{"commentary":{"id":"keil-delitzsch","name":"Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary","website":"https://worthy.bible/commentaries/keil-delitzsch-commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"bb5cc0f9cfe0a93b3c903bb6972c6bc8c4e9f2bd3be6c2a6d276737cf9c5edce","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":39,"totalNumberOfChapters":909,"totalNumberOfVerses":6516,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"1KI","commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","name":"1 Kings","commonName":"1 Kings","introduction":"The Books of Kings\n\nIntroduction\n\nContents- and Character- Origin and Sources- of the Books of the Kings.\n\nThe books of the Kings, which were but one book originally like the books of Samuel, and which like the latter, were divided into two books by the Alexandrian translators (see the Introduction to the books of Samuel), contain, in accordance with their name (מלכים), the history of the Israelitish theocracy under the kings, from the accession of Solomon to the extinction of the monarchy on the overthrow of the kingdom of Judah, when Jerusalem was destroyed by the Chaldaeans and the people were carried away into exile in Babylon. they embrace a period of 455 years, from 1015 to 560 b.c., that is to say, to the reign of the Babylonian king Evil-merodach. And as every kingdom culminates in its king, and the government of the kings determines the fate of the kingdom, the contents of the books before us, which are named after the kings of Israel, consist for the most part of a history of those kings; inasmuch as, whilst on the one hand the reigns of the several kings form the historical and chronological framework for the description of the historical development of the people and kingdom, on the other hand the leading phases which the monarchy assumed furnish the basis of the three periods, into which the history of this epoch and the contents of our books are divided.\n\nThe first period (1015-975 b.c.) embraces the forty years of Solomon's reign over the undivided kingdom of the twelve tribes of Israel, when the Israelitish kingdom of God stood at the summit of its earthly power and glory; though towards the end of this period it began to decline inasmuch as the rebellion of Solomon against the Lord in the closing years of his reign prepared the way for the rebellion of the ten tribes against the house of David. - The second period commences with the division of the one kingdom into the two kingdoms, Israel (or the ten tribes) and Judah, and stretches over the whole period during which these two kingdoms existed side by side, terminating with the destruction of the kingdom of the ten tribes by the Assyrians, i.e., from 975 to 722 b.c. - The third period embraces the still remaining years of the continuance of the kingdom of Judah, until its eventual dissolution by the Chaldaeans and the carrying away of the people into exile in Babylon, viz., from 722 to 560 b.c.\n\nThe first part of our books (1 Kings 1-11) therefore contains a description of the reign of Solomon, (a) in its commencement, viz., his ascent of the throne and the consolidation of his power (1 Kings 1 and 2); (b) in the gradual development of the strength and glory of his government, by his marriage, his sacrifice and prayer at Gibeon, his judicial wisdom, and his court (1 Kings 3:1-5:14)-also by the building of the temple and royal palace and the dedication of the temple (1 Kings 5:15-9:9), by the erection of his other edifices and the introduction of navigation and commerce (1 Kings 9:10-28), by the spreading abroad of the fame of his wisdom, and by the increase of his wealth (1 Kings 10); and (c) in its eventual decline in consequence of the sin into which the aged monarch fell through his polygamy and idolatry (1 Kings 11). The second part opens with an account of the falling away of the ten tribes from the royal family of David, and relates in a synchronistic narrative the history of the two kingdoms in the three stages of their development: viz., (a) the early enmity between the two, from Jeroboam to Omri of Israel (1 Kings 12:1-16:28); (b) the establishment of friendship and intermarriage between the two royal houses under Ahab and his sons, down to the destruction of the two kings Joram of Israel and Ahaziah of Judah by Jehu (1 Kings 16:29-2 Kings 10); (c) the renewal of hostilities between the two kingdoms, from Jehu's ascent of the throne in Israel and Athaliah's usurpation of the throne in Judah to the overthrow of the kingdom of Israel in the sixth year of Hezekiah's reign in Judah (2 Kings 11-17). And, lastly, the third part contains the history of the kingdom of Judah from Hezekiah to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldaeans, and carries it down to the thirty-seventh year of the imprisonment of king Jehoiachin in exile (2 Kings 18-25).