2 Kings 7:6

For the Lord had made the host of the Syrians to hear a noise As the eyes of the Syrians who came to seize Elisha were deluded, and deceived, so here the other sense is made to err. We need not enquire how it was brought about, for we are not told, nor intended to know. The report of what had alarmed the host would come to the knowledge of the Israelites in time, and they could only say, -It is the Lord's doing, and is marvellous in our eyes".

hath hired against us Instances of such mercenary service are found elsewhere in the Bible narrative. Thus (2 Samuel 10:6) -the children of Ammon sent and hiredthe Syrians of Beth-rehob &c." And Amaziah, king of Judah, hiredvaliant men out of Israel (2 Chronicles 25:6).

the kings of the Hittites In the Bible we first meet with the Hittites as one among several nations whose land God promised to Abraham and his seed (Genesis 15:20). Next they are mentioned as dwelling near Hebron (Genesis 23:4), and from them Abraham buys a burial-place for Sarah, which is afterwards spoken of (Genesis 25:9) as in the field of Ephron the son of Zohar the Hittite. Two of Esau's wives were of this people (Genesis 26:34), and their name occurs several times in the story of the captivity, among the people whose land Israel was to go up and possess (Exodus 3:8; Exodus 3:17; Exodus 13:5 &c.). In Numbers 13:29 the spies when they came back mentioned the Hittites as some of the dwellers in the country, and in Joshua 1:4, the whole country which the people were to go in and possess is described as -from the wilderness and this Lebanon even unto the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites". The Hittites are among the enemy whom Israel overcame at the taking of Jericho (Joshua 24:11), and they are part of the host conquered at the waters of Merom (Joshua 11:4). Some of them continued to dwell in the land in the days of the Judges (Judges 3:5) and intermingled with the children of Israel. Uriah the Hittite was among David's captains (2 Samuel 23:39), and Hittite women were among the wives of Solomon (1 Kings 11:1). For the kings of the Hittites, Solomon (1 Kings 10:29) brought horses out of Egypt, and in the present chapter we have the same kings represented as a cause of great alarm to the Syrian host around Samaria. Yet in profane literature this people, evidently very wide-extended and powerful, are unmentioned, and it is only the modern deciphering of the records of Egypt and Babylon which has given us a conception of the Hittite power. Thence we learn that from very early times they were in conflict with Egypt, and that one of their chief towns, Kadesh on the river Orontes, was the scene of several contests between the Hittites and the Egyptians. Their other chief city is found to have been Carchemish on the Euphrates, so that the description of their territory in Joshua 1:4 is seen to be utterly correct, and we can understand how the hiring of such a mighty enemy would be sure to alarm Benhadad. For particulars of the inscriptions which relate to the Hittites see Records of the Past2:161; 2:61; 5:6, &c. and Dr Wright's Empire of the Hittites.

and the kings of the Egyptians Large districts of Egypt, called by Greeks, Nomes, were under distinct organization though owning allegiance to the Pharaoh. It is very probable that at various periods there were two if not three kingdoms in the land. Hence the Assyrians speak of the kingsthat had been hired out of Egypt. If this had been the case then Ben-hadad and his army would have been shut in both on the north and on the south. We need not wonder at the terror such a thought inspired. The plural -kings" of the Egyptians may perhaps here be used vaguely, as -princes" of Babylon is in 2 Chronicles 32:31, when only Berodach-baladan is in question.