THEOSISJerome of Stridon
Thus declares the Lord God: Strike your hand and stomp your foot, and proclaim, Woe, for all the detestable iniquities of the house of Israel. The prophet is instructed to highlight the severity of their sins through gestures, movements, and words, illustrating the anguish of those who are horrified, astounded, and weeping. Just as we respond with both body and spirit when confronted with something extraordinary and shocking—splashing our hands, stomping our feet, and raising our voices in lamentation—so the prophet, perceiving with spiritual insight the impending judgments, speaks about the dreadful wickedness of the house of Israel in the following terms. Spiritually, we strike our hands when we renounce sinful actions.
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We stomp our feet when we refuse to follow the path of the unrighteous. We mourn and cry when we are discontented with the deeds we witness. This sorrow is encapsulated in the expression woe, which Aquila rendered as ἄ, ἄ, and Simmachus as σχετλίασον, meaning to weep or wail; while LXX and Theodotion offer εύ῀γε, a term more fitting for joy than for mourning. They will perish by sword, famine, and plague. The reason for lamentation is that the dwellers of the mountains, along with those who worship at altars and idols, will fall victim to the sword, starvation, and disease. Those who are misled by various illusions, frequently altering their beliefs and swayed by every doctrine, will meet their end by the sword and be divided into factions, abandoning the faith of the one true church. Furthermore, those who lack spiritual nourishment perish from hunger, oblivious to Him who declared, I am life (John 14:6). Moreover, an individual bound to specific or manifold vices cannot liberate themselves, much like one afflicted by a contagious disease.