Obadiah 1:6

How are [the things] of Esau searched out!.... Or how are the Esauites, the posterity of Esau, sought out!

How are the things of Esau searched out! how are his hidden things sought up! How are the things of Esau searched out! - by hostile soldiers seeking booty.

Esau; the father of this people, and here put for his posterity. All that the Edomites had laid up in the most secret places, in unsearchable caves, and deep abysses of hollow rocks, how are all his treasures found out, seized, and brought forth a prey to greedy soldiers! How durst they adventure here?

Obadiah 1:6 How are [the things] of Esau searched out! [how] are his hidden things sought up!Ver. 6. How are the things of Esau searched out!] Or, as Drusius reads it, How are the posterity of Esau searched out! the men to the slaughter, the wealth to the spoil! what cunning and daring soldiers were these to pry into every corner for prey, and to pull them out of every lurking hole, where they might have been circumvented and butchered, in those dark and narrow places: this shows surely that they were both armed and animated by God himself. Confer Joe 2:6-9, but especially Jeremiah 49:10-11, where you have the full of that which is here but abridged; and therefore this verse hath not so much as an Athnach in it for distinction. How are his hid things sought out!] i.e. his treasures and jewels, which have their name in Hebrew from hiding, because men used to secret and secure them with utmost care and diligence. See Matthew 13:44; hence they are called treasures of darkness, Isaiah 45:3; see Job 3:21. Abundance of this was found at Constantinople, taken by the Turks; so that the soldiers divided it among themselves by hatfuls, wondering at their wealth, and deriding their folly, that possessing so much, they would bestow so little in defence of themselves and their country, lost by their tenacity and niggardice. And the same is reported of Heidelberg. This that is here threatened against Edom was accordingly executed in the fifth year after the destruction of Jerusalem, saith Josephus; Nebuchadnezzar, in the 23rd year of his reign, invading and wasting Idumea. Ill-gotten goods prosper not. Men rake together their riches, and know not who shall gather them, Psalms 39:6. But, "let no man go beyond and defraud another: for God is the avenger of all such," 1 Thessalonians 4:6. They do best that renounce, with St Paul, those hidden things of dishonesty, 2 Corinthians 4:2, not walking in craftiness, nor making haste to be rich; for treasures of wickedness profit not, Proverbs 10:2; and when God comes by his judgments to turn the bottom of the bag upwards, as Joseph’ s steward once did, all our secret thefts will out. See Ecclesiastes 12:14.

(5-9) The completeness of the overthrow awaiting Edom. It is no mere inroad of a marauding tribe. Something would escape the robber, though he might go away quite satisfied with his plunder; and even a raid in vintage time, for the purpose of doing all the mischief possible to the country, would leave here and there a scattered bunch, gleanings for the inhabitants when the spoilers had retired, but now everything is doomed to destruction. Edom is completely robbed and ransacked. Notice how the sad, almost pathetic, conviction of this breaks out—as if rather from a friend (see Introduction) than an enemy—in the parenthetical “how art thou cut off!” in the very middle of the sentence. Every one must perceive, the prophet seems to say, a higher hand at work here. (5) Some grapes.—Gleanings, as in margin. (Comp. Isaiah 17:6; Isaiah 24:13.) (6) How are the things of Esau searched out!—Literally, How are they searched out Esau! Where Esau is either taken collectively = Edom as a nation, or we must supply, as in the Authorised Version, “the things of,” or, as Ewald, “they of.” For search, comp. Zephaniah 1:12. His hidden things.—Heb., matspunξm, from tsapan = to hide, but whether hidden treasures or hiding places cannot be determined, as the word only occurs here. (7-9) Overtaken by this terrible calamity, and deserted by her allies, Edom will turn in vain for counsel to her senators and wise men, and for support to her heroes and mighty men, for these will not only share in the general ruin, but are marked out for an overthrow as signal as their renown. (7) All the men of thy confederacy. . . .—This desertion by allies is doubtless put prominently forward as the due retribution on Edom for his treachery and cruelty to his natural ally, his brother Jacob. The members of the confederacy are not specified. In Jeremiah 27:3 we find Edom associated with Moab, Ainmon, Tyre, and Sidon, in the warning to submit to Nebuchadnezzar. The two former would be the natural allies of Edom, and in Ezekiel 25:8 Seir is joined with Moab as reproaching Israel. From Psalms 60:8, we may add to these Philistia (comp. also Obadiah 1:19). The expression “have brought thee to the border” is variously understood. The most natural explanation is that the fugitives from the ruin of Edom, flying into the territory of neighbouring and allied tribes for help, are basely driven back to their own frontier, and left to their fate. The men that were at peace with thee.—As in margin, the men of thy peace, an expressive Hebrew idiom occurring in Jeremiah 20:10; Jeremiah 38:22, and in Psalms 41:9, where it is translated “mine own familiar friend.” Great difference of opinion exists as to the connection of this and the following clause, and as it stands the text presents considerable difficulty.

6. the things of Esau] lit. how are they searched out, Esau; i. e. everything, people and property alike, that belongs to Esau. his hidden things] rather places; his treasure-houses and receptacles hewn in the secret places of the rocks, and inaccessible as he thought them. Comp. Jeremiah 49:10. Hidden treasures, R.V.

How are the things of Esau searched out! - literally, “How are Esau, out searched!” i. e., Esau, as a whole and in all its parts and in all its belongings, all its people and all its property, one and all.

In Obadiah 1:5-6 the prophet pictures the completeness of the destruction by a comparison of the calamity to come with familiar experiences. Thieves… robbers… grape-gatherers — R.V.