everlasting covenant

Scott · #1 (**permalink**) 02-21-2007, 10:05 AM

Isa. 24:5 reads: "The earth is defiled by its people; they have disobeyed the laws, violated the statutes and broken the everlasting covenant."

What covenant does this refer to?

***Contra_Mundum*** · #2 (**permalink**) 02-21-2007, 11:54 AM

I don't want to seem more sure than I am, but it seems to me as if this passage is simply refering in a poetic parallelism--a triad really--to the will of God. "Laws," "statutes," "covenant"--the three together indicate the total expression of the will of God.

In this case, according to Alexander, we see that if Israel, the people of God, be judged severely for their violations of all these things specially, all the more should not the rest of the nations of the whole earth be brought to the same bar of holy justice?

If a general reference not be accaptable, then we are left with proposing the Covenant of Works as a specific arrangement. The problem I see with that suggestion is that the CoW is improperly referenced then as an "everlasting" or "eternal" covenant.

**armourbearer** · #3 (**permalink**) 02-21-2007, 04:16 PM

Bruce, well done in pointing out the paralelism. What it shows is that "covenant" is not always the equivalent of "promise" in OT usage. I would not regard this as a reference to the covenant of works per se; however, the text is best understood on the supposition of a covenant of works.

I cannot see any difficulty in referring to the first covenant as everlasting. Those who have not been saved by the covenant of grace are condemned by the covenant of works. As may be illustrated by the text, the people of the earth are cursed under a broken covenant. Blessings!