\n\nNow, although the history of the kings, or the account of both the duration and character of their reigns, and also of their various enterprises, so far as they promoted or hindered the progress of the kingdom of God, forms the principal substance of these books, they do not consist of a mere chronicle of the deeds and fortunes of the several kings, but describe at the same time the ministry of the prophets in the two kingdoms, and that to some extent in so elaborate a manner, that whilst some have discovered in this a peculiarly \"prophetico-didactic purpose\" (Hvernick, De Wette, etc.), others regard it as an endeavour \"to set forth the history of the Israelitish and Jewish kings in its relation to the demands, the doings, the proclamations, and the predictions of the prophets, from Solomon to the Babylonian exile\" (Kern). But however unmistakable the prophetico-didactic character may be, which the books of Kings have in common with the whole of the historical writings of the Old Testament, a closer investigation of their character will show that there is no ground for the assertion that there is any prophetico-didactic purpose in the mode in which the history is written. For the account of the ministry of the prophets is introduced into the history of the kings as the spiritual leaven which pervaded the Israelitish monarchy from the beginning to the end, and stamped upon its development the character of the theocracy or divine rule in Israel. Jehovah, as the invisible but yet real King of the covenant nation, had created the peculiar instruments of His Spirit in the prophets who maintained His law and right before the kings, standing by their side to advise and direct, or to warn and punish, and, wherever it was necessary, proving their utterances to be words of God by signs and wonders which they did before the people. Thus the Lord directed the prophet Samuel to anoint Saul and David princes over His people, and the prophet Nathan to communicate to David the promise of the everlasting endurance of his throne (2 Sam 7). But when at a later period David sinned (2 Sam 11 and 24), it was the prophets Nathan and Gad who threatened him with punishment from God, and on his confession of sin and repentance announced the forgiveness and favour of God (Sa2 12:1-15; Sa2 24:11-19). Through the medium of the prophet Nathan, Solomon was also appointed the successor of David upon the throne (Sa2 12:25), and not only anointed king, but installed in defiance of the machinations of Adonijah (1 Kings 1). But since the monarchy was transmitted from Solomon in a direct line through his descendants by virtue of the divine promise in 2 Sam 7, it is only in connection with important enterprises, or when the kingdom is involved in difficulties, that we find the prophets coming forward in after times to help or advise those kings who walked in the ways of the Lord; whereas under the idolatrous and godless rulers they offer, in the power of God, such energetic resistance to idolatry and to everything evil and ungodly, that princes and people are compelled to bow before them and succumb to their divine words. In this way the prophets accompanied the monarchy in all its course from Solomon to the Captivity as guardians of the rights of the God-King, and as interpreters of His counsel and will. Under Solomon, indeed, there was apparently a long period, during which prophecy fell into the background; since the Lord Himself not only appeared to this king in a dream at Gibeon shortly after he ascended the throne, but also appeared to him a second time after the dedication of the temple, and promised him the fulfilment of his prayers, and the glorification and eternal continuance of his kingdom, on condition of his faithful observance of the divine commands (Kg1 3:5., Kg1 9:1.). But towards the end of his reign it rose up again in all the more threatening attitude, against the king who was then disposed to fall away from Jehovah. It was no doubt a prophet who announced to him the separation of ten parts of his kingdom (Kg1 11:11.)-possibly the same Ahijah who promised Jeroboam the government over ten tribes (Kg1 11:29.). But after the division of the kingdom, when Jeroboam proceeded, in order to fortify his throne, to make the political division into a religious one, and to this end exalted the image-worship into the state religion, the prophets continued to denounce this apostasy and proclaim to the sinful kings the destruction of their dynasties. And when at a still later period Ahab the son of Omri, and his wife Jezebel, endeavoured to make the Phoenician worship of Baal and Asherah into the national religion in Israel, Elijah the Tishbite, \"the prophet as fire, whose words burned as a torch\" (Ecclus. 