(22) Neither carry forth a burden.--Interpreted by the parallel passage in Nehemiah 13:15-22, the burden would be the baskets of fruit, vegetables, or fish which were brought in from the country by the villagers who came to the Temple services, and the wares of the city which were taken to the gates to be sold in turn to them. The Sabbath was observed after a fashion, but, as Sunday has been for many centuries and in many parts of Christendom, it was turned into a market-day, and so, though men abstained probably from manual labour, the quiet sanctity which of right belonged to it was lost. Passages like Isaiah 56:2-6; Isaiah 58:13 show that the evil was one of some standing, and the practice of the time of Jehoiakim was not likely to be more rigorous than it had been in the time of Isaiah, or was, at a later period, after the return from the Captivity.
17:19-27 The prophet was to lay before the rulers and the people of Judah, the command to keep holy the sabbath day. Let them strictly observe the fourth command. If they obeyed this word, their prosperity should be restored. It is a day of rest, and must not be made a day of labour, unless in cases of necessity. Take heed, watch against the profanation of the sabbath. Let not the soul be burdened with the cares of this world on sabbath days. The streams of religion run deep or shallow, according as the banks of the sabbath are kept up or neglected. The degree of strictness with which this ordinance is observed, or the neglect shown towards it, is a good test to find the state of spiritual religion in any land. Let all; by their own example, by attention to their families, strive to check this evil, that national prosperity may be preserved, and, above all, that souls may be saved.
Neither carry forth a burden out of your houses on the sabbath day,.... Not of dirt and soil only, as some restrain the sense; but of any ware or merchandise, in order to be sold in the city or elsewhere:
neither do ye any work; any servile work, any kind of manufacture, either within doors or without; or exercise any kind of trade, or barter and merchandise, or do any sort of worldly business; nothing but what was of mere necessity, for the preservation of life; see Exodus 20:10;
but hallow ye the sabbath day; or, "sanctify it" (b); by separating it from all worldly business, and devoting it to the worship of God in public and private, spending it wholly in acts of religion and piety:
as I commanded your fathers; not Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; but those that came out of Egypt, to whom, and to their posterity after them, this commandment was enjoined, Exodus 20:8; so that this was not a novel injunction, but what was commanded from the beginning of their civil and church state; from the time of their coming out of Egypt, and becoming a separate people and nation, under a theocracy, or the government of God himself; being chosen and set apart to be a special, peculiar, and holy people to himself, of which the sanctification of the sabbath was a sign; and was to be observed unto the Messiah's coming, the sum and substance of it, Colossians 2:16.
neither do ye any work; any servile work, any kind of manufacture, either within doors or without; or exercise any kind of trade, or barter and merchandise, or do any sort of worldly business; nothing but what was of mere necessity, for the preservation of life; see Exodus 20:10;
but hallow ye the sabbath day; or, "sanctify it" (b); by separating it from all worldly business, and devoting it to the worship of God in public and private, spending it wholly in acts of religion and piety:
as I commanded your fathers; not Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; but those that came out of Egypt, to whom, and to their posterity after them, this commandment was enjoined, Exodus 20:8; so that this was not a novel injunction, but what was commanded from the beginning of their civil and church state; from the time of their coming out of Egypt, and becoming a separate people and nation, under a theocracy, or the government of God himself; being chosen and set apart to be a special, peculiar, and holy people to himself, of which the sanctification of the sabbath was a sign; and was to be observed unto the Messiah's coming, the sum and substance of it, Colossians 2:16.
(b) "sanctificate", Cocceius, Schmidt.