βSurely vain are all men by nature, who are ignorant of God, and could not out of the good things that are seen know him that is: neither by considering the works did they acknowledge the workmaster;β
Vain. Septuagint, βfoolish by nature, who are ignorant of God.β (Haydock) β In this and the three following chapters, the miseries of idolatry are described, to shew the value of wisdom and piety. (Calmet) β Without the knowledge of God, all is darkness, 1 Corinthians ii. 2. (St. Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho) β Is. He who is, must be the most proper name of God, Exodus iii. 14. Philosophers could perceive that all creatures had a beginning, and that there must be some first cause or God, whom some confessed, but did not honour as they ought, Romans i. (Worthington) β Could not. Inasmuch as they were vain. (Haydock)
βBut deemed either fire, or wind, or the swift air, or the circle of the stars, or the violent water, or the lights of heaven, to be the gods which govern the world.β
Fire. The chief god of the Persians. β Wind. Zephyrus, &c. β Air. Which is perhaps the wind. Socrates was accused of adoring nothing, but heaven and the clouds, (Aristot.[Aristotle?] nub.) as the Jews were. Nil prΔter nubes et CΕli numen adorant. (Juvenal xiv. 97.) β Stars. The zodiac, or pleiads. This species of idolatry was most ancient and general. β Water. The ocean, Neptune, &c. The Egyptians adored water above all, as the origin of other things. Hence they were punished first by it. (Philo, vit. Mor. 1.) β Moon. These were mostly the objects of worship, under the names of Baal, Astarte, (Calmet) the PhΕbus, or DianΔ of the Romans. (Haydock)
βFor by the greatness and beauty of the creatures proportionably the maker of them is seen.β
Thereby. God is announced by the heavens, and by all creatures, Psalm xviii. 1., and Romans i. 20. βWho can look up to heaven, and be so foolish as not to allow that there is a God?β (Cicero, Harusp.)
βBut miserable are they, and in dead things is their hope, who call them gods, which are the works of men's hands, gold and silver, to shew art in, and resemblances of beasts, or a stone good for nothing, the work of an ancient hand.β
Of men. The pagans in general took the material statue to be the residence of a god. (St. Augustine, City of God chap. vii. 6., and viii. 13.) β The more learned regarded the figures of the sun, &c., as his representations, while others supposed that Jupiter meant the heavens, Juno the air, Vulcan, fire, &c. β Hand. This is to abuse antiquity. The idol of the Arabs was a rough stone. In more polished nations, the workmanship of Praxiteles, Phidias, &c., was more regarded. (Calmet) β As no creature deserves to be esteemed a god, much less do the works of menβs hands. (Worthington)
βOr made it like some vile beast, laying it over with vermilion, and with paint colouring it red, and covering every spot therein;β
Vermilion. The ancients greatly esteemed this colour, (Calmet) and painted with it the statues of their gods on festival days, and the bodies of those who had the honour of a triumph. (Pliny, [Natural History?] xxxiii. 6.)
βAnd when he had made a convenient room for it, set it in a wall, and made it fast with iron:β
Iron. Baruch (vi. 26.) ridicules the same custom, and the other prophets intimate that the pagans took these statues to be really gods, otherwise their practice was no more blameable than that of the Jews, who fastened the cherubim to the ark with gold, and carried them. But the latter did not believe that the Deity resided personally in those images; no more than we do, that Christ is attached to his image on the cross. This distinguishes the behaviour of the faithful from that of pagans. (Calmet)