3:2
(Version 2.) Lift up your eyes and see where you have not fallen. On the roads you were sitting, waiting for them like a robber in the wilderness (or like a deserted raven). For it is written in Hebrew, Arabic, and can also mean Arabs, that this people, devoted to robbery, still raids the borders of Palestine today, and they besiege the roads for those descending from Jerusalem to Jericho: of which the Lord also mentions in the Gospel (Luke 10). So lift up your eyes, O Jerusalem, and look around, and see where you are not laid low by fornication. For just as thieves are accustomed to lay traps for travelers in the evening and in deserted places, so you, sitting by the brothel of Proverbs, were sitting in the streets in the evening, in order to destroy the souls of those who commit fornication. Therefore, the whole land is polluted with your fornications. And significantly, next to these who promise to abandon heretical errors, it is commanded that they lift their eyes straight ahead. For unless they begin to see straight, they cannot condemn their former wickedness.
3:2-3
(Verse 2, 3.) And you have polluted (or killed) the land with your fornications, and in your evils (Alternative: in malice): therefore the drops of rain have been withheld, and the late rain has not come (or you have had many shepherds to stumble). The land has been killed (or polluted), because of the killing of those who perished in idolatrous fornication. Hence the blessing of all things has been taken away, so that they would suffer the drought of the word of God. Whether they had shepherds through whom they offended God, so that those who should have been teachers, to prevent others from error, became authors of impiety.
The forehead of a prostitute has become yours, and you were not ashamed. LXX: The appearance of a prostitute has become yours: you have become without shame towards everyone. Because above (To chapter II, 35) he had said: I have not sinned, and yet he had sinned more by denying his own crimes: therefore now he accuses [you] as if [you were] a shameless and excessively impudent woman: so that [you] do not carry [yourself] with a shameless expression only towards one or two, but [you] are not ashamed before anyone. Let us use this language against the assembly of heretics, who boast in their errors.
3:4-5
(Verse 4, 5.) Therefore, at least from now on, call me, my Father, you are the leader of my virginity: will you be angry forever, or will you persist until the end? Let the heretics be ashamed who do not want to convert to better things, nor return to their Father and Creator, and let them hear: At least from now on, call me, my Father, you are the leader of my virginity. He himself embraces your soul with his affection, and teaches how one should pray and repent. However, the more merciful he who shows the way to salvation after fornication, the more wretched the prostitute who does not want to receive health after wounds.
Behold, you have spoken, and you have done evil, and you have been able. For words of repentance, with words of pride you blasphemed: and you fulfilled your evil intention, and you showed your strength against a man, so that you could do what you discussed in speech.
3:6-10
(Verse 6 and following) And the Lord said to me in the days of King Josiah: Have you seen what the adulteress Israel has done? She went upon every high hill and under every leafy tree and committed adultery there. And I said, after she had done all these things: Return to me, but she did not return. And her treacherous sister Judah saw that I had dismissed the adulteress Israel and had given her a bill of divorce. But her treacherous sister Judah did not fear, but she also went and committed adultery. She defiled the land with her adulterous acts and committed adultery with stone and wood. And in all this, her treacherous sister Judah did not return to me with her whole heart, but in falsehood, says the Lord. The torments of some are the remedies of others. And when a murderer is punished, he receives indeed what he has done, but others are deterred from the crime. Therefore, when the ten tribes, which were called Israel, were captured by the Assyrians and taken to Media, the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin, which should have feared similar things and turned their whole minds towards God, overcame the crimes of the ten tribes. And they followed idols to such an extent that they placed a statue of Baal in the Temple of God, which is called an idol by Ezekiel, set up for zeal and emulation of the Lord. But it speaks under the figure of two sisters, because from one are generated Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, by the stock, and the former is called the adversary, the latter the rebellious one. For the former completely turned away from God, immediately worshipping golden calves in Dan and Bethel. But the latter, in whose possession was the Temple and the true religion of God, gradually departed from the Lord (3 Kings 12). And for this reason, she is called the rebellious one. According to the spiritual interpretation, prophecy about heretics is this: those who, thinking themselves wise in heretical cunning, ascend the mind of pride with knowledge of a false name; and, defiled by the pleasures of this flesh, expose their fornication under every leafy and pleasant tree. When they are delivered to the devil for the destruction of the flesh, it often happens that the house of Judah, that is, the confession and true faith, is not at all frightened by their example but commits much greater evils. And they contaminate the land of the Church with the ease of their fornication, committing adultery with stone and wood, following the teachings that are against God. But if an ecclesiastical man wishes to correct someone who has gone astray, and to cut away the rotten flesh, and to bring back to repentance those who have followed falsehood: and nonetheless they continue to adhere to the ancient error under the guise of Ecclesiastical truth, it can be said of them: In all these things, her treacherous sister Judah has not turned back to me with her whole heart, but in deceit. But this prophecy was fulfilled during the time of Josiah, a righteous king, under whom Jeremiah began to prophesy.
