But this thing I commanded them, saying: Hearken to my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people: and walk ye in all the way that I have commanded you, that it may be well with you.

“He has therefore abolished these things, that the new law of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is without the yoke of necessity, might have a human oblation. And again He says to them, "Did I command your fathers, when they went out from the land of Egypt, to offer unto Me burnt-offerings and sacrifices? But this rather I commanded them, Let no one of you cherish any evil in his heart against his neighbour, and love not an oath of falsehood." We ought therefore, being possessed of understanding, to perceive the gracious intention of our Father; for He speaks to us, desirous that we, not going astray like them, should ask how we may approach Him. To us, then, He declares, "A sacrifice [pleasing] to God is a broken spirit; a smell of sweet savour to the Lord is a heart that glorifieth Him that made it." We ought therefore, brethren, carefully to inquire concerning our salvation, lest the wicked one, having made his entrance by deceit, should hurl us forth from our [true] life.”

“In a manner most germane to this parable, He said by Jeremiah: "Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be my people; and ye shall walk in all my ways, which I have commanded you." This is the invitation of God. "But," says He, "they hearkened not, nor inclined their ear." This is the refusal of the people. "They departed, and walked every one in the imagination of their evil heart." "I have bought a field-and I have bought some oxen-and I have married a wife." And still He urges them: "I have sent unto you all my servants the prophets, rising early even before day-light." The Holy Spirit is here meant, the admonisher of the guests. "Yet my people hearkened not unto me, nor inclined their ear, but hardened their neck."”

“You are blessed who are delivered from the curse. Christ, the Son of God, by his coming has confirmed and completed the law but has taken away the additional precepts, although not all of them, yet at least the more grievous ones. He confirmed the former and abolished the latter, and he has again set the free will of humankind at liberty. He does not subject them to the penalty of a temporal death but gives laws to them according to another constitution. For this reason, he says, "If anyone will come after me, let him come." And again, "Will you also go away?" And besides, before his coming he refused the sacrifices of the people, while they frequently offered them, when they sinned against him and thought he was to be appeased by sacrifices but not by repentance.”

“Here he excludes confidence in sacrifices: and first he excludes concern for sacrifices, setting down the statement: "Add your burnt offerings to your victims"; as if to say: just as the greater part of the victims goes to your own use, so eat the burnt offerings for yourselves entirely, since I am not delighted by the consumption of flesh. Psalm 49: "Shall I eat the flesh of bulls, or drink the blood of goats?" And he gives the cause: "for I did not speak." For the Lord did not want this for his own sake, but so that through it he might call them back from idolatry. Hence before the worship of the calf, of which Exod. 33 speaks, no precepts about sacrifices were given. Psalm 39: "Sacrifice and oblation you did not desire; but ears you have perfected for me. Burnt offering and sin offering you did not require. Then I said: behold, I come." Second, he argues the disobedience in moral matters; and first he shows the fault; second, he threatens the punishment, at the place, "cut off your hair." Concerning the first, two things. First he proves the disobedience as it were by induction, showing them disobedient to the law, by setting down the law's precepts: "but this word I commanded" — from the beginning, as it were chiefly intended. "Hear my voice" — concerning the moral precepts. Ezech. 36: "You shall be to me a people, and I will be to you a God." And the contempt of the precept: "and they did not hear (...) and they turned backward," always adding sins afterward. Isa. 56: "All have turned aside to their own way, each one to his own avarice, from the greatest even to the last." He also shows them disobedient to the preceding prophets: "and I sent to you all the servants the prophets." 4 Kings 17: "The Lord testified in Israel and in Judah, by the hand of all the prophets and seers, saying: Turn back from your most evil ways, and keep my precepts and ceremonies, according to all the law which I commanded your fathers, and as I sent to you by the hand of my servants the prophets. Who did not hear, but hardened their neck, according to the neck of their fathers, who were unwilling to obey the Lord their God." He also foretells that they would not obey him. "And you shall speak (...) and they will not hear." Ezech. 3: "The house of Israel is unwilling to hear you, because they are unwilling to hear me: for indeed the whole house of Israel is of a hardened forehead and a hard heart." Isa. 65: "I called, and you did not answer; I spoke, and you did not hear, and you did evil in my eyes, and what I did not want, you chose." Second, he draws the conclusion: "and you shall say to them." Above, ch. 2: "In vain I struck your sons; they did not receive discipline." Faith, of the Lord. Romans 10: "With the heart one believes unto righteousness, but with the mouth confession is made unto salvation." Or fidelity toward one's neighbor. Prov. 20: "Who shall find a faithful man?"”

“But this thing commanded I them, saying,.... This was the sum and substance of what was then commanded, even obedience to the moral law; this was the main and principal thing enjoined, and to which the promise was annexed: obey my voice: the word of the Lord, his commands, the precepts of the decalogue; obedience to which was preferable to the sacrifices of the ceremonial law; see Sa1 15:22, wherefore it follows: and I will be your God, and ye shall be my people; the meaning is, that while they were obedient to him, he would protect them from their enemies, and continue them in their privileges and blessings, which he had bestowed upon them as his peculiar people: and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you; not only in some of them, but in all of them; not merely in the observance of legal sacrifices, but chiefly in the performance of moral actions; even in all the duties of religion, in whatsoever is required in the law, respecting God or man: that it may be well unto you; that they might continue in the land which was given them for an inheritance, and enjoy all the blessings promised to their obedience.”