[4] How closely these documents are transcribed is shown by the recurrence of "_unto this day_," though the phrase had long ceased to be true when the book appeared.
[5] It is inferred from 1 Kings viii. 12, 13, which have a poetic tinge, and to which the LXX. add "Behold they are written in the Book of the Song," that in this section the "Book of Jashar" has been utilised, and that the reading הישר has been confused with שירה (Driver, p. 182).
[6] 2 Chron. xx. 34, R.V., "The history of Jehu, the son of Hanani, which _is inserted in the Book of the Kings of Israel_" (not "who is mentioned," A.V., which, however, gives in the margin the literal meaning "was made to ascend").
[7] Movers, _Krit. Untersuch._, p. 185 (Bonn, 1836). The use of older documents explains the phrase "till this day," and the passages which speak of the Temple as still standing (1 Kings viii. 8, ix. 21, xii. 19; 2 Kings x. 27, xiii. 23). Sometimes the traces of earlier and later date are curiously juxtaposed, as in 2 Kings xvii. 18, 21 and 19, 20.
[8] Difference of sources is marked by the different designations of the months, which are called sometimes by their numbers, as in the Priestly Codex (1 Kings xii. 32, 33), sometimes by the old Hebrew names Zif ("_blossom_," April, May, 1 Kings vi. 1), Ethanim ("_fruit_," Sept., Oct., 1 Kings viii. 2), and Bul ("_rain_," 1 Kings vi. 38).
[9] מִז־הַנָּהָר (compare עֲבַר־נַהֲרָה). _Lit._, "_Beyond_ the river," _i.e._, from the Persian standpoint. It becomes a fixed geographical phrase. Traces of the editor's hand occur in 1 Kings xiii. 32 ("the cities of Samaria"); 2 Kings xiii. 23 ("as yet").
[10] Comp. 2 Kings viii. 25 with ix. 29.
[11] See 2 Kings xv. 30 and 33, viii. 25 and ix. 29.
[12] As, perhaps, the clause "In the thirty and first year of Asa king of Judah" in 1 Kings xvi. 23; and the much more serious "in the 480th year after the children of Israel were come out of the land of Egypt," which are omitted by Origen (_comm. in Johannem_, ii. 20), and create many difficulties. The only narratives which critics have suggested as possible interpolations, from the occurrence of unusual grammatical forms, are 2 Kings viii. 1-6 and iv. 1-37 (in the story of Elisha); but these forms are perhaps northern provincialisms.
[13] _Speaker's Commentary_, ii. 475. Instances will be found in 1 Kings xiv. 21, xvi. 23, 29; 2 Kings iii. 1, xiii. 10, xv. 1, 30, 33, xiv. 23, xvi. 2, xvii. 1, xviii. 2.
[14] Stade, p. 79; Kalisch, _Exodus_, p. 495.
[15] See Keil, pp. 9, 10.
[16] R. F. Horton, _Inspiration_, p. 843.
[17] He was not the author of the Book of Samuel, for the standpoint and style are quite different. In the First and Second Books of Samuel the high places are never condemned, as they are incessantly in Kings (1 Kings iii. 2, xiii. 32, xiv. 23, xv. 14, xxii. 43, etc.).
[18] Baba Bathra, 15 a.
[19] _Seder Olam Rabba_, 20.
[20] Even then he would have been ninety years old.
[21] There are, however, some _differences_ between 2 Kings xxv. and Jer. lii. (see Keil, p. 12), though the manner is the same, Carpzov, _Introd._, i. 262-64 (Hävernick, _Einleit._, ii. 171). Jer. li. (verse 64) ends with "Thus far are the words of Jeremiah," excluding him from the authorship of chap. lii. (Driver, _Introd._, p. 109). The last chapter of Jeremiah was perhaps added to his volume by a later editor.
[22] "The Old Testament does not furnish a history of Israel, though it supplies the materials from which such a history can be constructed. For example, the narrative of Kings gives but the merest outline of the events that preceded the fall of Samaria. To understand the inner history of the time we must fill up this outline with the aid of the prophets Amos and Hoshea."--ROBERTSON SMITH'S _Preface_ to translation of Wellhausen, p. vii.