Lecture 20

^2:20^ Res. Behold, O Lord, and consider whom you have thus made a vintage of: shall women then eat their own fruit, their children of a span long? Shall the priest and the prophet be slain in the sanctuary of the Lord?

42. Here he presents the prayer.

And first, he calls forth mercy because of the cruelty of the punishment;

second, because of its universality, at the child and the old man lie without on the ground (Lam 2:21);

third, because of the impossibility of escape, at you have called as to a festival (Lam 2:22).

For the first, he does two things.

First, he gets his attention: whom have you thus made a vintage of, as if to say, “No one other than me”; or, “Who is there like as I am,” because I was chosen from among my fathers. The Lord has made a vintage of me in the day of his fierce anger (Lam 1:12).

Second, he presents the cruelty of the punishment against natural piety: shall women then eat their own fruit, as if to say, “Can you really allow this?” We read in Josephus and Hegesippus that this was done at the siege of the Romans, and in 2 Kings 5 and 7 at the siege of Samaria. The hands of the pitiful women have boiled their own children (Lam 4:10).

And also against good religion: shall the priest and the prophet be slain in the sanctuary of the Lord, as if to say, “Can you really allow them to be killed?” Begin at my sanctuary (Ezek 9:6).