_Calvin_ remarks: "In order the more strongly to impress upon the hearts of men the benefits of Christ's death, the Prophet shews how necessary is that healing which was mentioned before. There is herd an elegant antithesis; for, in ourselves we are scattered, but, in Christ collected; by nature we go astray and are carried headlong to destruction,--in Christ we find the way in which we are led to the gate of salvation; our iniquities cover and oppress us,--but they are transferred to Christ by whom we are unburdened."--_All we_--in the first instance, members of the covenant-people,--not, however, as contrasted with the rest of mankind, but as partaking in the general human destiny.--_We have turned every one to his own way_; we walked through life solitary, forsaken, miserable, separated from God and the good Shepherd, and deprived of His pastoral care. According to _Hofmann_, the going astray designates the _liability_ to punishment, but not the misery of the speakers; and the words also: "We have turned," &c., mean, according to him, that they chose their own ways, but not that they walked sorrowful or miserable. But the ordinary use of the image militates against that view. In Ps. cxix. 176: "I go astray like a lost sheep, seek thy servant," the going astray is a figurative designation of being destitute of salvation. The misery of the condition is indicated by the image of the scattered flock, also in 1 Kings xxii. 17: "I saw all Israel scattered upon the hills as sheep that have not a shepherd." _Michaelis_ pertinently remarks: "Nothing is so miserable as sheep without a shepherd,--a thing which Scripture so often repeats, Num. xxvii. 17," &c. As a commentary upon our passage, Ezek. xxxiv. 4-6 may serve; [Pg 287] and according to that passage we shall be compelled to think of their being destitute of the care of a shepherd: "And they are scattered, because there is no Shepherd; and they become meat to all the beasts of the field. My sheep wander on all the mountains, and on every high hill, and over the whole land my sheep are scattered, and there is none that careth for them, or seeketh them." The point of comparison is very distinctly stated in Matt. ix. 36 also: ἰδὼν δὲ τοὺς ὄχλους ἐσπλαγχνίσθη περὶ αὐτῶν, ὅτι ἦσαν ἐσκυλμένοι καὶ ἐῤῥιμένοι ὡσεὶ πρόβατα μὴ ἔχοντα ποιμένα. Without doubt, turning to one's own ways is sinful, comp. chap. lvi. 11; but here it is not so much the aspect of sin, as that of misery, which is noticed. As the chief reason of the sheep's wandering and going astray, the bad condition of the shepherd must be considered, comp. Jer. l. 6: "Perishing sheep were my people; their shepherds led them astray," John x. 8: πάντες ὅσοι πρὸ ἐμοῦ ἦλθον, κλέπται εἰσὶ καὶ λῃσταί--פגע with ב signifies "to hit;" hence _Hiphil_, "to cause to hit." The iniquities of the whole community _hit_ the Servant of God in their punishments; but according to the biblical view, their punishments can come upon Him