Malachi 3:14

Ye have said, It is vain to serve God: and what profit is it that we have kept his ordinance, and that we have walked mournfully before the LORD of hosts?

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(14) Mournfully—i.e., with all outward signs of fasting. (Comp. Matthew 6:16.) The fasting referred to is not that of the Day of Atonement, but of voluntary fasts. We see here, in already a somewhat developed form, that disposition to attribute merit to observances of outward forms of religion for their own sake, without regard to the secret attitude of the heart, which reached such a pitch among the majority of the Jews in the time of our Lord, and especially among the Pharisees.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

3:13-18 Among the Jews at this time, some plainly discovered themselves to be children of the wicked one. The yoke of Christ is easy. But those who work wickedness, tempt God by presumptuous sins. Judge of things as they will appear when the doom of these proud sinners comes to be executed. Those that feared the Lord, spake kindly, for preserving and promoting mutual love, when sin thus abounded. They spake one to another, in the language of those that fear the Lord, and think on his name. As evil communications corrupt good minds and manners, so good communications confirm them. A book of remembrance was written before God. He will take care that his children perish not with those that believe not. They shall be vessels of mercy and honour, when the rest are made vessels of wrath and dishonour. The saints are God's jewels; they are dear to him. He will preserve them as his jewels, when the earth is burned up like dross. Those who now own God for theirs, he will then own for his. It is our duty to serve God with the disposition of children; and he will not have his children trained up in idleness; they must do him service from a principle of love. Even God's children stand in need of sparing mercy. All are righteous or wicked, such as serve God, or such as serve him not: all are going to heaven or to hell. We are often deceived in our opinions concerning both the one and the other; but at the bar of Christ, every man's character will be known. As to ourselves, we have need to think among which we shall have our lot; and, as to others, we must judge nothing before the time. But in the end all the world will confess that those alone were wise and happy, who served the Lord and trusted in Him.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Ye have said, It is vain to serve the God - o "as receiving no gain or reward for their service. This is the judgment of the world, whereby worldlings think pious, just, sincere, strict men, vain, i. e., especially when they see them impoverished, despised, oppressed, afflicted, because they know not the true goods of virtue and eternal glory, but measure all things by sight, sense and taste. Truly, if the righteous had not hope of another and better life, in vain would they afflict themselves, and bear the afflictions of others. For, as the Apostle says 1 Corinthians 15:19. 'If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.' But now, hoping for another blessed and eternal life for the slight tribulations of this, we are the happiest of all men."

And we have walked mournfully - o Again they take in their mouths the words of Psalmists, that they took the garb of mourners, going about mourning before God for their country's afflictions.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

14. what profit … that we … kept, &c.—(See on [1196]Mal 2:17). They here resume the same murmur against God. Job 21:14, 15; 22:17 describe a further stage of the same skeptical spirit, when the skeptic has actually ceased to keep God's service. Ps 73:1-14 describes the temptation to a like feeling in the saint when seeing the really godly suffer and the ungodly prosper in worldly goods now. The Jews here mistake utterly the nature of God's service, converting it into a mercenary bargain; they attended to outward observances, not from love to God, but in the hope of being well paid for in outward prosperity; when this was withheld, they charged God with being unjust, forgetting alike that God requires very different motives from theirs to accompany outward observances, and that God rewards even the true worshipper not so much in this life, as in the life to come.

his ordinance—literally, what He requires to be kept, "His observances."

walked mournfully—in mournful garb, sackcloth and ashes, the emblems of penitence; they forget Isa 58:3-8, where God, by showing what is true fasting, similarly rebukes those who then also said, Wherefore have we fasted and Thou seest not? &c. They mistook the outward show for real humiliation.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Ye; ye that are the children of forefathers who had this good land given to them, and ever made fruitful while they feared and obeyed their God; you that have been well rewarded for your obedience, or you priests who have tithes, sacrifices, offerings, and first-fruits given you for your services.

Have said; have thought first, and next have discoursed it; unthankful to your God, you have atheistlike maintained it in disputes, that

it is vain to serve God; all is lost labour, no profit to God nor any to yourselves; therefore better sit still and do nothing, than to no purpose.

