The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Kings — Section 267

EXPOSITION. CHAPTER XVI. Aha.z can have been no more than twenty a.t hie accession, since in that case he must Vers. 1-2O.-REIGN OF AHAZ OVER have married nt ten years of nge, and have JUDAll. WAB OF AHAZ WITH f'EKAH AND had a. son a.t eleven I The reading of REZIN. En-EDITION OF TIGLATH-PILESEB "twenty-five" instead of "twenty," found in some Hebrew codices, in the Vatican AGAINST THEM. RELIGIOUS ClliNGEB HADE manuscript of the Septuagint, and else- :BY AH.A.z. Hrs DEATH. where, is therefore to be preferred. And Vere. 1-4.-General character of the reigned sixteen years in 1erusalem. So the reign of .Miaz. Aha.z was the most wicked author of Chronicles (2 Chroa. n:viii. 1) king that had as yet reigned in Judah. The a.ad Josephus(' Ant. Jud.,' ix. 12. §3), The reign of Ahe.z probably lasted from B.o. 742 author, therefore, prefaces liie account of to B.o. 727. And did not that which was the reign by a. brief summary of some of right in the sight of the Lord his God, like the king's chief iniquities. (1) He departed David his father. Compare what is ea.id of from the way of David (ver. 2); (2) he Abijah (1 Kings xv. 3), but the form of made his son pass through the fire to Moloch 1peech here used is stronger. Manosseh (Ter. 3) ; and (3) he took an active part in ( eh. xxi. 2) and Amon ( eh. xxi. 20-22) alone, of all the kings of Judah, receive grentcr the worship at the high places and in the condemnation. • groves, a.t which most previous kings bad Ver. 3.-But he walked in the way of winked, bnt which they had uot coua- the kings of Israel, Not, of course, by '8nanced. establishing a. worship of calves, but by following the worst practices of the worst Ver. 1.-In the seventeenth year of Peka.h Israelite kings, e.g. Ahab and Ahaziah, and the Bon of B.emalia.h Ahas the Bon of 1otha.m reintroducing into Judah the Phamicion Xing of 1udah began to reign. (For the idolatry, which Joash and the high priest ~hronologica.l difficulties connected with Jehoiada had cast out (eh. xi. 17, 18). As this statement, see the comment on eh. xv. the writer of Chronicles says (2 Chron. 27.) xxviii. 2), "He walked in the ways of the Ver. 2.-Twenty years old was Ahaz when kings of Israel, and made al.ao molten image, he began to reign. As sixteen years after- for Baalim." Baalim is eithrr a. plural of wards his son Hezekiah was twenty-five diguity, or a word denoting the different {eh. xviiL 2), it ill sce.rcely poBBible that forms under which Baul was worshipped,  OH. XVI. 1-20.] THE SECOND BOOK OF THE KINGS. 313