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2 Kings Chapter
Sixteen
2 Kings 16
Chapter Contents
Ahaz, king of Judah, His wicked reign. (1-9) Ahaz takes a
pattern from an idol's altar. (10-16) Ahaz spoils the temple. (17-20)
Commentary on 2 Kings 16:1-9
(Read 2 Kings 16:1-9)
Few and evil were the days of Ahaz. Those whose hearts
condemn them, will go any where in a day of distress, rather than to God. The
sin was its own punishment. It is common for those who bring themselves into
straits by one sin, to try to help themselves out by another.
Commentary on 2 Kings 16:10-16
(Read 2 Kings 16:10-16)
God's altar had hitherto been kept in its place, and in
use; but Ahaz put another in the room of it. The natural regard of the mind of
man to some sort of religion, is not easily extinguished; but except it be
regulated by the word, and by the Spirit of God, it produces absurd
superstitions, or detestable idolatries. Or, at best, it quiets the sinner's
conscience with unmeaning ceremonies. Infidels have often been remarkable for believing
ridiculous falsehoods.
Commentary on 2 Kings 16:17-20
(Read 2 Kings 16:17-20)
Ahaz put contempt upon the sabbath, and thus opened a
wide inlet to all manner of sin. This he did for the king of Assyria. When
those who have had a ready passage to the house of the Lord, turn it another
way to please their neighbours, they are going down-hill apace to ruin.
── Matthew Henry《Concise Commentary on 2 Kings》
2 Kings 16
Verse 3
[3] But he walked in the way of the kings of Israel, yea,
and made his son to pass through the fire, according to the abominations of the
heathen, whom the LORD cast out from before the children of Israel.
Pass — By way of oblation, so as to be consumed for a
burnt-offering, which was the practice of Heathens, and of some Israelites, in
imitation of them.
Verse 5
[5] Then Rezin king of Syria and Pekah son of Remaliah king
of Israel came up to Jerusalem to war: and they besieged Ahaz, but could not
overcome him.
Could not overcome — Because God of his
own mere grace, undertook his protection, and disappointed the hopes of his
enemies.
Verse 7
[7] So Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglathpileser king of
Assyria, saying, I am thy servant and thy son: come up, and save me out of the
hand of the king of Syria, and out of the hand of the king of Israel, which
rise up against me.
Sent messengers, … — But was it because
there was no God in Israel, that he sent to the Assyrian for help? The sin
itself was its own punishment; for tho' it served his present turn, yet he made
but an ill bargain, seeing he not only impoverished himself, but enslaved both
himself and his people.
Verse 12
[12] And when the king was come from Damascus, the king saw
the altar: and the king approached to the altar, and offered thereon.
Offered — A sacrifice, and that not to God, but to the Syrian
idols, to whom that altar was appropriated.
Verse 13
[13] And he burnt his burnt offering and his meat offering,
and poured his drink offering, and sprinkled the blood of his peace offerings,
upon the altar.
Peace-offerings — For the Heathens; and Ahaz, in
imitation of them, offered the same sorts of offerings to their false gods,
which the Israelites did to the true.
Verse 14
[14] And he brought also the brasen altar, which was before
the LORD, from the forefront of the house, from between the altar and the house
of the LORD, and put it on the north side of the altar.
Brazen attar — Of burnt-offerings, made by
Solomon, and placed there by God's appointment.
From between, … — His new altar was at first set
below the brazen altar, and at a farther distance from the temple. This he took
for a disparagement to his altar; and therefore impiously takes that away, and
puts his in its place.
And put, … — So he put God's altar out of its
place and use! A bolder stroke than the very worst of kings had hitherto given
to religion.
Verse 15
[15] And king Ahaz commanded Urijah the priest, saying, Upon
the great altar burn the morning burnt offering, and the evening meat offering,
and the king's burnt sacrifice, and his meat offering, with the burnt offering
of all the people of the land, and their meat offering, and their drink
offerings; and sprinkle upon it all the blood of the burnt offering, and all
the blood of the sacrifice: and the brasen altar shall be for me to enquire by.
Great altar — This new altar; which was greater
than Solomon's.
