4134 — The Earth Defiled, and Why?
By Editor
Please explain Isa. 24:5. "The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, and broken the everlasting covenant." To our mind, it seems to be a general statement of universal transgression. If we wish to particularize, we could say that the laws had reference to God's moral law; the ordinance would certainly have reference to baptism; and the covenant, the new covenant in our Lord Jesus Christ. The American Revised Version, which is more uniform in its rendering, has, "The earth also is polluted under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, violated the statutes, broken the everlasting covenant." Rotherham's emphatic translation renders, "They have set aside laws; gone beyond statute, broken an age-abiding covenant." Spurrell renders: "They have transgressed the law, they have changed the decree; they have broken the everlasting covenant." Bishop Lowth renders: "They have transgressed the law, they have changed the decree, they have broken the everlasting covenant," and declares in a note that "the law" should be singular. The Septuagint reads: "They have transgressed the law, and changed the ordinances, from the everlasting covenant." That is, the ordinance connected with the covenant, which would include not only the matter of baptism, but also that of the Lord's supper. Boothroyd also has, "They have transgressed the law, they have changed the ordinances, they have broken the everlasting covenant." Let the reader get the picture of the prophet, and he will get a better idea of what he means. Let him read the context, and he sees a whole world in transgression of everything that is good and sacred.—'The earth mourneth and fadeth away, the world languisheth and fadeth away, the haughty people of the earth do languish. The earth also is defiled under the inhabitants thereof; because they have transgressed the laws, changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore hath the curse devoured the earth, and they that dwell therein are desolate.' The same picture is presented in Isa. 59:13, 14: 'In transgressing and lying against the Lord, and departing away from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood. And judgment is turned away backward, and justice standeth afar off: for truth is fallen in the street, and equity can not enter.' There is not a law of God but that is transgressed, not an ordinance of God but that apostasy has sought to change, and every phase of His great, new everlasting covenant has been broken. Those who try to make technical applications of these great, broad, general statements, merely confuse and do not help.