I have loved you,
says the LORD.
Yet you say, How have you loved us? Was not Esau Jacob's brother?
says the LORD:
yet I loved Jacob,
All Commentaries on Malachi 1:2 Go To Malachi 1
Augustine of Hippo
AD 430
Furthermore, who would be so impiously foolish as to say that God cannot turn the evil wills of people—as he wills, when he wills and where he wills—toward the good? But when he acts, he acts through mercy; when he does not act, it is through justice. For “he has mercy on whom he wills, and whom he wills, he hardens.” Now when the apostle said this, he was commending grace, of which he had just spoken in connection with the twin children in Rebecca’s womb: “Before they had yet been born or had done anything good or bad, in order that the electing purpose of God might continue, it was said of them, ‘The elder shall serve the younger.’ ” Accordingly he refers to another prophetic witness, where it is written, “Jacob I loved, but Esau I have hated.” Then, realizing how what he said could disturb those whose understanding could not penetrate to this depth of grace, he adds, “What therefore shall we say to this? Is there unrighteousness in God? God forbid!” Yet it does seem unfair that, without any merit derived from good works or bad, God should love the one and hate the other. Now if the apostle had wished us to understand that there were future good deeds of the other—which God, of course, foreknew—he never would have said “not of good works” but rather “of future works.” Thus he would have solved the difficulty; or rather he would have left no difficulty to be solved. As it is, however, when he went on to exclaim, “God forbid!” he proceeds immediately to add (to prove that no unfairness in God is involved here), “For he says to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will show pity to whom I will show pity.’ ” Now who but a fool would think God unfair either when he imposes penal judgment on the deserving or when he shows mercy to the undeserving? Finally, the apostle concludes and says, “Therefore it is not a question of him who wills nor of him who runs but of God’s showing mercy.”
