The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Chronicles — Section 296

xx. 14), Elijah (:u:i. 12)-were the recognized medium of communication between God nod the people. The prophets at this time sent to testify for Jehovah against the people are not named, with one exception; which may suggest that one may be an honoured, true, and faithful servant of God in Church or state, and may render important services to both without having his name chronicled on the registers of time. 2. its tenor. A testimony against the nation, in terms similar to those of Zechariah. Their idol-worship was: (1) A direct transgression of Jehovah's corumandme::.ts (Exod. xx. 3-5, 23; xxiii. 13; Lev. xxvi. 1, 30; Deut. iv. 15-19; x.xvii. 15). (2) An express violation of the covenant into which they had entered with Jehovah (eh. xxiii. 16). (3) A fatal obstacle to their prosperity, whether national or individual (Numb. xiv. 41; Deut. xxviii. 29; Ps. i. 3, 4; xvi. 4; xcvii. 7; Jonah ii. 8). (4) A sure sign of their abandonment by God (eh. xii. 5; xv. 2; Deut. xxxi. 16, 17; Josh. xxiv. 20; 1 Chron. x.xviii. 9). 3. Its reception. "They would not give ee.r." Unwilling to obey, they would not listen. The truth was unpalatable, and hence they rejected it. They loved the darkness rather than the light, because their deeds were evil (John iii. 19): they hated the truth, because it condemned them (Ps. 1. 17; Amos v. 10). IV. ZECHARIAH's ASSASSINATION. (Ver. 20.) A deed of: 1. Atrocious inhumanity. Murdered by his countrymen, the princes of Judah, in some sort his near kinsmen, c.:msidering that he himself was a collateral descendant of the royal line, his mother having been Ahazia.h's sister (eh. xxii. 11). 2. Revolting cruelty. Stoned with stones. Lapida.tion, a peculiarly Jewish form of punishment, is described in the Mishna.. " The condemned, if a man, was led naked to the place of torture, but a. woman was allowed to retain her clothes. The offender was always taken out of the city. . . . All that was necessary was that the place should be in a valley, or foss, with steep banks, from the top of which one of the witnesses threw the accused down. If he falls on his back and is killed, well and good; if not, another witness throws a stone on his chest. The first stones were cast at the head, so as to hasten death and shorten the sufferings of the victim. There were no regular executioners. In the time of the kings, the tmvereigns appointed men to ca.rry out the sentence" (Stapfer, 'Palestine in the Time of Chmt,' pp. 112, 113; cf. Keil's 'Archaologie,' § 153). This terrible mode of execut- ing capital punishment the Law reserved for aggravated offences (Lev. xx. 2, 27 ; xxiv. 14; l\umb. xv. 35), in particnlar for practising and enticing to idolatry (Deut. xiii. 10; xviii. 5). Victims of stoning were, in Old Testament times, Achan (Josh. vii. 25), Naboth (1 Kings x.xL 13), Hadoram (eh. L 18), Zechariah; in New Testament times, Srephen (Acts vii. 58), Paul (Acts xiv.19), and (perhaps) Antipas (Rev. ii. 13). 3. Gross profanity. Murdered in the court of Jehovah's house, "between the sanctuary and the altar" (Matt. xxiii. 35), always regarded as an aggravation of the original crime (Lam. ii. 10), and a special form of defilement (Ezek. ix. 7). J ehoiada. would not shed there the blood of Joash's grandmother (eh. xxiii. 14); Joash did not hesitate to spill there the blood of Jehoiada's son. 4. Horrible impiety. Murdered, although e. prophet of Jehovah (1 Kings xi.x. 10); murdered, because he told them the truth (cf. John viii. 40); murdered by men themselves guilty of death and deserving to be stoned (see above); murdered in Jehovah's house and before his altar, in defiance of his Law and contempt for his religion. 5. Monstrous ingratitud,e. Murdered "at the king's commandment ; " done to death by a man to whom his father (or grandfather) had given life, education, a crown, a kingdom, a reformed religion, a settled country (eh. xxii. 11-xxiii. 21). The vocabulary of vituperation has been exhausted to set forth the wickedness, odious- ness, and loathsomeness of this vice. It has been likened to "a sharp-toothed vulture," " a marble-hearted fiend, more hideous than the sea-monster;" it has been spoken of as "the most detestable act" a person can commit, a vice more abominable "than lying, vainness, babbling, drunkenness; " a monster whos~ to?th is keener than the winter wind. Nor is it too much to say that, amongst this hideous crew of God-for- saken wretches, Joash stands pre-eminent. A creature as mean and despicable the earth surely iJ; seldom called on to support and nourish. 6. Unavoidable avengement. Zecharia.h himself, feeling this, ere his eyes closed and his lips became silent in death, uttered a prayer or invocation, "T~e Lord look upon it, and require it,'' in reality .a. prediction which soon became a history. Contrast the prayer of Stephen for his murderers (Acts vii 60). Zechariah the murdered prophet, and Stephen the martyred ll.cacou, each emQO<l.ied and illµstrated the spirit of the dispensation under which he 1111. xxrv. 1-27.J THE SECOND BOOK OF THE CHRONICLES. 297