the Lord hath not insisted so long vpon this mat∣ter without cause, but hath been thus instant in exhorting the people, to the end they might acknowledge that they were chastised, and in the end deliuered from all their mise∣ries, by the immediate hand of God. For they (being of an obstinate nature) might com∣plaine, that it was needlesse to trouble their heads with so many repetitions of one and the same thing. The Prophet answers, that it is no wonder, seeing he hath to deale with a sort of transgressors: and thus in other words, he confirmes that which he said in the fourth verse, touching the yron sinew. The summe is, that God knowing the peruersitie of this peo∣ple, omitted no good meanes to win them to his obedience: by how much the more then they haue been conuinced by sufficient and infallible testimonies, so much the lesse shall they be excusable before him. Now ha∣uing pulled off their vizard of holinesse, to wit, their glorying in the name of Israel, (as in the first verse) hee imposeth vpon them a more proper name, and flatly calles them rebels.
By the vvombe. I vnderstand not their first estate, by and by after they were separated to be the Lords people; but from their deliue∣rance out of Egypt, which was as a birth of the Church: Exod. 12.21. But howsoeuer this people had had infinit experiences of Gods great goodnesse towards them, yet they ne∣uer ceased to behaue themselues disloyally against so good a benefactor; nor to wax more and more vntamed: so that hee had iust cause to tax them with the titles of rebels and traitors.