48:1), came forward with the irresistible power of God and maintained a victorious conflict against the prophets and servants of Baal, warding off the utter apostasy of the nation by uniting the prophets into societies, in which the worship of God was maintained, and the godly in Israel were supplied with a substitute for that legal worship in the temple which was enjoyed by the godly in Judah. And in the kingdom of Judah also where were never wanting prophets to announce the judgments of the Lord to idolatrous kings, and to afford a vigorous support to the pious and God-fearing rulers in their endeavours to promote the religious life of the nation, and to exalt the public worship of God in the temple. But since the kingdom of Judah possessed the true sanctuary, with the legal worship and an influential body of priests and Levites; and since, moreover, the monarchy of the house of David was firmly established by divine promises resting upon that house, and among the kings who sat upon the throne, from Rehoboam onwards, there were many godly rulers who were distinguished for their lofty virtues as governors; the labours of the prophets did not assume the same prominent importance here as they did in the kingdom of the ten bribes, where they had to fight against idolatry from the beginning to the end.\n\nThis explains the fact that the ministry of the prophets assumes so prominent a position in the books of the Kings, whereas the history of the kings appears sometimes to fall into the background in comparison. Nevertheless the historical development of the monarchy, or, to express it more correctly, of the kingdom of God under the kings, forms the true subject-matter of our books. It was not a prophetico-didactic purpose, but the prophetico-historical point of view, which prevailed throughout the whole work, and determined the reception as well as the treatment of the historical materials. The progressive development of the kingdom was predicted and described by the Lord Himself in the promise communicated to David by the prophet Nathan: \"And when thy days shall be fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will set up thy seed after thee, which shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name; and I will stablish the throne of his kingdom for ever. I will be his Father, and he shall be my son, that if he go astray, I may chasten him with man's rod, and with stripes of the children of men; but my mercy will not depart from him, as I caused it to depart from Saul, whom I put away before thee. And thy house and thy kingdom shall be for ever before thee, thy throne will be established for ever\" (Sa2 7:12-16). This thoroughly glorious promise forms the red thread which runs through the history of the kings from Solomon to the Babylonian captivity, and constitutes the leading idea in the record of this history in our books. The author's intention is to show in the history of the kings how the Lord fulfilled this gracious word, how He first of all chastised the seed of David for its transgressions, and then cast it off, though not for ever. To this end he shows in the history of Solomon, how, notwithstanding the usurpation of the throne attempted by Adonijah, Solomon received the whole of his father's kingdom, as the seed of David promised by the Lord, and established his power; how the Lord at the very beginning of his reign renewed to him at Gibeon the promise made to his father on the condition of his faithful observance of His law, and in answer to his prayer gave him not only a wise and understanding heart, but also riches and honour, so that his equal was not to be found among all the kings of the earth (1 Kings 1:1-5:14); how Solomon then carried out the work of building the temple, entrusted to him by his father according to the will of the Lord; and how, after it was finished, the Lord again assured him of the fulfilment of that promise (1 Kings 5:15-9:9); and, lastly, how Solomon, having attained to the highest earthly glory, through the completion of the rest of his buildings, through the great renown of his wisdom, which had reached to nations afar off, and through his great riches, acquired partly by marine commerce and trade, and partly from tributes and presents, forgot his God, who had bestowed this glory upon him, and in his old age was led astray into unfaithfulness towards the Lord through his numerous foreign wives, and had at last to listen to this sentence from God: \"Because thou hast not kept my covenant and my statutes, which I have commanded thee, I will surely rend the kingdom from thee, and give it to thy servant: notwithstanding in thy days I will not do it, for David thy father's said; but I will rend it out of the hand of thy son. Howbeit I will not rend away all thy kingdom; but will give one tribe to thy son for David my servant's sake, and for Jerusalem's sake which I have chosen\" (1 Kings 9:10-11:13). Thus, because God had promised to the seed of David the eternal possession of the throne (Sa2 7:12.), one portion of the kingdom was to be left to the son of Solomon, with the chosen city of Jerusalem, and his servant (Jeroboam, Kg1 11:26-40) was only to obtain dominion over ten tribes. The historical realization of this prophecy is shown in the history of the two divided kingdoms.