3:11
(Verse 11.) And the Lord said to me: He has justified his soul, the one who turned away from Israel, by the comparison of the one who acted treacherously in Judah. Israel is more just, he said, in comparison to Judah: because she perished immediately in the beginning, while the other could be corrected by her sufferings. Let us observe that the new heresy is compared to the old, in which Israel is said to be justified in comparison to Judah. And it is not surprising that the name of justice is attributed to one sister of a nation, when even Sodom receives the name of justice in comparison to Jerusalem, as the Lord says through Ezekiel: Sodom has been justified by you (Ezek. 16:55): and the tax collector becomes just by comparison to the Pharisee (Luke 18).
3:12-13
(Verse 12 onwards) Go, and cry out (or read) these words against the North, and say: Return, O backsliding Israel, declares the Lord, and I will not turn away (or strengthen) my face from you (or against you), for I am holy (or merciful), declares the Lord, and I will not be angry forever. However, know your iniquity, for you have transgressed against the Lord your God (or acted wickedly), and have scattered (or poured out) your ways to strangers under every green tree, and have not listened to my voice, says the Lord. The Hebrew word Carath () signifies 'call, shout, and read'. Hence it was translated by Aquila and Symmachus as 'shout: read the Septuagint and Theodotion'. However, it is directed towards the North, against Babylon and the Assyrians, to the twelve tribes: and their return is preached. And I will not turn my face away from you, he says; or I will not set my face against you, so that I will not receive you with the severity of judgment, but with the countenance of mercy. For I am holy and merciful, so that I may not remember your iniquities anymore, nor recall that you have departed from the Lord and that you have delighted in idols for him, and that you have committed fornication under every shady and leafy tree. Indeed, this can be said about heretics and those negligent in the Church, who are daily called to repentance by ecclesiastical men: and it can properly be applied to them, 'And you did not hear my voice.' But every heretic dwells in the North, and has lost the heat of faith, nor can he hear that of the Apostle: fervent in spirit (Rom. XII, 11). And because he has given himself over to pleasures, he has departed from the Lord, and has scattered his ways with alien doctrines, and has followed pleasure. For no heresy is constructed except for the sake of gluttony and the belly, so as to seduce burdened women with sins, always learning and never coming to the knowledge of truth (II Tim. III), concerning whom it is truly said: who devour my people like bread (Psal. XIII, 8): and those whom Christ points out, devouring the houses of widows (Matth. XII). And when I have mercy on you, do not think that it is just: but remember always your iniquity, and know that you have fornicated against the Lord, and lower the proud neck, so that as you have offended the Lord through arrogance, you may please Him through humility. But what we said above, 'And I will not set My face upon you,' fits with that prophetic saying: 'Turn away your face from my sins, and blot out all of my iniquities.' (Psalm 50:11).