What profit is it that we have kept his ordinance? while what they have before their eyes is the fruit of God’s goodness, and what they want is punishment of their not doing it better; whilst a very unsuitable observing the ordinances of God hath so much profit for you, dare you say there is no profit? Sottish atheists! who will not try what a more agreeable service would do.

And that we have walked mournfully: so the hypocrites and ungodly object against God, Isaiah 58:3; yet their dissembled mournings, as Ahab’s, had their reward, and infinitely better than they

Ye; ye that are the children of forefathers who had this good land given to them, and ever made fruitful while they feared and obeyed their God; you that have been well rewarded for your obedience, or you priests who have tithes, sacrifices, offerings, and first-fruits given you for your services.

Have said; have thought first, and next have discoursed it; unthankful to your God, you have atheistlike maintained it in disputes, that

it is vain to serve God; all is lost labour, no profit to God nor any to yourselves; therefore better sit still and do nothing, than to no purpose.

What profit is it that we have kept his ordinance? while what they have before their eyes is the fruit of God’s goodness, and what they want is punishment of their not doing it better; whilst a very unsuitable observing the ordinances of God hath so much profit for you, dare you say there is no profit? Sottish atheists! who will not try what a more agreeable service would do.

And that we have walked mournfully: so the hypocrites and ungodly object against God, Isaiah 58:3; yet their dissembled mournings, as Ahab’s, had their reward, and infinitely better than they

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Ye have said, it is vain to serve God,.... This they said in their hearts, if not with their lips, that it was a vain thing for a man to serve God; he got nothing by it; he had no reward for it; it fared no better with him than the wicked; nay, the wicked fared better than he; and therefore who would be a worshipper of God? see Job 21:15. Abarbinel understands this also with respect to God, who is worshipped; to whom worship, say these men, is no ways profitable, nor does he regard it; see Job 35:7 and therefore it is in vain to serve him, since neither he, nor we, are the better for it:

and what profit is it that we have kept his ordinance; or "his observation" (n); that is, have observed that which he commanded to be observed; this respects not any single and particular ordinance, but every ordinance of God: the Sadducees of those times seem designed, who denied the resurrection of the dead, and a future state of rewards and punishments, and so might well conclude it in vain to serve God:

and that we have walked mournfully before the Lord of hosts? or "in black" (o); which is the habit of mourners; see Psalm 38:6 with an humble spirit, as Jarchi interprets it; or with humiliation (or contrition) of spirit, as the Targum, which paraphrases the whole verse thus,

"ye have said, he gains nothing who worships before the Lord; and what mammon (or riches) do we gain because we have kept the observation of his word, and because we have walked in contrition of spirit before the Lord of hosts?''

Aben Ezra and Abarbinel seem to understand this last clause of their being afflicted and suffering for the sake of religion, and which they endured in vain, seeing they were not respected and rewarded for it; but the other sense is best, which represents them as sincere penitents, and humble worshippers of God in their own account, and yet were not taken notice of by him: it seems to describe the Pharisees, who disfigured their faces, and affected down looks and sorrowful countenances (p).

(n) "observationem ejus", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Drusius; "observantiam ejus", Cocceius. (o) "atrate", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator; so Stockius, p. 926; "pullati", Tigurine version; "atrati", Cocceius. (p) The word is used by Josephus ben Gorion for sincere walking, l. 6. c. 20. p. 612. Vid. Not. Breithaupt. in ib.; it is interpreted "humbly" by R. Sol. Urbin. Ohel Moed, fol. 102. 2.

Geneva Study Bible

Ye have said, It is vain to serve God: and what profit is it that we have kept his ordinance, and that we have walked mournfully before the LORD of hosts?

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

14. kept his ordinance] lit. observed his observance. Kept his charge, R.V.

It is the same tendency to regard mere outward observance as true religion, which earlier prophets had denounced (1 Samuel 15:22; Isaiah 58:1-4), and which culminated in the Pharisaism of New Testament times (John 18:28).

walked mournfully] With outward signs of mourning: “in mourning apparel”, R.V. as a sign of humiliation and contrition. Comp. Joel 2:13; Isaiah 58:5; Matthew 6:16-18.