\n\nIn the synchronistic account of these kingdoms, according to the principle already adopted in the book of Genesis, of disposing of the subordinate lines of the patriarchs before proceeding with the main line, the reigns of the kings of Israel are described before those of the contemporaneous kings of Judah, and to some extent in a more elaborate manner. The reason of this, however, is, that the history of the kingdom of Israel, in which one dynasty overthrew another, whilst all the rulers walked in the sin of Jeroboam, and Ahab even added the worship of Baal to that sin, supplied the author with more materials for the execution of his plan than that of the kingdom of Judah, which had a much quieter development under the rule of the house of David, and of which, therefore, there was less to relate. Apart from this, all the events of the kingdom of Judah which are of any importance in relation to the progress of the kingdom of God, are just as elaborately described as those connected with the kingdom of Israel; and the author does equal justice to both kingdoms, showing how the Lord manifested Himself equally to both, and bore with them with divine long-suffering and grace. But the proof of this necessarily assumed different forms, according to the different attitudes which they assumed towards the Lord. Jeroboam, the founder of the kingdom of Israel, when told that he would be king over the ten tribes, had received the promise that Jehovah would be with him, and build him a lasting house as He built for David, and give Israel to him, on condition that he would walk in the ways of God (Kg1 11:37-38). This implied that his descendants would rule over Israel (of the ten tribes) so long as this kingdom should stand; for it was not to last for ever, but the separation would come to an end, and therefore he is not promised the everlasting continuance of his kingdom (see at Kg1 11:38). But Jeroboam did not fulfil this condition, nor did any of the rulers of Israel who succeeded him. Nevertheless the Lord had patience with the kings and tribes who were unfaithful to His law, and not only warned them continually by His prophets, and chastised them by threats of punishment and by the fulfilment of those threats upon the kings and all the people, but repeatedly manifested His favour towards them for the sake of His covenant with Abraham (Kg2 13:23), to lead them to repentance-until the time of grace had expired, when the sinful kingdom fell and the ten tribes were carried away to Media and Assyria. - In the kingdom of David, on the contrary, the succession to the throne was promised to the house of David for all time: therefore, although the Lord caused those who were rebellious to be chastised by hostile nations, yet, for His servant David's sake, He left a light shining to the royal house, since He did not punish the kings who were addicted to idolatry with the extermination of their family (Kg1 15:4; Kg2 8:19); and even when the wicked Athaliah destroyed all the royal seed, He caused Joash, the infant son of Ahaziah, to be saved and raised to the throne of his fathers (2 Kings 11). Consequently this kingdom was able to survive that of the ten tribes for an entire period, just because it possessed a firm political basis in the uninterrupted succession of the Davidic house, as it also possessed a spiritual basis of no less firmness in the temple which the Lord had sanctified as the place where His name was revealed. After it had been brought to the verge of destruction by the godless Ahaz, it received in Hezekiah a king who did what was right in the eyes of Jehovah, as his father David had done, and in the severe oppression which he suffered at the hands of the powerful army of the proud Sennacherib, took refuge in the Lord, who protected and saved Jerusalem, \"for His own and His servant David's sake,\" at the prayer of the pious king of Jerusalem (Kg2 19:34; Kg2 20:6). But when at length, throughout the long reign of Manasseh the idolater, apostasy and moral corruption prevailed to such an extent in Judah also, that even the pious Josiah, with the reformation of religion which he carried out with the greatest zeal, could only put down the outward worship of idols, and was unable to effect any thorough conversion of the people to the Lord their God, and the Lord as the Holy One of Israel was obliged to declare His purpose of rejecting Judah from before His face on account of the sins of Manasseh, and to cause that purpose to be executed by Nebuchadnezzar (Kg2 23:26-27; Kg2 24:3-4); Jehoiachin was led away captive to Babylon, and under Zedekiah the kingdom was destroyed with the burning of Jerusalem and the temple. Yet the Lord did not suffer the light to be altogether extinguished to His servant David; but when Jehoiachin had pined in captivity at Babylon for thirty-seven years, expiating his own and his fathers' sins, he was liberated from his captivity by Nebuchadnezzar's son, and raised to honour once more (Kg2 25:27-30). - The account of this joyful change in the condition of Jehoiachin, with which the books of the Kings close, forms so essential a part of their author's plan, that without this information the true conclusion to his work would be altogether wanting. For this event shed upon the dark night of the captivity the first ray of a better future, which was to dawn upon the seed of David, and with it upon the whole nation in its eventual redemption from Babylon, and was also a pledge of the certain fulfilment of the promise that the Lord would not for ever withdraw His favour from the seed of David.