Sacrifice — Whatsoever is offered to the true
God, either in my name (for possibly he did not yet utterly forsake God, but
worshipped idols with him) or on the behalf of the people, shall be offered on
this new altar.
Enquire by — That shall be reserved for my
proper use, to enquire by; at which I may seek God, or enquire of his will, by
sacrifices joined with prayer, when I shall see fit. Having thrust it out from
the use for which it was instituted, which was to sanctify the gifts offered
upon it, he pretends to advance it above its institution, which it is common
for superstitious people to do. But to overdo is to underdo. Our wisdom is, to
do just what God has commanded.
Verse 18
[18] And the covert for the sabbath that they had built in
the house, and the king's entry without, turned he from the house of the LORD
for the king of Assyria.
The covert — The form and use whereof is now
unknown. It is generally understood of some building, either that where the
priests after their weekly course was ended, abode until the next course came;
which was done upon the sabbath-day: or that in which the guard of the temple
kept their station; or that under which the king used to sit to hear God's
word, and see the sacrifices; which is called, the covert of the sabbath,
because the chief times in which the king used it for those ends, was the
weekly sabbath, and other solemn days of feasting, or fasting (which all come
under the name of sabbaths in the Old Testament) upon which the king used more
solemnly, to present himself before the Lord, than at other times.
The entry — By which the king used to go from
his palace to the temple.
── John Wesley《Explanatory Notes on 2 Kings》
16 Chapter 16
Verses 1-18
Verses 1-20
In the seventeenth year of Pekah.
A people’s king and priest, or kinghood and priesthood
I. The kinghood.
1. The de-humanising force of false religion. Ahaz was an idolator.
2. The national curse of a corrupt king-hood.
3. The mischievous issues of a temporary expediency. Ahaz, in order
to extricate himself from the difficulties and trials which Rezin and Pekah had
brought on his country, applies to the King of Assyria.
II. The priesthood.
Urijah is the priest. There seems to have been more than one of this name, and
nothing is known of him more than what is recorded in this chapter. He was a
priest, who at this time presided in the temple of Jerusalem. He seems to have
been influential in the State, and, although a professed monotheist, was in
somewhat close connection with Ahaz the idolatrous king. Two things are worthy of
note concerning him.
1. An obsequious obedence to the royal will. The Assyrian king having
taken Damascus, is followed by Ahaz to the city; in order, no doubt, to
congratulate him on his triumphs. While at Damascus, Ahaz is struck with the
beauty of an altar. He seems to have been so charmed with it that he commands
Urijah, his priest, to make one exactly like it.
2. An obsequious silence to the royal profanation. See what the king
did, no doubt, in the presence of the priest. This fawning, sacerdotal
sycophant not only “did according to all King Ahaz commanded,” but he stood by
silently and witnessed without a word of protest this spoliation of the holy
temple. (David Thomas, D. D.)
Verses 1-20
In the seventeenth year of Pekah.
A people’s king and priest, or kinghood and priesthood
I. The kinghood.
1. The de-humanising force of false religion. Ahaz was an idolator.
2. The national curse of a corrupt king-hood.
3. The mischievous issues of a temporary expediency. Ahaz, in order
to extricate himself from the difficulties and trials which Rezin and Pekah had
brought on his country, applies to the King of Assyria.
II. The priesthood.
Urijah is the priest. There seems to have been more than one of this name, and
nothing is known of him more than what is recorded in this chapter. He was a
priest, who at this time presided in the temple of Jerusalem. He seems to have
been influential in the State, and, although a professed monotheist, was in
somewhat close connection with Ahaz the idolatrous king. Two things are worthy of
note concerning him.
1. An obsequious obedence to the royal will. The Assyrian king having
taken Damascus, is followed by Ahaz to the city; in order, no doubt, to congratulate
him on his triumphs. While at Damascus, Ahaz is struck with the beauty of an
altar. He seems to have been so charmed with it that he commands Urijah, his
priest, to make one exactly like it.
2. An obsequious silence to the royal profanation. See what the king
did, no doubt, in the presence of the priest. This fawning, sacerdotal
sycophant not only “did according to all King Ahaz commanded,” but he stood by
silently and witnessed without a word of protest this spoliation of the holy
temple. (David Thomas, D. D.)
Verses 10-15
And King Ahaz went to Damascus . . . and saw an altar.
The cosmopolitan in religion
This is an incident familiar to all Bible students. You know that
King Ahaz, and it is saying a great deal, was about the most foolish and weak
king that ever sat upon the throne of Judah. After the time of Solomon the
kingdom was threatened by the neighbouring kingdom of Israel, which had made a
league with the King of Syria, whose centre was in Damascus. They had already
besieged Jerusalem ineffectually. It was the time when Isaiah the prophet was
carrying on his ministry in the holy city. He advised this weak and foolish
young man to have no fear whatever of the two powers that were leagued against
him, He described them in that uncomplimentary phrase of two “smoking stumps of
firebrands”--what you would describe as spent forces--and advised the young
king to be quiet, and trust in God. But trust in God was not original or clever
enough for Ahaz. He was one of the men who thought that you might trust in God
when you had exhausted every other resource. So, instead of trusting in God, he
proceeded to do the very opposite thing--to strip the temple of Jehovah of its
vessels of gold and silver, to strip its walls of the platings of gold, and to
send this gold, with some treasures from his own house, as a present to
Tiglath-pileser, the King of Assyria--the Roman Empire of that day, threatening
and menacing every other power--and he said: “I am thy son and thy servant;
come and save me out of the hands of the King of Israel and the King of Syria.”
And the device succeeded; the glittering gold secured the strong arm of the
Assyrian king. Tiglath-pileser conquered Syria, led away the king of it
captive, established some sort of a seat at Damascus; and Ahaz went up to visit
him, and while there turned things over in his own mind, and, thinking that
religion was very useful to a politician, he came across a heathen altar--an
elaborate and aesthetic
altar--and it occurred to him that it would be another original thing to
enlarge the original scope of the temple at Jerusalem, and to bring something
of an ornate character into its service, by erecting there an altar of the
exact pattern of the thing he had seen at Damascus. Having unfortunately a
creature who was supple and obedient, in Urijah the priest--the very opposite
of Isaiah the prophet--having
sent an exact pattern of the altar by special messenger to Jerusalem, his
assiduous and time-serving priest had it all ready by the time of his return.
It was put in the centre of the sanctuary, and now said King Ahaz to his supple
and accommodating religious functionary, “I am not going to desert the old
altar, it is to be kept on the premises, it is to be moved a little to the
north; the great altar is to take the central position, the altar with the
heathen embellishments upon it, with heathen and corrupt associations connected
with it, is to have the centre; but I am not going over to heathenism--God
forbid!--I have a very tender place in my heart for the old altar, and in the
day when trouble comes, and when perhaps this brilliant experiment in religion
has failed, in the day when darkness falls, the old altar will do for me to
inquire by.” He did not know that he was mocking God when he did that.
1. Have you met this man Ahaz? I have seen him. He is a type, and the
type is not extinct. He is like a man who has gone away from the Church that
gave him all that he was ever worth, and he says that he has not gone away from
it. The old altar is not put away, it is only in practice that he has gone over
to another Church--for family reasons, and for aesthetic considerations. I
think you have met the man, and know the type. The cosmopolitan in matters of
religion, the man who comes to you and raves about the wonders of Buddhism; and
he asks you if you have read the Vedas and the Zendavesta, and if you are acquainted
with Confucian philosophy, and if you know that there is really a great deal of
truth and merit in heathen religion. Now nobody would deny that this man had
made some sort of a discovery, as Ahaz did, but nobody sensible has ever
thought of denying that there is a certain element of truth in heathen
religions. God has not left Himself without witness; He has not been doing
nothing in the great heathen countries through all the ages; He has spoken here
and there; and there may be enough truth in a system to hold it together for
centuries. But you may be sure that the man who talks in this way has not on
the spot considered the product of heathen religion, and when he talks of the
picturesqueness of many heathen customs, he has forgotten the degradation and
the uncleanness and the shameful superstition and the unutterable cruelty and
lies that are connected with the religions that he praises. Either the
Christian religion was designed and destined to supersede and supplant all
others, or it was not, and we must make up our minds. Study comparative
religions if you will, but the man who studies the Christian religion, and digs
deeply into it, contents, will find a glory that takes to itself every
scattered ray of glory that is in every other religion, and repels all that is
base and degrading and unworthy. If the Christian religion is not intended to
supersede and supplant all others, if the faiths of the world were sufficient
by themselves to save the world, even the faith of Judah, with its doctrine of
one righteous and holy God, then the Incarnation was a superfluity, and the cross and bitter
passion of our Lord were altogether unnecessary, The cosmopolitan in religion
does not dig deeply enough into the glory that excels, to see that it does
excel all other light.
