The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Kings — Section 220

of the httnde of He.znel, e.nd not euft'er him me.nuecripts omit tile word, e.ud it is wont- to con_tinue subject" ('Ant. Jud.,' ix. 8. § 5). ing in the Chaldec, Syriac, and Arabio Ee did n?t turn from hie sin of idole.try, versions. Theui11a would cancel it. But p<'rhape did not l!Ullpeot the.t it was this sin walked therein ; li tere.lly, 1,e walked. ll u t which 1.e.d provoked God's ttnger: but in here again a corruption may be suspooted. " genera.I way he repented, humbled him• Instead or 'lj~y we shouid read ~7i;,, which Eclt; e.nd beeought God's mercy e.nd e.esist- ttnce. And the Lord hearkened unto him. lost its final letter in consequence or tiUl God 6CC'epted his repent.e.noo, all imperfect vau that immediately followed it. And e.s it wn._s, so far 11B to se.ve the people from there remained the grove also in Samaria. the entire destruction with which it was " 'l'he grove in Samaria" we.s that idolatrous threatened by the severe mee.snres of Httznel emblem which Ahab had set up at Jezebel'& (rnr. 7), to continue the ne.tio:ial exist.iuce suggestion (1 Kings xvi. 83), the nature of (ver. 23), end ultimefoly to restore the which ho.s been much disputed. Some ne.tioue.l prosperity (ver. 25 e.nd eh. xiv. think that it wo.s "on image of Aste.rte" 25-27). But he did not remove the oppres- (see • Homiletic Commente.ry' on l Kings, sion, &B Josephus ime.gines, in Jehoe.he.z's p. 874); but more probably it was a mer,i time. Ver. 22 me.kes this fa.et e.bsolutely emblem, analogous to the Assyril\n "se.crcd certain. For he B&W the oppression of Israel, tree." Its mo.terial me.y sometimes have because the Xing of Syria oppressed them. been wood, but was perhaps more usually Oppression is eh,ays hateful to God, even metal. The mistranslation "grove" origin- "·hen hc is using it as his instrument for e.ted with the Septuagint translators, who chastising or punishiug e. guilty people. uniformly rendered n;,F?.~ by lill.a'or. It .is lie " S!l0S" it, notes it, le.ye it up in his surprising that Jehu did not destroy the remembre.nce for future retribution (comp. aslierah together with the other idolatroUB Exod. iii. 7; Isa. x. 5--12, etc.). (On erections or Ahab in Se.me.ria (eh. x. 26...:... the nature and extent of the oppreeilion of 28); but, for some reason or other, it seems this period, see ver. 7, e.nd the comment to have been spared, and to have been still ad Zoe.) standing. So long as it stood, even if it did Ver. 5.-And the Lord gs.ve lsre.el a not attract the religious regards of any, it aaviour, so that they went out from 'IIILder would be a stnuding dishonour to God, and the he.Ji.d of tha Syrians. A "saviour" would so increase the sin of the no.tion. mea.ns a deliverer from the hand of the Beuce its mention in this passage. Syrians (comp. Judg. iii. 9, 15; Neh. Uli" Ver. 7.-Neither did he leave of the people 27, where in the Hebrew the word used is to Jehoahaz but 1lfty horsemen, and ten the same). The special •• deli,erer" was chariots, and ten thouaan.d footmen. This probably in the mind of tl:.e writer, Jero- verse seems to be o.n exegetical note on boam II., by whom he says, in eh. xiv. 27, ver. 4, which perhaps it once followed that God "saved" Israel; but Joash, who immediately, the parenthetic section (vers. 5 began the delivera.nce (ver. 25), may al.so and 6) having been added later, as an o.fter- be glanced at. A.Dd the ohildre:a of Israel thonght, either by the original writer, or dwelt in their tents. Here, as so often perhaps by a later ho.nd. The meaning elsewhere (I Kings viii. 66; xii. 16; eh. seems to be that Ha.zael limited the stand- xiv. 12; Zech. xii. 7), the word "tents" is ing army of Jehoahaz to fifty horsemen, ten a mere e.rche.ulm for "abodes, hoUBes." cha.riots, and ten thousand footmen, not that Isre.el had dwelt in tents until the going he slew the entire military population except down into Egypt, and again from the tiwe this small remnant. The policy of limiting of quitting Egypt to the entrance into the forces to be 1naintained by a subject- Cane.an; and thus the word· ohel had ac- king was one known to the Romans, and quired a 80COnd.e.ry meaning of "a.bode," has often been adopted in the East. It is .. dwelling - pl.e.ce." In the time which still a part of our own policy in the govern- followed on the deliverance from the Syrian ment of India.. 'file limitation left the yoke, the Israelites of the ten tribes were colllltry at the mercy of o.11 its neighbours no longer engaged in marcheH and counter- (see ver. 20). l'or the King of Syria had we.rche11, in battles, iJrirm.ishes, or sieges, destroyed them, and had 1D&de them like the but quietly abode in their several houses, dust by threshing. Possibly this means no As beforetime; i.e. as in tlJe peaceful time more than an utter destruction-a tre.mpling before the attacks of He.zael began. in tLe dust, us we phrase it (see Jer. li. 33; Ver. 6.-Jievertheleu they departed not Micah iv. 12, 13; and perhaps Isa. xxi. 10), from the Binll of the ho111e of 1eroboam, who But it may be an allusion to that des Iruction made Israel sin. " The hoU8e of Jeroboam" of prisonns by mealll! of a thre~hing instrU:, is an un.llBue.l expreseion in this connection, mcnt, which was certainly sometimes prac- and is scarcely appropriate, since every tised (2 Sam. xii. 31; Prov. xx. 26), and :- hu11110" he,d acted iu the 1&Ule way. Some which is made a special charge ugninst Oil, XIII, 1-25.] '!'HE SECOND HOOK OF THE KINGS.