Mal 1:6-7 | JFB | STEP | 6. Turning from the people to the priests, Jehovah asks, whereas His love to the people was so great, where was their love towards Him? If the priests, as they profess, regard Him as their Father ( ) and Master, let them show the reality of their profession by love and reverential fear ( ). He addresses the priests because they ought to be leaders in piety to the rest of the people, whereas they are foremost in "despising His name." Wherein have we despised, &c.—The same captious spirit of self-satisfied insensibility as prompted their question ( ), "Wherein hast Thou loved us?" They are blind alike to God's love and their own guilt.

Malachi 1:6-7

6. Turning from the people to the priests, Jehovah asks, whereas His love to the people was so great, where was their love towards Him? If the priests, as they profess, regard Him as their Father (Isa 63:16) and Master, let them show the reality of their profession by love and reverential fear (Ex 20:12; Lu 6:46). He addresses the priests because they ought to be leaders in piety to the rest of the people, whereas they are foremost in "despising His name."

Wherein have we despised, &c.—The same captious spirit of self-satisfied insensibility as prompted their question (Mal 1:2), "Wherein hast Thou loved us?" They are blind alike to God's love and their own guilt.

7. ye offer, &c.—God's answer to their challenge (Mal 1:6), "Wherein have we despised?"

polluted bread—namely, blemished sacrifices (Mal 1:8, 13, 14; De 15:21). So "the bread of thy God" is used for "sacrifices to God" (Le 21:8).

polluted thee—that is, offered to thee "polluted bread."

table of the Lord—that is, the altar (Eze 41:22) (not the table of showbread). Just as the sacrificial flesh is called "bread."

contemptible— (Mal 1:12, 13). Ye sanction the niggardly and blemished offerings of the people on the altar, to gain favor with them. Darius, and probably his successors, had liberally supplied them with victims for sacrifice, yet they presented none but the worst. A cheap religion, costing little, is rejected by God, and so is worth nothing. It costs more than it is worth, for it is worth nothing, and so proves really dear. God despises not the widow's mite, but he does despise the miser's mite [MOORE].