There may possibly be a reference to the frequent national Fasts which were observed after the return from Babylon. See Zechariah 7:3; Zechariah 7:5; Zechariah 8:19.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 14. - It is vain. It brings no acknowledgment or reward. The Latin and Greek Versions have, "He is vain who serveth God." Have kept his ordinance (charge). Have done what he ordered. They are either wilfully deceiving themselves and others by pretending an obedience which they never really paid; or they think that the outward observance of certain legal requirements is all that is required. Some think that an interval of time separates this from the last section, and that meanwhile they had made some efforts at improvement, expecting, how. ever, immediate results in added blessings; and as these did not come as quickly as they hoped, they relapsed into their old distrust. Have walked mournfully; i.e. in mourning apparel, as if fasting and mourning for sin (Psalm 35:13, 14; Job 30:28). Septuagint, "Why went we as suppliants (ἱκέται)?" Before the Lord. Out of reverence and awe of Jehovah. They attributed a certain virtue to voluntary fasts, without any consideration of the spirit in which they were observed (see the reproof of such formal observances in Isaiah 58:4, etc.). Malachi 3:14

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The impatient murmuring of the nation. - Malachi 3:13. "Your words do violence to me, saith Jehovah; and ye say, What do we converse against Thee? Malachi 3:14. Ye say, It is vain to serve God; and what gain is it, that we have kept His guard, and have gone about in deep mourning before Jehovah of hosts? Malachi 3:15. And now we call the proud blessed: not only have the doers of wickedness been built up, but they have also tempted God and have been saved." After the Lord has disclosed to the people the cause of His withholding His blessing, He shows them still further, that their murmuring against Him is unjust, and that the coming day of judgment will bring to light the distinction between the wicked and those who fear God. חזק with על, to be strong over any one, does not mean to be harsh or burdensome, but to do violence to a person, to overpower him (cf. Exodus 12:33; 2 Samuel 24:4, etc.). The niphal nidbar has a reciprocal meaning, to converse with one another (cf. Ezekiel 33:30). The conversations which they carry on with one another take this direction, that it is useless to serve God, because the righteous have no advantage over sinners. For שׁמר משׁמרתּו see the comm. on Genesis 26:5. Hâlakh qedōrannı̄th, to go about dirty or black, either with their faces and clothes unwashed, or wrapped in black mourning costume (saq), is a sign of mourning, here of fasting, as mourning for sin (cf. Psalm 35:13-14; Psalm 38:7; Job 30:28; 1 Maccabees 3:48). מפּני יהוה, from awe of Jehovah. The fasting, and that in its external form, they bring into prominence as a special sign of their piety, as an act of penitence, through which they make reparation for certain sins against God, by which we are not to understand the fasting prescribed for the day of atonement, but voluntary fasting, which was regarded as a special sign of piety. What is reprehensible in the state of mind expressing itself in these words, is not so much the complaint that their piety brings them no gain (for such complaints were uttered even by believing souls in their hours of temptation; cf. Psalm 73:13), as the delusion that their merely outward worship, which was bad enough according to what has already been affirmed, is the genuine worship which God must acknowledge and reward. This disposition to attribute worth to the opus operatum of fasting it attacked even by Isaiah, in Isaiah 58:1-14; but after the captivity it continued to increase, until it reached its culminating point in Pharisaism. How thoroughly different the persons speaking here are from the believing souls under temptation, who also appeal to their righteousness when calling upon God in their trouble, is especially clear from their further words in Malachi 3:15. Because God does not reward their fasting with blessing and prosperity, they begin to call the proud sinners, who have happiness and success, blessed. ועתּה is the particle of inference. The participle מאשּׁרים has the force of a futurum instans (cf. Ewald, 306, d), denoting what men prepare to do. Zēdı̄m, the haughty or proud, are the heathen, as in Isaiah 13:11, who are called עשׂי רשׁעה in the following clause. The next two clauses are placed in a reciprocal relation to one another by gam ... gam (cf. Jeremiah 12:16-17; Exodus 1:21), and also, notwithstanding the fact that they have tempted God, are delivered when they fall into misfortune. Bâchan Elohim, to prove or test God, i.e., to call out His judgment through their wickedness.