\n\n(Note: Sthelin makes the following remark in his Einleitung (p.122): \"The books of the Kings form an antithesis to the history of David. As the latter shows how obedience to God and to the utterances of His prophets is rewarded, and how, even when Jehovah is obliged to punish, He makes known His grace again in answer to repentance; so do the books of the Kings, which relate the overthrow of both the Hebrew states, teach, through the history of these two kingdoms, how glorious promises are thrown back and dynasties fall in consequence of the conduct of individual men (compare Kg1 11:38 with Kg1 14:10, and still more with Kg2 21:10. and Kg2 23:27). The sins of one man like Manasseh are sufficient to neutralize all the promises that have been given to the house of David.\" There is no need to refute this erroneous statement, since it only rests upon a misinterpretation of Kg2 21:10., and completely misses the idea which runs through both books of the Kings; and, moreover, there is no contradiction between the manifestation of divine mercy towards penitent sinners and the punishment of men according to their deeds.)\n\nThus the books of the Kings bring down the history of the Old Testament kingdom of God, according to the divine plan of the kingdom indicated in 2 Sam 7, from the close of David's reign to the captivity; and the fact that in Kg1 1:1 they are formally attached to the books of Samuel is an indication that they are a continuation of those books. Nevertheless there is no doubt that they formed from the very first a separate work, the independence and internal unity of which are apparent from the uniformity of the treatment of the history as well as from the unity of the language. From beginning to end the author quotes from his original sources, for the most part with certain standing formulas; in all important events he gives the chronology carefully (Kg1 6:1, Kg1 6:37-38; Kg1 7:1; Kg1 9:10; Kg1 11:42; Kg1 14:20-21, Kg1 14:25; Kg1 15:1-2, Kg1 15:9-10, etc.); he judges the conduct of the kings throughout according to the standard of the law of Moses (Kg1 2:3; Kg1 3:14; Kg2 10:31; Kg2 11:12; Kg2 14:6; Kg2 17:37; Kg2 18:6; Kg2 21:8; Kg2 22:8., Kg2 23:3, Kg2 23:21, etc.); and he nearly always employs the same expressions when describing the commencement, the character, and the close of each reign, as well as the death and burial of the kings (compare Kg1 11:43; Kg1 14:20, Kg1 14:31; Kg1 15:8, Kg1 15:24; Kg1 22:51; Kg2 8:24; Kg2 13:9; Kg2 14:29; and for the characteristics of the several kings of Judah, Kg1 15:3, Kg1 15:11; Kg1 22:43; Kg2 12:3; Kg2 14:3; Kg2 15:3, etc.; and for those of the kings of Israel, Kg1 14:8; Kg1 15:26, Kg1 15:34; Kg1 16:19, Kg1 16:26, Kg1 16:30; Kg1 22:53; Kg2 3:2-3; Kg2 10:29, Kg2 10:31; Kg2 13:2, Kg2 13:11, etc.). And so, again, the language of the books remains uniform in every part of the work, if we except certain variations occasioned by the differences in the sources employed; since we find throughout isolated expressions and forms of a later date, and words traceable to the Assyrian and Chaldaean epoch, such as כּר for חמר in Kg1 5:11; צדנין in Kg1 11:33; רצין in Kg2 11:13; מדינות in Kg1 20:14-15, Kg1 20:17, Kg1 20:19; קבל in Kg2 15:10; החילים שׂרי in Kg1 15:20; Kg2 25:23, Kg2 25:26; טבּחים רב in Kg2 25:8; פּחה in Kg1 10:15; Kg1 20:24; Kg2 18:24; and many others, which do not occur in the earlier historical books. - The books of the Kings are essentially distinguished from the books of Samuel through these characteristic peculiarities; but not so much through the quotations which are so prominent in the historical narrative, for these are common to all the historical books of the Old Testament, and are only more conspicuous in these books, especially in the history of the kings of the two kingdoms, because in the case of all the kings, even of those in relation to whom there was nothing to record of any importance to the kingdom of God except the length and general characteristics of their reign, there are notices of the writings which contain further information concerning their reigns. - The unity of authorship is therefore generally admitted, since, as De Wette himself acknowledges, \"you cannot anywhere clearly detect the interpolation or combination of different accounts.\" The direct and indirect contradictions, however, which Thenius imagines that he has discovered, prove to be utterly fallacious on a closer inspection of the passages cited as proofs, and could only have been obtained through misinterpretations occasioned by erroneous assumptions. (See, on the other hand, my Lehrbuch der Einleitung in das A. T. p. 184ff.)