Malachi 4:6

And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, &c. After the times of the Maccabees, to the times of Christ, the Jewish people were miserably divided among themselves, by discords, which broke out into civil wars, of which Josephus gives an account. And moreover, the different religious sects among them, especially those of the Sadducees and Pharisees, greatly distracted the people, and alienated and separated the nearest relations from each other. Now John the Baptist began to apply a remedy to these evils, by instilling the precepts of love and charity, and directing all to one and the same master, Christ: see Luke 3:11; Matthew 3:11; Mark 1:7; John 1:15. This seems to be the most probable interpretation of the words, taking them in the sense of our translation, and as they are understood by the LXX., and by St. Luke 1:17. But a more easy sense may be given of them by translating the Hebrew preposition על, not to, but with, in which sense it is often used, and as Kimchi, Noldius, and others render it, namely, He shall turn the hearts of the fathers with the children, and of the children with the fathers; that is, he shall do his utmost to produce a national reformation, to turn both fathers and children from their evil practices, and to make them all unanimously join in the great duties of repentance and amendment of life; to restore a true sense of religion, which was then dwindled into a mere form, and thereby to prepare the people for the reception of Christ, in order to prevent the utter excision denounced upon the land, as it follows, Lest I come and smite the earth with a curse. By the earth here, as frequently elsewhere, is meant the land of Judea, and the clause would be better rendered, Lest I come and smite the land, namely, of Judea, with utter destruction: for so the word חרם, here rendered curse, is often translated, as the learned reader may see by referring to Numbers 21:2; Deuteronomy 7:2; Deuteronomy 7:13; Deuteronomy 7:15; Joshua 6:21; Zechariah 14:11. So that the meaning is, Lest, when I come to execute judgment upon Judea, all the inhabitants of it should be utterly destroyed. By the preaching of John, and his directing the people to Christ, many were brought to repentance and reformation of life, and thereby escaped the common destruction of the nation. All, therefore, did not perish, but a remnant was saved, as St. Paul takes notice, Romans 9:27; Romans 9:29; Romans 11:5. Judea, however, remains a desolation, and Jerusalem a heap of ruins, both of them sad and perpetual monuments of God's displeasure against such as reject Christ and his salvation. The three remarkable predictions, therefore, contained in this last chapter of the ancient records of the divine will, like a multitude of others, which have come under our consideration in the course of these notes, have all been punctually fulfilled. The harbinger of the Messiah appeared at the time foretold, in the spirit and power of Elias; the Messiah himself was manifested as the Sun of righteousness, as soon as that messenger sent before his face had prepared his way; and the most signal vengeance was executed, as foretold, on all such as rejected him and his salvation. These remarkable predictions, therefore, added to all that went before, being evidently verified, are so many fresh proofs of the divine authority of the Holy Scriptures, of the truth of the Christian religion, of the certain accomplishment of all the promises and threatenings of the gospel of Christ, and of the absolute necessity of possessing the religion there delineated, and practising the duties there enjoined. This, indeed, is the design of all the prophecies, and even of all the books contained in the Old and New Testaments, and the principal use which ought to be made of them.

Thus, through the assistance of God, we are come to the conclusion of the writings of the prophets: for, from the time of Malachi to the time of the Messiah, for the space of near four hundred years, there was, as some of the prophets had foretold there should be, a famine of the words of the Lord; (see Amos 8:11;) and during this long course of time no prophet appeared in Israel, where there had been before a succession of them for a very long period of years. The divine providence, it is probable, as was intimated in the argument to this book, caused this long cessation of prophecy, this long famine of the word of the Lord in the land, in order to excite the greater expectation and a more fervent desire of the coming of the great prophet, the Christ of God; and to prepare men's minds for a new and different dispensation, in which, after the first establishment of it, there was no longer to be a succession of prophets; but the work of God in and among men, in order to their salvation, was to be carried on through and by the grace of the Lord Jesus, that great one, who had been foretold by the mouth of all the prophets; and by the fellowship of the Holy Ghost, or a Divine Spirit, enlightening and renewing men's minds, inspiring them with true wisdom, and communicating to them the divine nature, and forming them after the image of him that had created them. It has been observed by some, and not improperly, that whereas the last word of the Old Testament is a curse which threatens the earth, of our danger of which we must be made sensible, that we may welcome the gospel of Christ, which comes with a blessing; it is with a blessing, with the choicest of blessings, that the New Testament ends: and with it let us arm ourselves, or rather, let God arm us, against this curse. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with us all! Amen.

To God only wise be ascribed all the glory.