(61) Give them unto thee for daughters.--The humiliation of Jerusalem must be so complete that she will gladly receive these once-despised enemies to the closest family relationship. We are not here to think of Sodom specifically, but (the concrete passing into the general) of that which Sodom represented, the heathen world at large. This shall be received with Jerusalem to the church of God; "but not by thy covenant." The covenant with Israel, however it may have been preceded by a "preaching of the Gospel" to Abraham (Galatians 3:8), was distinctly a covenant of works, under which neither Jew nor Gentile could attain salvation (see Rom. and Gal. throughout). Not, therefore, by this should the nations of the earth be given to Jerusalem as representing the Church.

Verse 61. - Then thou shalt remember thy ways, etc. The pardon which God gives is not, as men sometimes dream, a water of Lethe, blotting out the memory of the evil past. Ezekiel represents that memory as quickened to a new intensity in the very hour of restoration. The shame which it brings with it is necessary as the safeguard of the new blessedness. Thy sisters, thine elder and thy younger. It is significant that, as in the Revised Version, both the adjectives are now in the plural. What was possible for Sodom and Samaria was possible also, as for the cities more immediately connected with them, so also for other nations of the heathen world. They to should be admitted into fellowship, not now as alters, but as daughters, acknowledging, i.e., her superiority. The limitation which follows, not by thy covenant, asserts, as it were, the restored prerogative of Judah, much as St. Paul asserts it in Romans 9-11. Those who are within the covenant of Israel, including, as it does, those who are the heirs of the faith of Abraham as well as his children according to the flesh, are in a closer relation to him than others who share in what have been called (the phrase, perhaps, taking its origin from these very words) the "uncovenanted mercies" of God.

16:59-63 After a full warning of judgments, mercy is remembered, mercy is reserved. These closing verses are a precious promise, in part fulfilled at the return of the penitent and reformed Jews out of Babylon, but to have fuller accomplishment in gospel times. The Divine mercy should be powerful to melt our hearts into godly sorrow for sin. Nor will God ever leave the sinner to perish, who is humbled for his sins, and comes to trust in His mercy and grace through Jesus Christ; but will keep him by his power, through faith unto salvation.Then thou shalt remember thy ways, and be ashamed,.... When covenant grace is manifested and applied, it brings persons to a sense of their sins, and to an ingenuous acknowledgment of them, with shame and blushing; they remember their evil ways in which they have walked, and blush at the thoughts of what they have been guilty of; and how they have sinned against a God of love, grace, and mercy; and what vile ungrateful creatures they have been:

when thou shalt receive thy sisters, thine elder and thy younger; Samaria and Sodom, Ezekiel 16:46; the ten tribes, or Benjamin and Simeon, whose part was in Judah, as Ben Melech; rather the Gentiles, even of all nations, ancient and modern, great and small, where the Gospel should come, and such of them as are called and converted by it; these, according to this prophecy, should be received into the communion of the church, to participate of all the privileges and ordinances of it, under the Gospel dispensation. The passage respects the calling of the Gentiles, and the incorporating of them into the Gospel church state. The Syriac version renders it, "when I shall receive thy sisters", &c. which the Targum interprets of greater and lesser provinces:

and I will give them unto thee for daughters; to be nursed up by the church, through the ministry of the word and ordinances, where they have a place, and a name better than that of sons and daughters; become members of the church, and so daughters of Jerusalem, the mother of us all, Galatians 4:26; to the laws, rules, and ordinances of which they submit, and yield an obedience, as daughters to their mother. The Targum is,

"I will deliver them unto thee for obedience.''

The Septuagint renders it, "for edification"; to be built up on their, most holy faith:

but not by thy covenant: made with the Israelites at Sinai, which genders to bondage, and under which the Jewish church with her children were in bondage, Galatians 4:24; but by virtue of the covenant of grace made with Christ; one article of which is, "I will be their father, and they shall be my sons and daughters", 2 Corinthians 6:18; or not on condition of observing the rites and ceremonies of the law, under which the former covenant was administered, the Gentiles being freed from that, the ceremonial law being abrogated by Christ; or, not because thou hast kept the covenant made with thee, therefore I give thee those (for that thou hast broken), but of my own mere grace and favour, so Jarchi: or I will give daughters to thee, which are not of thy covenant, of thy law, so Kimchi; who are not of the same religion, meaning the Gentiles; and so the phrase is the same with that in John 10:16; "which are not of this fold". There is an ancient exposition of the Jews, mentioned by Jarchi, Kimchi, and Abarbinel, which renders it, "but not of that patrimony"; and explains it of the inheritance which God gave to Abraham between the pieces; as if the persons intended by those who are given for daughters did not belong thereunto.