\n\nAll that can be determined with certainty in relation to the origin of the books of Kings is, that they were composed in the second half of the Babylonian captivity, and before its close, since they bring the history down to that time, and yet contain no allusion to the deliverance of the people out of Babylon. The author was a prophet living in the Babylonian exile, though not the prophet Jeremiah, as the earlier theologians down to Hvernick have assumed from the notice in the Talmud (Baba bathra, f. 15, 1): Jeremias scripsit librum suum et librum Regum et Threnos. For even apart from the fact that Jeremiah ended his days in Egypt, he could hardly have survived the last event recorded in our books, namely, the liberation of Jehoiachin from prison, and his exaltation to royal honours by Evil-merodach. For inasmuch as this event occurred sixty-six years after his call to be a prophet, in the thirteenth year of Josiah, he would have been eighty-six years old in the thirty-seventh year after Jehoiachin had been carried away into exile, even if he had commenced his prophetic career when only a young man of twenty years of age. Now, even if he had reached this great age, he would surely not have composed our books at a later period still. Moreover, all that has been adduced in support of this is seen to be inconclusive on closer inspection. The similarity in the linguistic character of our books and that of the writings of Jeremiah, the sombre view of history which is common to the two, the preference apparent in both for phrases taken from the Pentateuch, and the allusions to earlier prophecies-all these peculiarities may be explained, so far as they really exist, partly from the fact that they were written in the same age, since all the writers of the time of the captivity and afterwards cling very closely to the Pentateuch and frequently refer to the law of Moses, and partly also from the circumstance that, whilst Jeremiah was well acquainted with the original sources of our books, viz., the annals of the kingdom of Judah, the author of our books was also well acquainted with the prophecies of Jeremiah. But the relation between Kg2 24:18. and Jer is not of such a nature, that these two accounts of the destruction of Jerusalem and the carrying away of the remnant of the people could have emanated from the hand of Jeremiah; on the contrary, a closer inspection clearly shows that they are extracts from a more elaborate description of this catastrophe (see at Kg2 24:18.).\n\nAs sources from which the author has obtained his accounts, there are mentioned, for the history of Solomon, a שּׁלמה דּברי ספר, or book of the acts (affairs) of Solomon (Kg1 11:41); for the history of the kings of Judah, יהוּדה למלכי הימים דּברי ספר, book of the daily occurrences of the kings of Judah (Kg1 14:29; Kg1 15:7, Kg1 15:23; Kg1 22:46; Kg2 8:23; Kg2 12:20, etc.); and for that of the kings of Israel, ישׂראל למלכי הימים דּברי ספר, book of the daily occurrences of the kings of Israel (Kg1 14:19; Kg1 15:31; Kg1 16:5, Kg1 16:14, Kg1 16:20, Kg1 16:27; Kg1 22:39; Kg2 1:18). These are quoted as writings in which more is written concerning the life, the deeds, and the particular undertakings, buildings and so forth, of the several kings. The two last-named works were evidently general annals of the kingdoms: not, indeed, the national archives of the two kingdoms, or official records made by the מזכּירים of the reigns and acts of the kings, as Jahn, Movers, Sthelin, and others suppose; but annals composed by prophets, and compiled partly from the public year-books of the kingdom or the national archives, and partly from prophetic monographs and collections of prophecies, which reached in the kingdom of Israel down to the time of Pekah (Kg2 15:31), and in that of Judah to the time of Jehoiakim (Kg2 24:5). Moreover, they were not written successively by different prophets, who followed one another, and so carried on the work in uninterrupted succession from the rise of the two kingdoms to the death of the two kings mentioned; but they had been worked out into a \"Book of the history of the times of the Kings\" for each of the two kingdoms, a short time before the overthrow of the kingdom of Judah, by collecting together the most important things that had been written both concerning the reigns of the several kings by annalists and other historians who were contemporaneous with the events, and also concerning the labours of the prophets, which were deeply interwoven with the course of public affairs, whether composed by themselves or by their contemporaries. And in this finished form they lay before the author of our work. This view of the annals of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel follows unquestionably from the agreement which exists between our books of the Kings and the second book of the Chronicles, in the accounts common to both, and which can only be explained from the fact that they were drawn from one and the same source. But in the Chronicles there are different writings of individual prophets quoted, beside the day-books of the kings of Judah and Israel; and it is expressly stated in relation to some of them that they were received into the annals of the kings (compare Ch2 20:34 and Ch2 32:32, and the Introduction to the books of the Chronicles). Moreover, there are no historical traces of public annalists to be found in the kingdom of the ten tribes, and their existence is by no means probable, on account of the constant change of dynasties. The fact, however, that the frequently recurring formula \"to this day\" (Kg1 9:13; Kg1 10:12; Kg2 2:22; Kg2 10:27; Kg2 14:7; Kg2 16:6; Kg2 17:23, Kg2 17:34, Kg2 17:41; Kg2 20:17; Kg2 21:15) never refers to the time of the captivity, except in the passages enclosed in brackets, but always to the time of the existing kingdom of Judah, and that it cannot therefore have emanated from the author of our books of the Kings, but can only have been taken from the sources employed, is a proof that these annals of the kingdom were composed towards the close of the kingdom of Judah; and this is placed beyond all doubt, by the fact that this formula is also found in many passages of the books of the Chronicles (compare Kg1 8:8 with Ch2 5:9; Kg1 9:21 with Ch2 8:8; Kg1 12:19 with Ch2 10:19; and Kg2 8:22 with Ch2 21:10). - In a similar manner to this must we explain the origin of the שּׁלמה דּברי ספר, since three prophetic writings are quoted in Ch1 29:29 in connection with Solomon's reign, and their account agrees in all essential points with the account in the books of the Kings. Nevertheless this \"history of Solomon\" never formed a component part of the annals of the two kingdoms, and was certainly written much earlier. - The assumption that there were other sources still, is not only sustained by no historical evidence, but has no certain support in the character or contents of the writings before us. If the annals quoted were works composed by prophets, the elaborate accounts of the working of the prophets Elijah and Elisha might also have been included in them. - Again, in the constant allusion to these annals we have a sure pledge of the historical fidelity of the accounts that have been taken from them. If in his work the author followed writings which were composed by prophets, and also referred his readers to these writings, which were known and accessible to his contemporaries, for further information, he must have been conscious of the faithful and conscientious employment of them. And this natural conclusion is in harmony with the contents of our books. The life and actions of the kings are judged with unfettered candour and impartiality, according to the standard of the law of God; and there is no more concealment of the idolatry to which the highly renowned Solomon was led astray by his foreign wives, than of that which was right in the eyes of God, when performed by the kings of the ten tribes, which had fallen away from the house of David. Even in the case of the greatest prophet of all, namely Elijah, the weakness of his faith","order":11,"numberOfChapters":22,"sha256":"58b0dcfb6399324d9958a1b0d99d90cfbb6615327995e64837aaf6496ed8e6ec","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/1KI/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"1KI","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":22,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/1KI/22.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"1KI","chapter":22},"totalNumberOfVerses":122},"chapter":{"number":22,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":1,"content":["Allied Campaign of Ahab and Jehoshaphat against the Syrians at Ramoth, and Death of Ahab (compare 2 Chron 18:2-34). - Kg1 22:1. \"And they rested three years; there was no war between Aram and Israel,\" ישׁב here is to keep quiet, to undertake nothing, as in Jdg 5:17, etc. The subject to ויּשׁבוּ is Aram and Israel mentioned in the second clause. The length of time given here points back to the end of the war described in 1 Kings 20.\nKg1 22:2-4\nIn the third year (not necessarily \"towards the end of it,\" as Thenius supposes, for Jehoshaphat's visit preceded the renewal of the war) Jehoshaphat visited the king of Israel, with whom he had already formed a marriage alliance by marrying his son to Ahab's daughter (Ch2 18:1; Kg2 8:18). Ahab then said to his servants that the king of Syria had kept the city of Ramoth in Gilead (probably situated on the site of the present Szalt: see at Deu 4:43), which he ought to have given up, according to the conditions of the peace in Kg1 20:34, and asked Jehoshaphat whether he would go with him to the war against Ramoth, which the latter promised to do. \"I as thou, my people as thy people, my horses as thy horses;\" i.e., I am at thy service with the whole of my military power. In the place of the last words we have therefore in the Chronicles ועמך בּמּלחמה, \"I am with thee in the war,\" i.e., I will assist thee in the war.