The prophet at once vindicates the claim he has just made (ver. 8). We have here -

I. AS UNSPARING EXPOSURE OF SINS IN HIGH QUARTERS. All classes are involved, and to each class the most scandalous characteristic offences are imputed.

1. Civil rulers. They are open to bribes, in direct violation of Exodus 23:8, and therefore pervert judgment. These sophists on the judgment seat make "the worse appear the better reason;" and at length reach such a stage of iniquity that they "abhor judgment," and "call evil good" etc. (Isaiah 5:20; cf. 2 Peter 2:14). In the striking figure of Isaiah (Isaiah 59:14), "truth is fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter." Their crimes are set out in detail in vers. 14. Meanwhile they are building fine mansions or laying out estates, but at the price of blood, like Ahab (1 Kings 19.) or Jehoiakim (Jeremiah 22:13-19); or they are wronging the poor, though the consequences may be fatal; as in modern society some of the "heads thereof" connive at social systems in government or in business, by which the poor are defrauded of their claim to a livelihood. "The bread of the needy is their life; he that defraudeth him thereof is a man of blood. He that taketh away his neighbour's living slayeth him: and he that defraudeth the labourer of his hire is a bloodshedder" (Ecclus. 35:21, 22).

2. Ecclesiastical leaders. The priests' duty was to teach the Law (Leviticus 10:11; Deuteronomy 17:11; Deuteronomy 33:10), but they too needed douceurs, or fees or bribes. They probably misinterpreted the Law from the same motive as did Eli's sons (1 Samuel 2:12-17). "So Arian bishops, themselves hirelings, by false expositions of Scripture countenanced Arian emperors in their persecution of the faithful" (Pusey). So, too, persecuting priests and prelates in more recent days.

3. Prophets. These religious teachers were raised up to promote a reformation; but they too had been dragged down to the level of other teachers. Divine prophecy had been corrupted into divination, as in the case of Balaam, and covetousness was universal (ver. 5; and cf. Ezekiel 13:1-6). An instructive parallel may be found in the case of the regular clergy of the medieval Church, who were gradually degraded to the low moral level of the secular clergy. We are reminded of the odiousness of a mercenary ministry. Thus all classes were combined in a conspiracy of unrighteousness (as in Ezekiel 22:23-31), and the love of money was the root of all this evil.

II. AN INDIGNANT PROTEST AGAINST UNWARRANTED FAITH IN GOD. They flatter themselves:

1. That they may lean upon the lord. Deaf to all past teachings, blind to the danger signals which history has erected, they insult God by leaning upon him, and expecting him to support their vile souls and pampered bodies (cf. Deuteronomy 29:19, 20). They further take for granted:

2. That the lord is among them. Though invisible to sense, and sending repeated protests, they assume his favourable presence. They trust in lying words, saying. "The temple of the Lord are these," as though the temple of the Lord and the Lord of the temple were identical. In a church at Innsbruck, on the tabernacle containing the consecrated wafer are the words, "Ecce tabernaculum Dei." If this daring perversion of Scripture had proclaimed a truth, what a false confidence for an unworthy communicant; as though "Corpus Christi" and "Christ in you" were the same! "There standeth One among you whom ye know not" may be true, but in a new sense; if not to sanctify, to condemn.

3. That no evil will be fall them. As though God's protests and a guilty conscience were not in themselves evils and the forecast shadows of coming doom. So deceitful and desperately wicked is the heart of man. These truths may be applied to many "nominal Christians."

(1) Ambitious monarchs or statesmen, "building up" their country by huge standing armies, or navies, or palaces, at the cost of grinding taxation, leading to semi-starvation and loathsome disease as among the Italian peasantry, or of tyrannical extortions from Egyptian felaheen, or of a merciless conscription as in Germany, driving some of her best sons from her shores.

(2) Landlords amassing fortunes from rack renting the fever slums of London, or confiscating the fruits of the tenants' industry in Ireland.

(3) Drink sellers fattening on the pauperism of their wretched customers, or carrying liquid poisons to tribes just emerging from barbarism.

(4) Hireling preachers or priests, prophesying smooth things to unrighteous aristocrats or plutocrats, or lulling guilty consciences by the opiate of the sacrament. Such men of expediency crucified even the Son of God that Zion might be "built up" (John 11:48; see Jeremiah 5:80, 31). To that final question an answer is found in ver. 12. - E.S.P.

I. THERE IS AN ETERNAL LAW OF "RIGHT" THAT SHOULD GOVERN MAN IN ALL HIS RELATIONS. Right, as a sentiment, is one of the deepest, most ineradicable and operative sentiments in humanity. All men feel that there is such a thing as right. What the right is is a subject on which there has been and is a variety of opinion. Right implies a standard, and men differ about the standard. Some say the law of your country is the standard; some say public sentiment is the standard; some say temporal expediency is the standard. All these are fearfully mistaken. Philosophy and the Bible teach that there is but one standard, that is the will of the Creator. That will He reveals in many ways — in nature, in history, in conscience, in Christ. Conformity to that will is right.

1. The law of Christ should govern man in his relations with God. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God," etc.

2. The law of right should govern man in his relation to his fellow men — "Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them." This law of right is immutable. It admits of no modification. It is universal. It is binding alike on all moral beings in the universe. It is benevolent. It seeks the happiness of all.

II. That a PRACTICAL DISREGARD OF THIS LAW LEADS TO FRAUD AND VIOLENCE. "For they know not to do right, saith the Lord, who store up violence and robbery in their palaces." The magnates of Samaria had no respect for the practice of right, hence they "stored up violence and robbery in their palaces." Fraud and violence are the two great primary crimes in all social life.

III. That FRAUD AND VIOLENCE MUST ULTIMATELY MEET WITH CONDIGN PUNISHMENT. "Therefore thus saith the Lord God: An adversary there shall be even round about the land; and he shall bring down thy strength from thee, and thy palaces shall be spoiled." How was this realised? "Against him came up Shalmaneser, king of Assyria; and Hoshea became his servant, and gave him presents. In the ninth year of Hoshea the king of Assyria took Samaria and carried Israel away into Assyria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozan and in the cities of the Medes" (2 Kings 17:3, 6; 2 Kings 18:9-11). The cheats and murderers of mankind will, as sure as there is justice in the world, meet with a terrible doom. "Punishment is the recoil of crime; and the strength of the backstroke is in proportion to the original blow."

(Homilist.).