Calvin seems to have overlooked [עליכם], “on your account.” The verse is— Therefore, on your account, withheld have the heavens from dew, And the earth has withheld its produce. The verb [כלא], to restrain, to keep back, to withhold, is used here twice, and in the first line in an intransitive sense, and in the second in a transitive sense, as it is often the case in other languages, when the same verb is both neuter and active. The 11th verse is passed by without any particular remarks. The word [חרב] is rendered “Siccitas—drought,” as Jerome does, and also our version, as well as Newcome and Henderson; but Grotius and also Marckius very justly observe, that it means here “waste,” or “desolation,” it being the same word as is applied to God’s house in verse 9. They left his house a waste; by a just retribution he had brought or called for a waste on the land, etc. The contrast is so evident that it cannot be denied. The ideal meanings of the word is to be waste or desolate: it is then applied to various things which produce desolation, the sword, drought, pestilence, etc.; but it is used here in its primary sense, and the contrast is very striking: “My house has been left waste; I have caused a waste to come upon every thing else.” The verse may be thus rendered— And I have called for a waste On the land and on the mountains, And on the corn and on the wine and on the oil, And on whatever the ground produces, And on man and on the cattle, And on all the labor of the hands. —Ed.