Page:An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) vol 4.djvu/84

78 and gave them no respite, no breathing time, no cessation of arms. He ruled the nations, but he ruled them in anger, every thing he said and did was in passion; so that he who had the government of all about him, had no government of himself; he made the world as a wilderness, as if he had taken a pride in being the plague of his generation, and a curse to mankind, (v. 17.) Great princes used to glory in building cities, but he gloried in destroying them; see Ps. ix. 6.

Two particular instances are here given of his tyranny, worse than all the rest: [1.] That he was severe to his captives; (v. 17.) He opened not the house of his prisoners; he did not let them loose homeward; so the margin reads it; he kept them in close confinement, and never would suffer any to return to their own land. This refers especially to the people of the Jews, and it is that which fills up the measure of the king of Babylon's iniquity, that he had detained the people of God in captivity, and would by no means release them; nay, and by profaning the vessels of God's temple at Jerusalem, did, in effect, say that they should never return to their former use, Dan. v. 2, 3. For this he was quickly and justly turned out by one, whose first act was to open the house of God's prisoners, and send home the temple-vessels. [2.] That he was oppressive to his own subjects; (v. 20.) Thou hast destroyed thy land, and slain thy people; and what did he get by that, when the wealth of the land, and the multitude of the people are the strength and honour of the prince, who never rules so safely, so gloriously, as in the hearts and affections of the people? But tyrants sacrifice their interests to their lusts and passions; and God will reckon with them for their barbarous usage of those who are under their power, whom they think they may use as they please.

(2.) Great pride and haughtiness; notice is here taken of his pomp, the extravagancy of his retinue; (v. 11.) he affected to appear in the utmost magnificence; but that was not the worst, it was the temper of his mind, and the elevation of that, that ripened him for ruin; (v. 13, 14.) Thou hast said in thy heart, like Lucifer, I will ascend into heaven. Here is the language of his vainglory, borrowed perhaps from that of the angels who fell, who, not content with their first estate, the post assigned them, would vie with God, and become not only independent on him, but equal with him: or perhaps it refers to the story of Nebuchadnezzar, who, when he would be more than a man, was justly turned into a brute, Dan. iv. 30. The king of Babylon here promises himself, [1.] That in pomp and power he shall exceed all his neighbours, and shall arrive at the very height of earthly glory and felicity; that he shall be as great and happy as this world can make him; that is the heaven of a carnal heart, and to that he hopes to ascend, and to be as far above those about him, as the heaven is above the earth. Princes are the stars of God, which give some light to this dark world; (Matth. xxiv. 29.) but he will exalt his throne above them all. [2.] That he shall particularly insult over God's mount Zion, which Belshazzar, in his last drunken frolic, seemed to have had a particular spite against, when he called for the vessels of the temple at Jerusalem, to profane them; see Dan. v. 2. In the same humour, he here said, I will sit upon the mount of the congregation, (it is the same word that is used for the holy convocations,) in the sides of the north; so Mount Zion is said to be situated, Ps. xlviii. 2. Perhaps Belshazzar was projecting an expedition to Jerusalem to triumph in the ruins of it, then when God cut him off. [3.] That he will vie with the God of Israel, of whom he had indeed heard glorious things, that he had his residence above the height of the clouds; "But thither," says he, "will I ascend, and be as great as he; I will be like him whom they call the Most High." It is a gracious ambition to covet to be like the Most Holy, for he has said, Be ye holy, for I am holy; but it is a sinful ambition to aim to be like the Most High, for he has said, He who exalts himself, shall be abased; and the devil drew our first parents in to eat forbidden fruit, by promising them that they should be as gods. [4.] That he shall himself be deified after his death, as some of the first founders of the Assyrian monarchy were, and stars had even their names from them, "But," (says he) "I will exalt my throne above them all." Such as this was his pride, which was the undoubted omen of his destruction.

3. The utter ruin that should be brought upon him:

(1.) It is foretold that his wealth and power should be broken, and a final period put to his pomp and pleasure; he has been long an oppressor, but he shall cease to be so, v. 4. Had he ceased to be so by true repentance and reformation, according to the advice Daniel gave to Nebuchadnezzar, it might have been a lengthening of his life and tranquillity. But those that will not cease to sin, God will make to cease. The golden city, which, one would have thought, might have continued for ever, is ceased; there is an end of that Babylon. The Lord, the righteous God, has broken the staff of that wicked prince, broken it over his head, in token of the divesting him of his office. God has taken his power from him, and disabled him to do any more mischief: he has broken the sceptres; for even those are brittle things, soon broken, and often justly.

(2.) That he himself should be seized; He is persecuted; (v. 6.) violent hands are laid upon him, and none hinders. It is the common fate of tyrants, when they fall into the power of their enemies, to be deserted by their flatterers, whom they took for their friends. We read of another enemy like this here, of whom it is foretold that he shall come to his end, and none shall help him, Dan. xi. 45. Tiberius and Nero thus saw themselves abandoned.

(3.) That he should be slain, and go down to the congregation of the dead, to be free among them, as the slain that are no more remembered, Ps. lxxxviii. 5. He shall be weak as the dead are, and like unto them, v. 10. His pomp is brought down to the grave, it perishes with him; the pomp of his life shall not, as usual, end in a funeral pomp. True glory, that is, true grace, will go up with the soul to heaven; but vain pomp will go down with the body to the grave, there is an end of it. The noise of his viols is now heard no more; death is a farewell to the pleasures, as well as to the pomps of this world. This mighty prince, that used to lie on a bed of down, and tread upon rich carpets, and to have coverings and canopies exquisitely fine, now shall have the worms spread under him, and the worms covering him, (v. 11.) worms bred out of his own putrefied body, which, though he fancied himself a god, proved him to be made of the same mould with other men. When we are pampering and decking our bodies, it is good to remember they will be worms' meat shortly.

(4.) That he should not have the honour of a burial, much less of a decent one, and in the sepulchres of his ancestors; The kings ofthe nations lie in glory; (v. 18.) either the dead bodies themselves, so embalmed as to be preserved from putrefaction, as of old among the Egyptians; or their effigies (as with us) erected over their graves. Thus, as if they would defy the ignominy of death, they lay in a poor, faint sort of glory, every one in his own house, his own burying-place; for the grave is the house appointed for all living, a sleeping-house, where the busy and troublesome will lie quiet, and the