Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Two hands put to evil.

Herman Witsius has written:
And yet those very persons that are so foolish in that which is good, are most subtle and crafty in that which is evil, Jer. iv. 22. They commit evil by that art which is exactly conformable to the pattern of the infernal spirits. Emphatical is that of Micah on this head, chap. vii. 3. …both hands are upon evil, that they may do it well. They are not slothful in evil, but apply both hands, exert all their strength. And they take care to do it well, according to the rules of that satanical art, carefully observing all the contrivances of wickedness; nay, they have learned to frame and contrive it with so much art as to impose it on the incautious under the appearance of good.”

Nor is the will less corrupt; for, 1st. It is averse to all that is truly good, Job xxi. 14. “Therefore they say unto God, depart from us, for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways. And when the great things of the law are written to them, they are counted as a strange thing;” as of no very great moment, and what they have no concern with, Hos. viii. 12. And how can it be otherwise? For since by reason of their blindness, they do not discern the excellency of true virtue, but on the contrary find many things in the practice of it which are opposite to their unruly lusts, their mind is averse to it: “they hate the good,” Micah iii. 2.”

(Witsius, Herman. The Economy of the Covenants Between God and Man, Volume II, Kingsburg, CA: den Dulk Christian Foundation, 1990, p. 9)

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