3:14-16
(V. 14 seqq.) Turn to me, O sons, returning (or wandering and straying), says the Lord: for I am your husband (or master), and I will take you, one from a city, and two from a family, and bring you to Zion, and I will give you shepherds according to my heart, and they will feed you with knowledge and doctrine. And when you have increased and multiplied in the land, in those days, says the Lord, they will no longer say, the ark of the covenant (or testament) of the Lord: neither will it come to mind, nor will they remember it, nor will it be visited, nor made anymore. The Jews think that this was fulfilled after the return from Babylon under the rule of Cyrus, king of Persia, and to Zerubbabel, son of Shealtiel (Isaiah 1). Even if not all returned, this is meant to signify: let one be taken from the city and two from the clan. But it is better understood in the coming of Christ, when the remnant was saved, as the Apostle says and explains: Unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us seed, we would have been like Sodom and similar to Gomorrah (Romans 9:29); then they were brought into Zion, about which it is written: Glorious things are said of you, O city of God (Psalm 87:2). And there were given shepherds according to his heart, the apostles and apostolic men, and they feed a multitude of believers, not in Jewish ceremonies, but in the knowledge of Christ and doctrine, and by preaching the Gospel spread throughout the whole world, they will not have confidence in the Ark of the Lord, which was the guardian of the Mosaic law, but they themselves will be the temple of God: nor will they follow the wandering Nazarenes, serving abolished sacrifices, but they will follow a spiritual worship. But others interpret this as referring to the end times, when with the coming in of the fullness of the Gentiles, all Israel will be saved (Rom. 11).
3:17
(Verse 17) In that time they shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Lord, and all nations shall gather unto it in the name of the Lord, in Jerusalem, and they shall not walk after the stubbornness of their wicked heart. The Lord shall not sit upon the ark of the Covenant and Cherubim, as was previously said to that people: You who sit upon the Cherubim, manifest (Psalm 79:2): but all who truly believe with perfect mind, shall be the throne of God. Or certainly, it is better understood as the whole Church: when all nations gather together in the name of the Lord in Jerusalem, where the vision of peace is found; and they shall not walk after the stubbornness of their wicked heart, to do what they desire, nor follow their own errors; but they shall say with the Prophet: My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me (Psalm 63:9).
3:18
(Verse 18.) In those days, the house of Judah shall go to the house of Israel, and they shall come together from the land of the North to the land that I gave to your fathers. This is fulfilled specifically in the coming of Christ, when the twelve tribes believed in the Gospel together, abandoning the land of the North, the harshest cold, and leaving behind the dominion of the devil. They then received the promised land, which had been promised to their fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I recently edited a small book about the promised land.
3:19
(Verse 19) But I said: How shall I put you among the children, and give you a desirable land, an excellent heritage of the armies of the nations? And I said, you shall call me father, and you shall not cease to follow me. For the excellent heritage of the armies of the nations, which the Seventy translated, Theodotion more significantly translated as the renowned heritage of the strongest nations, signifying Christ, who is the leader and Lord of all nations, to his name and the belief in his passion. He himself said to Israel: 'You shall call me Father.' And: 'Whoever believes in me, believes in the Father' (John II, 19). He himself promised: 'I will make you into sons: in the number, namely, of my sons, who have believed in me from the people of the nations; and to whom I have given the desirable land.' For as many as received him, he gave them the power to become sons of God (John I).
3:20
(Verse 20) But as a woman may despise her lover, so the house of Israel has despised Me, says the Lord. The voice of Christ is near the people of Judah, to whom He said: I will make you as sons, and I will give you a desirable land. And you shall call Me Father, and you shall not cease to go after Me. Just as a woman, he says, despises not her husband, but her lover, if she has once been united with him, seeing him serving her lust, and the law of nature changed in her, by which she was once subject to her husband, with the Lord saying: And her conversion shall be to you. So the house of Israel, that is, the people of Judah, has despised the Lord the Savior to their own destruction.
3:21-22