And the pride of Israel testifieth to his face: and they do not return to the Lord their God, nor seek him for all this (amid all this). If with Keil and others
(1) we understand "the pride of Israel" to mean Jehovah the glory of Israel, and take the verb in the sense of "testify," the meaning will be that Jehovah bore witness to the face of Israel by the weakening and wasting of their kingdom, as portrayed in the preceding verse. We prefer
(2) to understand "the pride of Israel" in the souse of "the haughtiness" of Israel, and the verb in the sense of "being humbled," as at Hosea 5:5. The real meaning, then, is expressed in the following rendering: And the haughtiness of Israel shall be humbled to his face. This humiliation is the effect of the wasting mentioned in the preceding verse; while the evidence of their humiliation is specified in the succeeding verse by their resorting to Egypt and repairing to Assyria from a consciousness of their helplessness. This rendering is countenanced by the LXX; both here and at Hosea 5:5; while Rashi says, "The verb עגה has the meaning of "humiliation." For all this. This emphasizes the obstinate blindness and perverseness of Ephraim, when, amid all the calamities and miseries of the kingdom both within and without, they turned not to Jehovah to solicit help and deliverance, but concluded treaties or made alliances with foreign nations in hope of being lifted up out of their national impotence. On this Aben Ezra makes the judicious remark: "They turned not to Jehovah as paupers who have nothing more to give foreign nations that they may help them."