A people that provoketh me to anger continually to my face; that sacrificeth in {d} gardens, and burneth incense upon altars of {e} brick;

(d) Which were dedicated to idols.

(e) Meaning their altars, which he thus named by contempt.

Wesley's Notes

65:3 To my face - With the utmost impudence, not taking notice of God's omnipresence, and omniscience. In gardens, and c. - Directly contrary to the divine rule.

King James Translators' Notes

upon...: Heb. upon bricks

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

3. continually-answering to "all the day" (Isa 65:2). God was continually inviting them, and they continually offending Him (De 32:21).

to my face-They made no attempt to hide their sin (Isa 3:9). Compare "before Me" (Ex 20:3).

in gardens-(See on [870]Isa 1:29; Isa 66:17; Le 17:5).

altars of brick-Hebrew, "bricks." God had commanded His altars to be of unhewn stone (Ex 20:25). This was in order to separate them, even in external respects, from idolaters; also, as all chiselling was forbidden, they could not inscribe superstitious symbols on them as the heathen did. Bricks were more easily so inscribed than stone; hence their use for the cuneiform inscriptions at Babylon, and also for idolatrous altars. Some, not so well, have supposed that the "bricks" here mean the flat brick-paved roofs of houses on which they sacrificed to the sun, &c. (2Ki 23:12; Jer 19:13).

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

65:1-7 The Gentiles came to seek God, and find him, because they were first sought and found of him. Often he meets some thoughtless trifler or profligate opposer, and says to him, Behold me; and a speedy change takes place. All the gospel day, Christ waited to be gracious. The Jews were bidden, but would not come. It is not without cause they are rejected of God. They would do what most pleased them. They grieved, they vexed the Holy Spirit. They forsook God's temple, and sacrificed in groves. They cared not for the distinction between clean and unclean meats, before it was taken away by the gospel. Perhaps this is put for all forbidden pleasures, and all that is thought to be gotten by sin, that abominable thing which the Lord hates. Christ denounced many woes against the pride and hypocrisy of the Jews. The proof against them is plain. And let us watch against pride and self-preference, remembering that every sin, and the most secret thoughts of man's heart, are known and will be judged by God.