(14) Thus saith the Lord.--The introduction of a new message from Jehovah, speaking through the prophet, is indicated by the usual formula.

Mine evil neighbours.--These were the neighbouring nations--Edomites, Moabites, Hagarenes--who rejoiced in the fall of Judah, and attacked her in her weakness (2Kings 24:2; Psalm 83:6-9; Psalm 137:7). In the midst of his burning indignation against the sins of his own people the prophet is still a patriot, and is yet more indignant at those who attack her. For them, too, there shall be a like chastisement (comp. Jeremiah 25:18-26), but not for them so signal a deliverance as that in store for Judah. They should be "plucked out" from their own land, Judah from the land of its exile.

Verse 14. - Here occurs a transition. The prophet comes forward with a denunciation in the name of Jehovah. All mine evil neighbors; the hostile, peoples, mentioned, in 2 Kings 24. My neighbors, because Jehovah "dwelleth in Zion." Pluck them out of their land; viz. by deportation into a foreign land. Judah and the neighboring nations shall share the same fate. This is indicated by the use of the same verb "to pluck out" in the next clause with reference to Judah (comp. 1 Kings 14:15, Hebrew). In the case of Judah, however, to be "plucked out" is a mercy as well as a judgment, considering who they are "out of" whose "midst" the Jews are "plucked."

12:14-17 The Lord would plead the cause of his people against their evil neighbours. Yet he would afterwards show mercy to those nations, when they should learn true religion. This seems to look forward to the times when the fulness of the Gentiles shall come in. Those who would have their lot with God's people, and a last end like theirs, must learn their ways, and walk in them.Thus saith the Lord against all mine evil neighbours,.... Or, "concerning" (h) them; the Egyptians, Philistines, Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Tyre, and Sidon; whom the Lord calls his "neighbours", because they were near the land of Canaan, where his people dwelt, to whom he vouchsafed his presence, and where the temple was in which he took up his residence; and his "evil" neighbours, because they often distressed and afflicted his people.

That touch the inheritance which I have caused my people Israel to inherit; meaning not only that they bordered on the land of Canaan, and so might be said to touch it, but that they did hurt unto it; in which sense the word touch is used, Psalm 105:15, the land of Canaan was an inheritance which was distributed by lot to the children of Israel, who were a people dear unto the Lord, as this shows; and therefore they that touched them, or their inheritance, as to do them any harm, touched the apple of his eye, and which he resented greatly, Zechariah 2:8.

Behold, I will pluck them out of their land; cause them to be carried captive into other lands, or be destroyed in their own; see Jeremiah chapters forty six through forty nine: and pluck out the house of Judah from among them; such of the Jews they had formerly carried captive, or who had fled to them upon the Chaldean invasion; these the Lord would cause to come forth from among them, and return them to their own land.

(h) "de omnibus", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius.