His name is derived from Chazah, to see; and the El joined to it means to see God. We have his history, and the effect wrought upon the mind of the prophet Elisha in beholding him with his prophetic spirit, foreseeing the cruelties of Hazael on the children of Israel. (2 Kings 8:15) The circumstance of Hazael's spreading a cloth dipped in water over the face of Benhadad, hath been thought by some to have been done not with the design to kill him. Historians tell us, that it is the custom in the east, in those violent fevers called Nedad, to make use of chilling methods for their recovery. The patients drink cold water, and a quantity of water is thrown upon them. So that whether Hazael wished the death of his master, or not, the dipping the cloth in water and covering his face with it, was among the methods used on those occasions for recovery. Be this, however, as it may, Hazael stands on record for a very awful character, and his name was highly unsuitable to his conduct. All that the prophet Elisha foretold literally came to pass; and he, that, while the servant of the king his master, stood astonished at the bare mention only of the cruelties Elisha admonished him of, actually perpetrated the very murders which he had shuddered at, when he became clothed with the royal purple. (See 2 Kings 13:3-7) Oh, what an awful representation doth his history afford of the sin and iniquity lurking in the human heart! In the whole nature of man it must be the same, for the seeds of sin are alike in all; and that they do not ripen and bear the like deadly fruit in all, is wholly owing to the preventing and restraining grace of God. The heart that is not conscious of this, is not conscious of the preciousness of the Lord Jesus Christ.