2. But I go on to speak, the next place, of this man as the type of a
man who will do anything, right or wrong, in order to succeed. Why did he erect
the Assyrian altar, or a pattern of it, in the temple at Jerusalem? Not because it
was false, or because it was true; the man did not understand religion a bit; it
was a kind of penny-in-the-slot business; them was magic in it; you did
something, and something came out of it, and he knew nothing better than that.
But he knew that this altar was the altar of a powerful nation, and that the men who
worshipped at it were succeeding, and there is where we make the mistake
to-day. We are worshipping success, right or wrong. Of course you want to
succeed; it would be exceedingly foolish on my part, and useless to suggest to
any man before me that he should not desire passionately the success of
anything with which he is connected. There is a danger of worshipping success
in the Christian Church, of sacrificing inward things for numbers and wealth in
the character of the Church. Naturally, I want my business to succeed, but I
want to know how the dividends are earned. That is a question that every
Christian man should ask. Naturally I want my party to succeed, but the party
had better journey in the wilderness for fifty years than sacrifice any of its
sincerity and its views for the sake of office. I would say in all earnestness that my ambition to
succeed, and yours, must in all things be strictly subordinated to our ambition
and purpose to do the will of God everywhere, and when we stand upon the
threshold of an enterprise we must not admit anything into it, if we know it,
that will clash with the will of God, and that will not be in accordance with
our conscience. What is religion? What do some people think it to be? Is it a
series of ecclesiastical and ceremonial operations, which God will accept as an
equivalent or a substitute for a man’s heart obedience? Is it an endeavour to
get the Most High over to your side, right or wrong? Is it not a feeling after
God, and finding Him, and then submitting the whole life, with all its
possibilities of success or failure to the absolute and undisputed authority,
and will of God?
3. I think I can see a little bit of a parable in this sad history.
There is a temple of God in the heart of every man here to-day which should be
kept inviolate for Him, and the golden vessels in it are the convictions that
God has created in your heart; and you must say, in the sight of God, “I will
not sacrifice one of these to ward off any impending danger, to buy over any
strong thing to my side; here I stand, I can no other; where God has placed me,
whatever comes.” I know what it means, I have graduated in business, and I know
it--how you are tempted to stretch a point here and there in the presence of
new combinations, in the presence of new competition and anti-Christian
customs. There is
a crisis coming on, and they tell you that if you will not bribe people and
drink with people, and do this, that, and the other, you will not succeed; and
you say, “I know it is abominable.” Will you whittle away the abominableness of
it until you make it fit for you to do it? Or will you say, “I can fail, but I
can’t stifle my conscience, and I cannot stifle the voice of God in my soul, I
cannot do evil that good may come.” Whenever you are tempted to do it, remember
the apostle’s words about the people who do it--it is a strong word, not a bit
too strong--“whose damnation is just.”
4. This is a man who, like many people to-day, tries to do an
impossible thing--to serve two masters--and he fails. He is going to keep in touch
with the true religion, and he is going to give the central place in life to
the religion that has only a grain of truth in it at best. He did not want to
cut himself adrift from the old religion; he had a great respect for it, and he
wanted to keep it on the premises, just as a man keeps a Bible on the premises.
He is going to resort to it in time of trouble; it is as great a comfort to him
as it is for him to know that there is a doctor somewhere in the vicinity if
illness should come. It would be too shocking to give up religion. Yes, but you
can relegate religion to the north side of the altar, and give it a subordinate
place, or you think you can, and you fail to see that you are mocking it. A
great many people say, “I like religion all very well in its place.” Where is
the place of religion? Some people think the proper place for religion is in
the pew, and it is to be left there with the hymn-book on Sundays, and returned
to when Sunday comes back again. We do not understand the heart of religion until
we understand that there is no place for religion in a man’s life unless it has
the first place, because the Lord Jesus Christ will not be one in a Pantheon of
many deities; it must be all or nothing. Not the main altar for business and
pleasure and fame, and a little comer on the north side for Jesus Christ; but
the supreme altar for Him, and He must govern your pleasures and your business.
