The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Kings — Section 287

the Hebrew word1 have the significa.tion wrought wioked thing, to provoke the Lord asaigned to them in the Authorized Version. to anger (see below, vers. 15---17). They may mean no more than the.t the Is- Ver. 12.-J'or they served idols; rather, raeli tea made their evil deeds e. bu.rrier be- and they seri,ed ido'la. The sense flows on tween themselves e.nd God. And they built from ver. 7, ea.oh verse being joined to the them high ple.oea in all their oitiea ( corn p. pr0Cf'ding one by the i,au connective. Gillu- 1 Kings xiv. 23), "In all their cities" is lim, the term translaterl " idols," is A. word probe.bly rhetorice.l ; but the gist of the rarely used, except by Ezekiel, with whom charge is the.t, instead of keeping to the it is common. "It contains," as Bahr says, one temple and one alte.r commanded by "a suborclina.te contemptuous and abusive God for the conserve.tion of their belief in signification; " the primary meaning of his unity, the Isra.elites "erected ple.ces of galal being "dnng," "ordure." Whereof worship all over the country, after the the Lord had said unto them, Ye shall not fashion of the heathen" (Bii.hr), e.nd so at do this thing (see Exod. xx. 4, 5, 23; Dent. once depra.ved their own faith, e.nd cee.secl to iv. 16-18, etc.). be e. perpetual protest to the surrounding Ver. 13.-Yet the Lord testified-rather, ne.tions. From the tower of the watohman and the Lord testified-against Israel, and to the fenoed oity ; i.e. from the smallest against Judah, by all the prophets, and by and most solitary place of human a.bode to all the seers. A " seer" is, properly, one the largest and most populous (comp. eh. who sees visions; a "prophet," one inspired xviii. 8). The expression was no doubt pro- to pour forth ntterances. Bot the words verbie.l, and (as used here) is a strong hy- were used as synonyms (see I Sam. ix. 9). perbole. Ever since the revolt of Jeroboam, there had Ver. 10.-And they set them up images; been a succession of prophets in both coun- rather, pillars (comp. Gen. u:viii. 18, 22; tries whose office it had been to rebuke sin xxxi. 13, 45, 51, 52; xxxv. 14, 20; Exod. and to enforce the precepts of the Law. In xxiv. 4; Dent. xii. 3; 2 So.m. xvili. 18, where Jndah there had been Shemaiah, contempo- the same word is so rendered). The mats~- rary with Rehoboe.m (2 Chron. xi. 2; xii. 5) ; tJ8th were stone pillars, anciently conneoted Iddo, contemporary with Abijah (2 Chron. with the worship of Bae.I, bat in Judah xiii. 22); A.zariah, with ABa (2 Chron. xv. perhaps used in a debased and debasing 1); Hanani, with the same (2 Chron. xvi. worship of Jehovah with self-invented rites, 7); Jehu, the son of Hane.ni. with Jehosha- instead of those which had the express phat (2 Chron. xix. 2); Jabaziel, the son of sanction of God, being commanded in the Zechariah, with the same (2 Chron. xx. H); Le.w (see the' Speaker's Commentary,' vol. Eliezer, the son of Doda.va.h, also contem- i. p. 417). And groves (oompare the com- porary with the same (2 Chron. xx. 37) ; ment on 1 Kings xiv. 14 o.nd 23, and see Zecho.riah, the son of Jehoiada, contempo- also that on oh. xiii. 6) in every high hill rary with Joa.ah (2 Chron. :xxiv. 20); another -rather, on e'l/ery liigh hill-and 11.11der every Zeohariah, contemporary with Uzziah (2 green tree. Note that the "groves " ( aahA- Chron. l[.l[Vi, 5); Joel, Micah, and Isaiah, rim) were "set up under green trees," and besides severe.I whose names are unknown. must therefore have been artificial structures In Israel, the succession h11d inclmled Ahi- of some kind, such as could stand beneath je.h the Shilonite, contemporary with Jero- their boughs. boam (1 Kings xiv. 2); Jehn, the son of Ver. 11.-And there they burnt inoense in Hane.ni, with Be.asha (1 Kings xvi. I): all the high places (comp. 1 Kings iii. 3; Elijah, and Mioaiah the son of lmlab, with xxii. 43; eh. xii. 3; xiv. 4; xv. 4, 35; xvi. Ahab (1 Kings xxii. 8) and Ahazit,h (eh. i. 4). Incense symbolized prayer (Pd. cxli. 3); Elisha, with Jehoram, Jehu, Jehoahaz, 2), aud ought to have been burnt only on and Joa.ah (eh. iii. 11-xiii. H); Jonah, the golden altar of incense within the veil with Jeroboam II. (oh. xiv. 25); Hosea a.nd As did the heathen whom the Lord oarried Amos, with the same(Hos. i. 1; Amos i.1): away before them. The offering of incense and Oded (2 Chron. xxviii. 9), contemporary to their gods by the Cauaanitish nations had with Pekah. God had never left himself not been previously mentioned: but the use without living witness. Besides the written of incense in religious worship was so widely testimony of the La.w, he had sent them a. spread in the ancient world, that their em- continuous series of prophets, who "repel\ted ployment of it might have been assumed as sod enforced the teaching of the Law by almost certain. The Egypti11,11s used in- word of mouth, breathing into tee old words cense I~.rgely in the worship of Ammon a new life, applying them to the facts of (' Recor:ls of the Past,' vol. x. p. 19). The their own times, urging them on the con- Babylonians burnt a thouse.nd t11lents'weight sciences oftheir hearers, and authorillitively of it every year at the great festival of Bel- deolaring to them that the terrible threaten- Merodaoh (Herod., i. 183). The Greeks and ings of the Law were directed age.inst the Romans otfered it with every saoruloe. And very sillll which they habitually practiBed..,.  THE SECOND BOOK OF THE KINGS. [oa. xvu.1-41,