Malachi 1:7
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By presenting defiled food on My altar. But you ask, ‘How have we defiled You?’ By saying that the table of the LORD is contemptible.
Commentaries
Excerpts gathered from published commentaries to ground the reading.
God's Love, and the Contempt of His NameMalachi 1:1-2:9 The Lord has shown love to Israel (Mal 1:2-5), but Israel refuses Him the gratitude which is due, since the priests despise His name by offering bad sacrifices, and thereby cherish the delusion that God cannot do without the sacrifices (Mal 1:6-14). The people are therefore punished with adversity, and the priesthood with desecration (Mal 2:1-9).
Open source ↗Thus prophet is sent first to convince and then to comfort, first to discover sin and to reprove for that and then to promise the coming of him who shall take away sin. And this method the blessed Spirit takes in dealing with souls, Joh 16:8. He first opens the wound and then applies the healing balm. God had provided (and one would think effectually) for the engaging of Israel to himself by providences and ordinances; but it seems, by the complaints here made of them, that they received the grace of God in both these in vain. I. They were very ungrateful to God for his favours to them, and rendered not again according to the benefit they received (Mal 1:1-5). II. They were very careless and remiss in the observance of his institutions; the priests especially were so, who were in a particular manner charged with them (Mal 1:6-14). And what shall we say of those whom neither providences nor ordinances work upon, and who affront God in those very things wherein they should honour him?
Open source ↗1:7 defiled the sacrifices?: Ritual uncleanness or contamination disqualified an object or person from being in the ceremonies of worship to the Lord. The defilement in this case resulted from ignoring the laws concerning acceptable animal sacrifices (Lev 22:17-25; Deut 15:21).
Open source ↗Original language
The Hebrew and Greek words behind this passage, with Strong's numbers — from openscriptures (CC BY-SA).
Cross-references
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“But you profane it when you say, ‘The table of the Lord is defiled, and as for its fruit, its food is contemptible.’
You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot partake in the table of the Lord and the table of demons too.
When you offer blind animals for sacrifice, is it not wrong? And when you present the lame and sick ones, is it not wrong? Try offering them to your governor! Would he be pleased with you or show you favor?” asks the LORD of Hosts.
No grain offering that you present to the LORD may be made with leaven, for you are not to burn any leaven or honey as an offering made by fire to the LORD.
There was an altar of wood three cubits high and two cubits square. Its corners, base, and sides were of wood. And the man told me, “This is the table that is before the LORD.”
They must be holy to their God and not profane the name of their God. Because they present to the LORD the offerings made by fire, the food of their God, they must be holy.
But if an animal has a defect, is lame or blind, or has any serious flaw, you must not sacrifice it to the LORD your God.