7 And when the LORD saw that they humbled themselves, the word of the LORD came to Shemaiah, saying, They have humbled themselves; therefore I will not destroy them, but I will grant them some deliverance; and my wrath shall not be poured out upon Jerusalem by the hand of Shishak.
And that I also have walked contrary unto them, and have brought them into the land of their enemies; if then their uncircumcised hearts be humbled, and they then accept of the punishment of their iniquity: Then will I remember my covenant with Jacob, and also my covenant with Isaac, and also my covenant with Abraham will I remember; and I will remember the land.
And the children of Israel said unto the LORD, We have sinned: do thou unto us whatsoever seemeth good unto thee; deliver us only, we pray thee, this day. And they put away the strange gods from among them, and served the LORD: and his soul was grieved for the misery of Israel.
And Jehoahaz besought the LORD, and the LORD hearkened unto him: for he saw the oppression of Israel, because the king of Syria oppressed them. (And the LORD gave Israel a saviour, so that they went out from under the hand of the Syrians: and the children of Israel dwelt in their tents, as beforetime. Nevertheless they departed not from the sins of the house of Jeroboam, who made Israel sin, but walked therein: and there remained the grove also in Samaria.) Neither did he leave of the people to Jehoahaz but fifty horsemen, and ten chariots, and ten thousand footmen; for the king of Syria had destroyed them, and had made them like the dust by threshing.
The LORD repented for this: This also shall not be, saith the Lord GOD. Thus he shewed me: and, behold, the LORD stood upon a wall made by a plumbline, with a plumbline in his hand. And the LORD said unto me, Amos, what seest thou? And I said, A plumbline. Then said the LORD, Behold, I will set a plumbline in the midst of my people Israel: I will not again pass by them any more:
I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and before thee, And am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants. And he arose, and came to his father. But when he was yet a great way off, his father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him. And the son said unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be called thy son.
And the first went, and poured out his vial upon the earth; and there fell a noisome and grievous sore upon the men which had the mark of the beast, and upon them which worshipped his image. And the second angel poured out his vial upon the sea; and it became as the blood of a dead man: and every living soul died in the sea. And the third angel poured out his vial upon the rivers and fountains of waters; and they became blood. And I heard the angel of the waters say, Thou art righteous, O Lord, which art, and wast, and shalt be, because thou hast judged thus. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and thou hast given them blood to drink; for they are worthy. And I heard another out of the altar say, Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are thy judgments. And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun; and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire. And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues: and they repented not to give him glory. And the fifth angel poured out his vial upon the seat of the beast; and his kingdom was full of darkness; and they gnawed their tongues for pain, And blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and their sores, and repented not of their deeds. And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared. And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet. For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty. Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame. And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon. And the seventh angel poured out his vial into the air; and there came a great voice out of the temple of heaven, from the throne, saying, It is done.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on 2 Chronicles 12
Commentary on 2 Chronicles 12 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
Rehoboam's defection from the Lord, and his humiliation by the Egyptian king Shishak . - 2 Chronicles 12:1. The infinitive כּהכין , “at the time of the establishing,” with an indefinite subject, may be expressed in English by the passive: when Rehoboam's royal power was established. The words refer back to 2 Chronicles 11:17. כּחזקתו , “when he had become strong” ( חזקה is a nomen verbale: the becoming strong; cf. 2 Chronicles 26:16; 2 Chronicles 11:2), he forsook the Lord, and all Israel with him. The inhabitants of the kingdom of Judah are here called Israel, to hint at the contrast between the actual conduct of the people in their defection from the Lord, and the destiny of Israel, the people of God. The forsaking of the law of Jahve is in substance the fall into idolatry, as we find it stated more definitely in 1 Kings 14:22.