Until we can say, “For me to live is Christ,” we have not come to the heart of
the Christian life. (C. Brown.)
The altar to “inquire by”
I call special attention to the last words--“and the brasen altar
shall be for me to inquire by.” Ahaz directed first of all that his own
offerings should be offered upon this new altar. He then commanded that the
offerings of the people, the morning and evening sacrifices as well as special
offerings, should be offered upon it. Nor did Ahaz stop here; for this is an
illustration of the fact that when we begin to interfere with God’s plan, and
to introduce into the divine economy of things our own improvements, we are
only beginning a course of action which will become more daring and irreverent
as time passes by.
1. Now I want you to observe how when once a man dares to interfere
with Divine ordinances, there is no telling where such a course will end. The
history of retrogression in this direction is a very striking one. Even Ahaz
would not have dared to do all he did at once; but having once erected a
heathen altar in the sanctuary of the God of Israel, the other things naturally
followed. The first stop was the one which prepared the way for every other
step. Ahaz had not been in sympathy with the worship of God from his earliest
days. He had entered more and more into alliance with heathen powers. He had
become a diplomatist in everything; even his religion had become a thing of
diplomacy. The result was that the great brazen altar upon which the nation had
offered its sacrifices for centuries was at length removed by him out of the
way, and an altar of his own making was made to take its place. But even now,
what did Ahaz say with regard to the old altar? Should it be removed right out
of the temple? No, the man was diplomatic still. “The brasen altar shall be for
me to inquire by.” Now this word 18 ambiguous, as ambiguous in the Hebrew as it
is in the English.
2. This conduct on the part of Ahaz in cautiously postponing the
final decision what he would do with the altar he readily thrust aside, exactly
illustrates what some men and women have done many a time. There are some here to-night
who remember their earliest days with strange and conflicting feelings. Their
earliest recollections ought to be to them exceedingly sacred. They remember
the hallowing influences which surrounded them in their early homes, when
simple piety reigned in that family. But possibly some of you have since then
gone out into the world, and have done what Ahaz did. You have formed
friendships with other men than those with whom your father would have
fraternised; but then you have known more of life, as you say, and you have
prospered more than your father ever did. As men of the world you laugh at the
simplicities of your ancestors, and smile at the little they knew of the
competitions of life, and how unequal they would be for the fight of to-day.
Your father, you freely admit, was a good man. There can be no doubt about
that; no one ever doubted his sincerity, his faith, for he was so childlike and
simple; but, poor man, so you think, he did not know as much as you do; and
then, after all, good as he was, hew as very narrow and bigoted in his views.
On the contrary, you have learned, you think, to realise that there is good in
everything. You favour all that because you say it is expansive, and shows
broad thought and profound sympathies; and just as Ahaz never thought for a
moment that he was worshipping other gods by his innovation, so you, with your broad
charity and expansive views, are bringing into the religion of Jesus Christ
what He never ordained, and after all think that the Spirit which inspired the
apostles is going on inspiring you, but that very much more is taught you in
this enlightened age than was ever taught them. Meanwhile, you have your
cultured view of the Cross. You will not thrust it away as a useless thing, but
you readily place it on one side. It is no longer the central fact of the
Gospel. Christ died for an example; He revealed His unselfishness. Yes, the old
altar must be put aside somewhere, somewhere on the north or the cold side, and
you will erect your altar from Damascus where the old altar used to be. But in
all this you do not want to commit yourselves finally. The thoughtful man, so
you think, is the man who always delays decision. Ahaz thought so too, if we
accept the first possible rendering of the words, for he practically said, “The
brasen altar shall be for me to think about. I will see where I will finally
put it. I am not quite sure that even now I have put it in its right place.” So
you say, “I do not think that even now the sacrifice of Christ and the story of
Calvary occupy just the proper niche.” They come in somewhere; but where, you
think it very difficult to decide. Meanwhile, to make sure, you will thrust it
aside and yet keep it within view; by and by you may see your way to have it
right outside the temple.
