XXII. 1 Kings 22 is the continuation of 1 Kings 20 (which in the LXX. immediately precedes it) in record of the Syrian war, but in tone far grander and spiritually instructive, a fit catastrophe of the tragedy of Ahab’s reign. In it, for the first time since 1 Kings 15:24, the history of Judah is t... [ Continue Reading ]
THREE YEARS WITHOUT WAR. — The period is clearly reckoned from the rash peace made by Ahab with Ben-hadad in 1 Kings 20:34. Evidently the king of Syria has recovered his independence, if not superiority; he has not restored Ramoth-gilead according to his promise; and his revived power is sufficient... [ Continue Reading ]
JEHOSHAPHAT THE KING OF JUDAH CAME DOWN. — The fuller account of the Chronicles (2 Chronicles 17) notices that the early part of his reign had been marked by a continuance or increase of the prosperity of Asa; but (1 Kings 18:1) adds, in significant connection, he “ had riches and honour in abundanc... [ Continue Reading ]
RAMOTH IN GILEAD. — The city is first mentioned (in Deuteronomy 4:43; Joshua 20:8; Joshua 21:38) as a city of refuge in the territory of Gad; then (in 1 Kings 4:13) as the centre of one of the provinces of Solomon, including the towns of Jair, and the strong hill country of Argob. In the Syrian wars... [ Continue Reading ]
I AM AS THOU ART. — The answer is apparently one of deference, as well as friendship, to the stronger kingdom. It must be remembered that, as the whole chapter shows, Ahab had now returned to the worship of the Lord.... [ Continue Reading ]
PROPHETS... FOUR HUNDRED. — These were clearly not avowed prophets of Baal, or the Asherah (“groves”), as is obvious from the context and from their words in 1 Kings 22:12. But Jehoshaphat’s discontent makes it equally clear that they were not in his view true prophets of Jehovah. Probably they were... [ Continue Reading ]
IS THERE NOT HERE A PROPHET OF THE LORD. — The rendering of the great name “Jehovah” by “the Lord” obscures the sense of the passage. In the previous utterance of the prophets the word (_Adonai_) is merely “Lord” in the etymological sense, which might mean the Supreme God of any religion. Jehoshapha... [ Continue Reading ]
MICAIAH (“who is like Jehovah”) — the name being the same as Micah. According to Josephus, he was the prophet of 1 Kings 20:35, who had “prophesied evil” of Ahab for his rash action towards Benhadad, and had already been imprisoned by him. The whole description, and especially the words of 1 Kings 2... [ Continue Reading ]
EACH ON HIS THRONE. — The description evidently implies that, having reluctantly consented to send for Micaiah, Ahab seeks to overawe him by display not only of royal pomp, but of prophetic inspiration, professing to come, like his own, from the Lord Jehovah.... [ Continue Reading ]
ZEDEKIAH. — The name itself (“righteousness of Jehovah”) must certainly imply professed devotion to the true God, whose Name here is first uttered by him. Symbolic action was not unfrequent in the prophets. (See Note on 1 Kings 11:30.) The use of the horns, as emblems of victorious strength, is also... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR THE LORD SHALL DELIVER IT. — The prophets, led by Zedekiah, now venture to use the Name of Jehovah, from which they had at first shrunk. The description, however, of their united reiteration of the cry, evidently with increasing excitement, reminds us of the repeated “O Baal, hear us” of Mount C... [ Continue Reading ]
BEHOLD NOW. — In the whole history, as especially in the words of the officer, there is evidence of the strange confusion of idea, so common in superstition at all times, which in some sense believes in the inspiration of the prophets as coming from God, and yet fancies that they can direct it as th... [ Continue Reading ]
GO, AND PROSPER. — Micaiah is a true disciple of Elijah in the defiant irony of the tone in which he takes up and mocks the utterance of the false prophets so bitterly as at once to show Ahab his scorn of them and him. But his message is couched in metaphor and symbolic vision, unlike the stern dire... [ Continue Reading ]
(19-22) The symbolic vision of Micaiah, which naturally recalls the well-known description in Job 1:6 of the intercourse of Satan with the Lord Himself, is to be taken as a symbol, and nothing more. (Josephus, characteristically enough, omits it altogether.) The one idea to be conveyed is the delusi... [ Continue Reading ]
A SPIRIT. — It should be _the spirit._ The definite article is explained by some, perhaps rather weakly, as simply anticipatory of the description which follows. Others take the phrase to signify “the spirit of prophecy,” a kind of emanation from the Godhead, looked upon as the medium of the prophet... [ Continue Reading ]
THE LORD... THE LORD. — The emphatic repetition of the Name Jehovah hero is an implied answer to the insinuation of mere malice in 1 Kings 22:8; 1 Kings 22:18.... [ Continue Reading ]
SMOTE MICAIAH ON THE CHEEK. — The act is not only the expression of contempt (see Isaiah 1:6; Micah 5:1; Matthew 5:39), but of professed indignation at words of blasphemy against God, or of contempt for His vicegerents; as is seen clearly, when it is recorded as directed against Our Lord or against... [ Continue Reading ]