In punishment of this defection ( בי מעלוּ כּי , because they had acted faithlessly to Jahve), Shishak, the king of Egypt, marched with a great host against Jerusalem. This hostile invasion is also briefly narrated in 1 Kings 14:25-28. Shishak (Sisak) is, as we have remarked on 1 Kings 14, Sesonchis or Sechonchosis, the first king of the 22nd dynasty, who has celebrated his victory in a relief at Karnak. In this sculpture the names of the cities captured are recorded on shields, and a considerable number have been deciphered with some certainty, and by them our account is completely confirmed. According to 2 Chronicles 12:3, Shishak's host consisted of 1200 chariots, 60,000 horsemen-numbers which, of course, are founded only upon a rough estimate-and an innumerable multitude of footmen, among whom were לוּבים , Libyans, probably the Libyaegyptii of the ancients (see on Genesis 10:13); סכּיּים , according to the lxx and Vulg. Troglodytes, probably the Ethiopian Troglodytes, who dwelt in the mountains on the west coast of the Arabian Gulf; and Cushites, i.e., Ethiopians. The Libyans and Cushites are mentioned in Nahum 3:9 also as auxiliaries of the Egyptians.
After the capture of the fenced cities of Judah, he marched against Jerusalem. - 2 Chronicles 12:5. Then the prophet Shemaiah announced to the king and the princes, who had retired to Jerusalem before Shishak, that the Lord had given them into the power of Shishak because they had forsaken Him. בּיד עזב , forsaken and given over into the hand of Shishak. When the king and the priests immediately humbled themselves before God, acknowledging the righteousness of the Lord, the prophet announced to them further that the Lord would not destroy them since they had humbled themselves, but would give them deliverance in a little space. כּמעט , according to a little, i.e., in a short time. פּליטה is accusative after ונתתּי . My anger shall not pour itself out upon Jerusalem. The pouring out of anger is the designation of an exterminating judgment; cf. 2 Chronicles 34:25.
But ( כּי after a negative clause) they shall be his servants, sc. for a short time (see 2 Chronicles 12:7), “that they may know my service, and the service of the kingdoms of the countries” (cf. 1 Chronicles 29:30); i.e., that they may learn to know by experience the difference between the rule of God and that of the heathen kings, and that God's rule was not so oppressive as that of the rulers of the world.
With 2 Chronicles 12:9 the account of the war is taken up again and continued by the repetition of the words, “Then marched Shishak ... against Jerusalem” (2 Chronicles 12:4). Shishak plundered the treasures of the temple and the palace; he had consequently captured Jerusalem. The golden shields also which had been placed in the house of the forest of Lebanon, i.e., the palace built by Solomon in Jerusalem, which Solomon had caused to be made (cf. 2 Chronicles 9:16), Shishak took away, and in their place Rehoboam caused brazen shields to be prepared; see on 1 Kings 14:26-28. - In 2 Chronicles 12:12 the author of the Chronicle concludes the account of this event with the didactic remark, “Because he (Rehoboam) humbled himself, the anger of Jahve was turned away from him.” להשׁחית ולא , and it was not to extermination utterly ( לכלה , properly to destruction, i.e., completely; cf. Ezekiel 13:13). And also in Judah were good things. This is the other motive which caused the Lord to turn away His wrath. Good things are proofs of piety and fear of God, cf. 2 Chronicles 19:3.
The length of Rehoboam's reign, his mother, and the judgment about him. Cf. 1 Kings 14:21 and 1 Kings 14:22 . ויּתחזּק here, as in 2 Chronicles 13:21, can, in its connection with what precedes, be only understood to mean that Rehoboam, after his humiliation at the hands of Shishak, by which his kingdom was utterly weakened and almost destroyed, again gained strength and power. Cf. also 2 Chronicles 1:1, where יתחזּק is used of Solomon in the beginning of his reign, after he overcame Adonijah, the pretender to the crown, and his party. - As to the age of Rehoboam, etc., see on 1 Kings 14:21. הרע ויּעשׂ , 2 Chronicles 12:14, is defined by the addition, “for he prepared not his heart to seek the Lord.” For the expression cf. 2 Chronicles 19:3; 2 Chronicles 30:19; Ezra 7:10.
Close of his reign. On the authorities, see the Introduction, and in reference to the other statements, the commentary on 1 Kings 14:29-31. מלחמות , wars, i.e., a state of hostility, was between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all days, can only be understood of the hostile attitude of the two rulers to each other, like מלחמה in Kings; for we have no narrative of wars between them after Rehoboam had abandoned, at the instance of the prophet, his proposed war with the Israelites at the commencement of his reign.