3. Perhaps you have done something else. It has not been to you a
question of opinion. You do not belong to these would-be clever and critical
people, but still you are a practical man of the world. You cannot enter into
the meaning of what they call higher criticism: you know nothing about it save
that you have seen a flippant leader in the daily press; and you are not
concerned about the discussion: you are business men, and cannot give time to
all that. The Bible may be all that your dear old father thought it was, for
all that you know; but then the world has its claims, you say, and you find that it will
not do in the interests of your trade or your profession to have the old Cross
placed too prominently, and the principles of the Cross observed too faithfully
in your daily life, and so you must thrust that a little aside and have another
altar that will be more respectable--one of the nondescript altars of Damascus.
It was just so with Ahaz. He had to think of the King of Assyria. Suppose the
King of Assyria paid him a visit: how very pained he would be to find there was
no altar there like his own; or, even if there was, that there was another
altar between it and the holy place, and thus precedence was given to that
other altar! Thus Ahaz had to consider matters as a practical man. He was a man
full of diplomatic wisdom. He knew that as long as he could keep in with the
King of Assyria things would probably be right. Why, then, should he sacrifice
all his prospects just for the sake of keeping that old altar in its right
place? Thus, off it had to go to the northern side.
4. But you tell me you cannot be a Christian and get on. Well, what
then? You reply that you must get on, that this is the highest necessity of
living. Is it? If you cannot be a Christian and succeed, then let success go.
Ah, but you reply that you must succeed. Very well, you follow just the track
of Ahaz. You must get on, must you? To that end you must get into alliance with
the world, and the spirit of the world, and ignore God and His altar. Face the
fact. You go into life and come into contact with men who sacrifice principle
upon the altar of gain in the profession or trade in which you are engaged. And
you say, “Other men do that, and I must do it in self-defence. I must build this
new altar, I must burn incense, not to God always, but burn incense upon the
altar of prosperity and worldly advancement. It pays others exceedingly well to
do this, and it should pay me.” This was precisely what Ahaz said with regard
to the kings of Syria (2 Chronicles 28:23)--“Because the
gods of the kings of Syria helped them, therefore will I sacrifice to them,
that they may help me.” I know that all this description may seem to many of
you to be exaggerated. Those of us who know something of the spiritual
condition of men and women know that there is nothing more common than this.
Think of it; look back over your conduct, and ask yourselves what you have done
that is distinctly a service to the Saviour. What have you ever said or done in
your life that would mark you out as a follower of Jesus Christ? How many a man
thinks of coming by and by to inquire by that altar upon which he has offered
no sacrifice! What is the altar upon which you offer your sacrifices? If it is
the altar of worldly success; then require of it. Be true to your convictions
and to your life.
Do not be mean, and only turn your back upon worldly pleasure when it has
turned its back upon you. Do not look to the world as long as the world can
further your purposes, always retaining a thought of God as a convenience for a
dark day or a troublous hour. That is the meanest and most degrading motive
that can take possession of the human heart. (D. Davies.)
Using God for emergencies
There is a blunt frankness about the transaction, almost amounting
to facetiousness, that interests one. The cool way in which the old heathen
altar is put in the front of the temple, while the brasen altar is ordered on
one side, yet not put out of sight, but reserved for special exigencies, when
the Damascus altar will not do, is very striking. Some men, having determined
to have the Assyrian altar in the place of Jehovah’s, would have commanded its
destruction as a thing whose use was past, and which it were well to put out of
sight. Not so Ahaz. He did not consider its use all gone. There might come a
time--very probably there would come a time--when the brasen altar would be of
essential service. Jehovah had many a time, through His prophets, come to the
help of His people, and had instructed them through His priests, and it were a
wise and good thing to keep the altar where, when occasion might demand it, he
could go and get the direction and the help that might not be obtained from the
Damascus altar’s service. It was a wise forecast, but a very base and wicked
one,--so base and wicked that such a man even as Ahaz was ought to have been
ashamed of it. (W. Aikman, D. D.)
──《The Biblical Illustrator》