Malachi 2:12

The Lord will cut off the man that doeth this,.... That is guilty of such treachery, wickedness, and idolatry: or "to the man that doeth this" y; all that belong to him, his children and substance: it denotes the utter destruction, not of a single man and his family only, but of the whole Jewish nation and its polity, civil and ecclesiastical, as follows:

the master and the scholar out of the tabernacles of Jacob; the Targum paraphrases it,

"the son, and son's son, out of the cities of Jacob;''

agreeable to which is Kimchi's note,

"it is as if it was said, there shall not be left in his house one alive; that there shall not be in his house one that answers him, that calls by name.''

In the Hebrew text it is, "him that is awake, and him that answers" z; which the Talmudists a explain, the former of the wise men or masters, and the latter of the disciples of the wise men; to which sense our version agrees: but by "him that waketh or watcheth", according to Cocceius, is meant the civil magistrate, who watches for the good of the commonwealth, and so may design the elders and rulers of the people; and by him that "answereth", the prophet, who returns answers when he is consulted in things belonging to the law of God, and such were the scribes and lawyers.

And him that offereth an offering unto the Lord of hosts; the priests, that offered sacrifice for the people; so that hereby is threatened an entire destruction, both of the civil and ecclesiastical polity of the Jews, that there should be no prince, prophet, and priest among them; all should be removed out of the tents of Jacob, or cities of Israel; see Hosea 3:4.

y לאיש "viro", Drusius, Cocceius, Burkius, De Dieu; "filius et qui fecerit istud", Piscator. z ער וענה "vigilantem et respondentem", Montanus, Vatablus, Drusius, Grotius; "vigilantem et responsantem", Junius Tremellius "vigilem et respondentem", Burkius. a T. Bab. Sanhedrin, fol. 82. 1.