Deliverance - Or, "remnant," as in Ezra 9:8.

Hast punished us less than our iniquities - Great, numerous, and oppressive as our calamities have been, yet merely as temporal punishments, they have been much less than our provocations have deserved.

And after all that is come upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great trespass,.... As famine, sword, pestilence, and captivity, for their idolatries and other heinous sins:

seeing that our God hast punished us less than our iniquities deserve; for they deserved eternal punishment, whereas it was temporal punishment that was inflicted, and this moderate, and now stopped; the sense is, according to Aben Ezra,"thou hast refrained from writing some of our sins in the book of remembrance, and thou hast let them down below in the earth, according to the sense of thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea;''but Jarchi better,"thou hast refrained thyself from exacting of us all our sins, and hast exacted of us beneath our sins (or less than they deserve), and hast not taken vengeance on us according to all our sins:"

and hast given us such deliverance as this; from captivity, which they now enjoyed.

And after all, continues Ezra, taking up again the אחרי־זאת of Ezra 9:10, - "after all that is come upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great trespass - yea, Thou our God has spared us more than our iniquity deserved, and hast given us this escaped remnant - can we again break Thy commandments, and join in affinity with the people of these abominations? Wilt Thou not be angry with us even to extirpation, so that no residue and no escaped remnant should be left?" The premiss in Ezra 9:13 is followed in Ezra 9:14 by the conclusion in the form of a question, while the second clause of Ezra 9:13 is an explanatory parenthesis. Bertheau construes the passage otherwise. He finds the continuation of the sentence: and after all this ... in the words וגו אתּה כּי, which, calmly spoken, would read: Thou, O God, hast not wholly destroyed us, but hast preserved to us an escaped remnant; while instead of such a continuation we have an exclamation of grateful wonder, emphatically introduced by כּי in the sense of כּי אמנם. With this construction of the clauses, however, no advance is made, and Ezra, in this prayer, does but repeat what he had already said, Ezra 9:8 and Ezra 9:9; although the introductory אהרי leads us to expect a new thought to close the confession. Then, too, the logical connection between the question Ezra 9:14 and what precedes it would be wanting, i.e., a foundation of fact for the question Ezra 9:14. Bertheau remarks on Ezra 9:14, that the question: should we return to break (i.e., break again) the commands of God? is an antithesis to the exclamation. But neither does this question, to judge by its matter, stand in contrast to the exclamation, nor is any such contrast indicated by its form. The discourse advances in regular progression only when Ezra 9:14 forms the conclusion arrived at from Ezra 9:13, and the thought in the premiss (13a) is limited by the thoughts introduced with כּי. What had come upon Israel for their sins was, according to Ezra 9:7, deliverance into the hand of heathen kings, to the sword, to captivity, etc. God had not, however, merely chastened and punished His people for their sins, He had also extended mercy to them, Ezra 9:8, etc. This, therefore, is also mentioned by Ezra in Ezra 9:13, to justify, or rather to limit, the כּל in כּל־הבּא. The כּי is properly confirmatory: for Thou, our God, hast indeed punished us, but not in such measure as our sins had deserved; and receives through the tenor of the clause the adversative meaning of imo, yea (comp. Ewald, 330, b). למטּה מ חשׂכתּ, Thou hast checked, hast stopped, beneath our iniquities. חשׂך is not used intransitively, but actively; the missing object must be supplied from the context: Thou hast withheld that, all of which should have come upon us, i.e., the punishment we deserved, or, as older expositors completed the sense, iram tuam. מעוננוּ למטּה, infra delicta nostra, i.e., Thou hast punished us less than our iniquities deserved. For their iniquities they had merited extirpation; but God had given them a rescued remnant. כּזאת, as this, viz., this which exists in the community now returned from Babylon to Judaea. This is the circumstance which justifies the question: should we, or can we, again (נשׁוּב is used adverbially) break Thy commandments, and become related by marriage? (חתחתּן like Deuteronomy 7:3.) התּעבות עמּי, people who live in abominations. The answer to this question is found in the subsequent question: will He not - if, after the sparing mercy we have experienced, we again transgress the commands of God - by angry with us till He have consumed us? כּלּה עד (comp. 2 Kings 13:17, 2 Kings 13:19) is strengthened by the addition: so that there will be no remnant and no escaping. The question introduced by הלוא is an expression of certain assurance: He will most certainly consume us.

And after all that is come upon us for our evil deeds, and for our great trespass, seeing that thou our God hast punished us less than our {g} iniquities deserve, and hast given us such deliverance as this;

(g) Has not utterly cast us down and destroyed us for our sins, De 28:13.

hast punished...: Heb. hast withheld beneath our iniquities

9:5-15 The sacrifice, especially the evening sacrifice, was a type of the blessed Lamb of God, who in the evening of the world, was to take away sin by the sacrifice of himself. Ezra's address is a penitent confession of sin, the sin of his people. But let this be the comfort of true penitents, that though their sins reach to the heavens, God's mercy is in the heavens. Ezra, speaking of sin, speaks as one much ashamed. Holy shame is as necessary in true repentance as holy sorrow. Ezra speaks as much amazed. The discoveries of guilt cause amazement; the more we think of sin, the worse it looks. Say, God be merciful to me sinner. Ezra speaks as one much afraid. There is not a surer or saddler presage of ruin, than turning to sin, after great judgments, and great deliverances. Every one in the church of God, has to wonder that he has not wearied out the Lord's patience, and brought destruction upon himself. What then must be the case of the ungodly? But though the true penitent has nothing to plead in his own behalf, the heavenly Advocate pleads most powerfully for him.