JOASH THE KING’S SON, of whom we know nothing hereafter, is apparently entrusted (like the seventy sons of 2 Kings 10:1) to the charge of the governor of the city, perhaps in theory left in command of Samaria with him.... [ Continue Reading ]
BREAD OF AFFLICTION... — Comp. Isaiah 30:20. This is a command of severe treatment, as well as scanty fare. Ahab’s affectation of disbelief — which his subsequent conduct shows to be but affectation — simply draws down a plainer and sterner prediction, accompanied moreover, if our text be correct by... [ Continue Reading ]
HEARKEN, O PEOPLE. — It is a curious coincidence that these are the opening words of the prophetic Book of Micah. They are not found in some MSS. of the LXX., and are supposed by some to be an early interpolation in this passage from that book.... [ Continue Reading ]
SO... JEHOSHAPHAT. — The continued adhesion of Jehoshaphat, against the voice of prophecy, which he had himself invoked (severely rebuked in 2 Chronicles 18:31), and, indeed, the subservient part which he plays throughout, evidently indicate a position of virtual dependence of Judah on the stronger... [ Continue Reading ]
I WILL DISGUISE MYSELF. — The precaution of Ahab is almost ludicrously characteristic of his temper of half-belief and half-unbelief. In itself it is, of course, plainly absurd to believe that God’s judgment has in all probability been pronounced, and yet to suppose that it can be averted by so puer... [ Continue Reading ]
(31)HIS THIRTY AND TWO CAPTAINS. — See 1 Kings 20:16; 1 Kings 20:24. The power of Syria had already recovered itself, and is directed with singular virulence against the person of the king who had unwisely spared it. Ahab is represented as the mover of the whole war, and as fighting bravely to the d... [ Continue Reading ]
CRIED OUT — _i.e.,_ to rally his people round him In 2 Chronicles 18:31 it is added, “And the Lord helped him; and God moved them to depart from him.”... [ Continue Reading ]
A CERTAIN MAN. — Josephus says, “a young man named Naaman.” (Comp. 2 Kings 5:1 : “because by him the Lord had given deliverance to Syria.”) THE DRIVER OF HIS CHARIOT. — In the Egyptian and Assyrian monuments, as subsequently in the Greek of the Homeric days, the war-chariot holds but two, the warrio... [ Continue Reading ]
THE KING WAS STAYED UP... — Ahab’s repentance, imperfect as it was, has at least availed to secure him a warrior’s death, before “the evil came” on his house and on Israel. Evidently he conceals the deadliness of his hurt, though it disables him from action, and bravely sustains the battle, till his... [ Continue Reading ]
THEY WASHED HIS ARMOUR. — There seems little doubt that this is a mistranslation, and that the LXX. rendering (supported also by Josephus) is correct: “And the harlots bathed in it,” that is, in the bloodstained pool, the usual public bathing-place of their shamelessness. The dog and the harlot are... [ Continue Reading ]
THE IVORY HOUSE. — See Amos 3:15. We note that now, for the first time since the days of Solomon (1 Kings 10:18), the use of ivory — in this case for inlaying the walls of houses — so characteristic of Zidonian art, is mentioned. The “undesigned coincidence,” in relation to the renewed intercourse w... [ Continue Reading ]
JEHOSHAPHAT. — The narrative here, so far as it is full and continuous, centres round the prophetic work of Elijah and Elisha, the scene of which was in Israel; and the compiler contents himself with the insertion of a few brief annalistic notices of the kingdom of Judah, taking up the thread of the... [ Continue Reading ]
THE HIGH PLACES WERE NOT TAKEN AWAY. — This agrees with 2 Chronicles 20:33, and stands in apparent contradiction with 2 Chronicles 17:6 : “He took away the high places and groves out of Judah.” Probably the key to the apparent discrepancy lies in the words “and groves” (Asherah). The high places tak... [ Continue Reading ]
AND JEHOSHAPHAT. — This verse is chronologically out of place. It refers to the policy of Jehoshaphat, pursued apparently from the beginning, of exchanging the chronic condition of war with Israel in the preceding reigns, for peace and alliance.... [ Continue Reading ]
THE REMNANT... — See 1 Kings 14:24; 1 Kings 15:12.... [ Continue Reading ]
THERE WAS THEN NO KING IN EDOM. — This notice is apparently connected with the following verses; for Ezion-geber is a seaport of the Edomite territory. Whatever may have been the influence of Hadad in the last days of Solomon (1 Kings 11:14), Edom does not seem to have regained independence till the... [ Continue Reading ]
SHIPS OF THARSHISH TO GO TO OPHIR. — See Note on 1 Kings 10:22. We note that this revival of maritime enterprise coincides with the renewed alliance through Israel with Tyre. The account in 2 Chronicles 20:35 makes the brief narrative of these verses intelligible. The fleet was a combined fleet of J... [ Continue Reading ]
AHAZIAH. — In this short reign the influence of Jezebel, evidently in abeyance in the last days of Ahab, revives; and the idolatry of Baal resumes its place side by side with the older idolatry of Jeroboam, and (see 2 Kings 1:2) with the worship of the Canaanitish Baalzebub.... [ Continue Reading ]