Isaiah 29:21

That make a man an offender for a word,.... Inadvertently spoken, unwarily dropped, without any bad design or ill meaning; or for a word misplaced or misconstrued; or for preaching and professing the

That make a man an offender for a word, and lay a snare for him that reproveth in the gate, and turn aside the just for a thing of nought.

That make a man an offender; that condemn and punish a man as if he were a great criminal. For a word; for a verbal reproof, as appears from the next clause. For him that reproveth; for God’ s faithful prophets and ministers, whose office it is to reprove ungodly men, such as these were. In the gate, publicly; which they took for a great affront and disgrace; although the reproof ought to be public, where the sin is public and scandalous. He mentions the gate, because there the people used to assemble, both upon civil and sacred accounts, and there prophets used to deliver their prophecies; of which see 17:19. Turn aside, to wit, from judgment, as this phrase is more fully delivered, , or from his right; which is elsewhere called the perverting, or overturning, or overthrowing of a man’ s right or judgment, as . The just; the faithful prophets and ministers of God, and among others Christ, who is oft called the just or righteous one, both in the Old and New Testament. For a thing of nought; not for any great advantage, but for a trifle, which is a great aggravation of their injustice. Or, with vanity, i.e. with vain and frivolous pretences, or without any colour of reason or justice.

Isaiah 29:21 That make a man an offender for a word, and lay a snare for him that reproveth in the gate, and turn aside the just for a thing of nought.Ver. 21. That make a man an offender for a word.] When he meant no hurt, or by perverting and misconstruing his speeches. Thus they sought to trap Christ in his speeches; and thus they dealt by many of the martyrs and confessors. To say, the Lord, and not our Lord, is called by Stephen Gardner symbolum haereticorum, a note of a heretic. Dr Storie’ s rule to know a heretic was, they will say, the Lord, and we praise God, and, the living God. Robert Cook was abjured for saying that the blessing with a shoe sole was as good as the bishop’ s blessing. Another for saying that alms should not be given until it did sweat in a man’ s hand. Mrs Catismore for saying that when men go to offer to images, they did it to show their new gear; and that images were but carpenters’ chips; and that folks go on pilgrimage more for the green way than for devotion. Philip Brasier for saying that when any miracle is done, the priests anoint the images, and make men believe these images sweat in labouring for them, &c. "Every day they wrest my words," saith David of his enemies. As the spleen is subservient to the liver, to take from it only the most putrid and feculent blood; so do detractors pick out the worst of everything, to lay it in a man’ s dish, or allege it against him. And lay a snare for him that reproveth.] Freedom of speech used by the Waldenses in blaming and reproving the vices and errors of great ones, effecit ut plures nefariae affingerentur eis opiniones, a quibus ornnino fuerant alieni, made them hardly thought and spoken of. Acts and Mon,. fol. 1116. Ibid., 1803. Ibid., 952. Ibid., 765. Ibid., 763. Ibid., 952. Girard.

(21) That make a man an offender for a word . . .—The words indicate that Isaiah had been accused, as Jeremiah was afterwards (Jeremiah 37:13), of being unpatriotic, because he had rebuked the sins of Israel and its rulers. Another interpretation gives, “that make men sinners in word,” i.e., suborn false witnesses against him. The former seems preferable, but the general drift of the passage is the same. The “snare” was laid for the “righteous man,” precisely because he “reproved in the gate:” i.e., preached in the open air in the places of public concourse, even in the presence of the rulers and judges as they sat there. Turn aside the just.—The phrase is used in Exodus 23:6; Amos 5:12; Malachi 3:5, for the deliberate perversion of justice. A thing of nought.—The Hebrew word is once more the tohu (“without form”) of Genesis 1:1. The accusations brought against the prophet were, as we say, incoherent, absolutely chaotic in their falsehood.

Verse 21. Him that reproveth in the gate - "Him that pleaded in the gate"] "They are heard by the treasurer, master of the horse, and other principal officers of the regency of Algiers, who sit constantly in the gate of the palace for that purpose:" that is, the distribution of justice. - Shaw's Travels, p. 315, fol. He adds in the note, "That we read of the elders in the gate. Deuteronomy 21:15; Deuteronomy 25:7; and, Isaiah 29:21; Amos 5:10, of him that reproveth and rebuketh in the gate. The Ottoman court likewise seems to have been called the Porte, from the distribution of justice and the despatch of public business that is carried on in the gates of it."

21. That make a man an offender for a word] The verb rendered “make an offender” usually means “lead into sin” (Exodus 23:33; Ecclesiastes 5:6, &c.); and is so understood in R.V. marg. “make men to offend by their words.” Here, however, the second part of the verse seems to shew that it is used in a declarative sense (= “make a man out to be an offender”). for a word should be translated either by a (false) word; or (as R.V.) in a cause. him that reproveth in the gate] (cf. Amos 5:10). The person indicated may be either a judge (“umpire, as Job 9:33) or a private individual who stands up for justice in the place of public assembly. turn aside the just (from his right, ch. Isaiah 10:2; Amos 5:12) for a thing of nought] rather, as R.V. with a thing of nought, “on an empty pretext.”

That make a man an offender - literally, ‘who cause a man to sin’ (מחטיאי machăṭı̂y'ēy); that is, who hold a man to be guilty, or a criminal.

20, 21. For the terrible one — The haughty and overbearing among the worldly Jewish leaders. Watch for iniquity — For opportunities to commit it.