This keyboarded and encoded edition of the work described above is co-owned by the institutions providing financial support to the Early English Books Online Text Creation Partnership. Searching, reading, printing, or downloading EEBO-TCP texts is reserved for the authorized users of these project partner institutions. Permission must be granted for subsequent distribution, in print or electronically, of this text, in whole or in part. Please contact project staff at eebotcp-info@umich.edu for further information or permissions.
Feede thy people with thy rod, the flocke of thine heritage, (which dwell solitarie in the wood) as in the midst of Carmel: let them feede in Bashan and Gilead, as in old time.
* 1.1A Comfort against the threatning of the former affliction or pu∣nishment, to the end the godly may be the more strengthened
in the former promises of God.* 1.2 And this verse or comfort contai∣neth two parts: the one, wherein God commandeth the heads or rulers of the Church to seede their people in or with their rod,* 1.3 that is, according vnto the authoritie and dignitie the which was left vnto them by God in the midst of their affliction and poore estate notwithstanding. The kingdome, I confesse, ceased among the Iewes in those afflictions, and also a long while afterward, accor∣dingly as the Lord threatned them by Ezech. cap. 21. ver. 26. saying: I will take away the diademe, and take off the crowne: this shall be no more the same: I will exalt the humble, and abase him that is hie: but yet all policie, or gouernment, power and dignitie, did not therfore cease in that people For they had Rulers or Gouernours of their nation, and the Synedrion or Consistorie of Elders, or chiefe men. Therefore according vnto that authoritie and power which was left vnto them God commandeth the Rulers, that they nourish, go∣uerne and preserue the people of the Church: and not that they cast them away and vtterly forsake them. And why I pray you doth he this? To wit, for because how forsaken soeuer, solitarie, afflicted, and small this people were, God neuerthelesse would preserue thē: and out of the selfe same people afterward gather vnto himselfe a most great Church, as shall anon be shewed ver. 15 and 16. Fur∣ther, God exhorting the Pastors and Rulers of this people to looke vnto it, defend, and feede it, calleth this people, their people flocke & heritage, not in contempt or reproch: but that by this name and re∣lation they may vnderstand, that this which they are commanded for to doe, cannot by them be ouerpassed and forslowed without a great offence. For this is belonging vnto their dutie. For God hath committed this people vnto them for to feede. Hereupon is there a mutuall band, by reason of these words, betweene the Rulers and the people giuen vnto them by God. This is one part of the com∣fort set forth by God in this verse.
* 1.4The second part of this verse is a promise of the full deliuerance and restoring of this people into their owne seates and home, as before, how greatly soeuer the land were layd waste before, & the nation carried vnto another countrie. For this land and this nation shall be restored. This people shall feede as before, and shall pos∣sesse Basan, and Galaad, and their other countries.
A comfort a∣gain•••• the for∣mer affliction.
Two parts of this verse.
1. A commande∣ment to feede their people.
2. A promise con∣cerning the de∣liuerance and restoring of this people.