\nKg1 22:5-7\nBut as Jehoshaphat wished also to inquire the word of the Lord concerning the war, Ahab gathered together about 400 prophets, who all predicted as out of one mouth a prosperous result to the campaign. These 400 prophets are neither the 400 prophets of Asherah who had not appeared upon Carmel when Elijah was there (Kg1 18:19-20), nor prophets of Baal, as some of the earlier commentators supposed, since Ahab could not inquire of them את־דּבר יהוה. On the other hand, they were not \"true prophets of Jehovah and disciples of the prophets\" (Cler., Then.), but prophets of Jehovah worshipped under the image of an ox, who practised prophesying as a trade without any call from God, and even if they were not in the pay of the idolatrous kings of Israel, were at any rate in their service. For Jehoshaphat did not recognise them as genuine prophets of Jehovah, but inquired whether there was not such a prophet still in existence (Kg1 22:7), that they might inquire the will of the Lord of him (מאותו).\nKg1 22:8\nAhab then named to him one, but one whom he hated, because he never prophesied good concerning him, but only evil,\n(Note: Just as Agamemnon says to Calchas in Il. iv. 106: μάντι κακῶν, ου ̓ πώποτέ μοι τὸ κρήγουν εἶπας, κ.τ.λ.)\nnamely, Micah the son of Jimlah. Josephus and the Rabbins suppose him to have been the prophet, whose name is not given, who had condemned Ahab in the previous war for setting Benhadad at liberty (Kg1 20:35.). But there is no foundation for this, and it is mere conjecture. At any rate, Ahab had already come to know Micah as a prophet of evil, and, as is evident from Kg1 22:26, had had him imprisoned on account of an unwelcome prophecy. Ahab's dislike to this prophet had its root in the belief, which was connected with heathen notions of prophecy and conjuring, that the prophets stood in such a relation to the Deity that the latter necessarily fulfilled their will; a belief which had arisen from the fact that the predictions of true prophets always came to pass (see at Num 22:6 and Num 22:17).\nKg1 22:9\nBy Jehoshaphat's desire, Ahab nevertheless sent a chamberlain (סריס; see at Sa1 8:15 and Gen 37:36) to fetch Micah (מהרה, bring quickly).\nKg1 22:10-12\nIn the meantime the prophets of the calves continued to prophesy success before the two kings, who sat upon thrones \"clothed in robes,\" i.e., in royal attire, upon a floor in front of the gate of Samaria. גּרן, a threshing-floor, i.e., a levelled place in the open air. In order to give greater effect to their announcement, one of them, named Zedekiyah the son of Cnaanah, made himself iron horns, probably iron spikes held upon the head (Thenius), and said, \"With these wilt thou thrust down Aram even to destruction.\" This symbolical action was an embodiment of the figure used by Moses in the blessing of Joseph (Deu 33:17): \"Buffalo horns are his (Joseph's) horns, with them he thrusts down nations\" (vid., Hengstenberg, Beitrr. ii. p. 131), and was intended to transfer to Ahab in the case before them that splendid promise which applied to the tribe of Ephraim. But the pseudo-prophet overlooked the fact that the fulfilment of the whole of the blessing of Moses was dependent upon fidelity to the Lord. All the rest of the prophets adopted the same tone, saying, \"Go to Ramoth, and prosper,\" i.e., and thou wilt prosper. (On this use of two imperatives see Ges. 130, 2).\nKg1 22:13-14\nThe messenger who fetched Micah tried on the way to persuade him to prophesy success to the king as the other prophets had done; but Micah replied with a solemn oath, that he would only speak what Jehovah said to him.\nKg1 22:15-17\nMicah's prophecy concerning the war, and his testimony against the lying prophets. - Kg1 22:15, Kg1 22:16. When Micah had come into the presence of the king, he replied to his question, \"Shall we go against Ramoth?\" etc., in just the same words as the pseudo-prophets, to show the king how he would speak if he were merely guided by personal considerations, as the others were. From the verbal agreement in his reply, and probably also from the tone in which he spoke, Ahab perceived that his words were ironical, and adjured him to speak only truth in the name of Jehovah. Micah then told him what he had seen in the spirit (Kg1 22:17): \"I saw all Israel scatter itself upon the mountains, as sheep that have no shepherd;\" and then added the word of the Lord: \"These have no master; let them return every one to his house in peace.\" That is to say, Ahab would fall in the war against Ramoth in Gilead, and his army scatter itself without a leader upon the mountains of Gilead, and then every one would return home, without being pursued and slain by the enemy. Whilst Zedekiyah attempted to give greater emphasis to his prophecy by symbolically transferring to Ahab's enterprise the success predicted by Moses, Micah, on the other hand, showed to the king out of the law that would really take place in the intended war, namely, that very state of things which Moses before his departure sought to avert from Israel, by the prayer that the Lord would set a man over the congregation to lead them out and in, that the congregation might not become as sheep that have no shepherd (Num 27:16-17).\nKg1 22:18\nBut although Ahab had asked for a true word of the Lord, yet he endeavoured to attribute the unfavourable prophecy to Micah's persona enmity, saying to Jehoshaphat, \"Did I not tell thee that he prophesies nothing good concerning me, but only evil (misfortune)?\" \nKg1 22:19-25\nMicah was not led astray, however, by this, but disclosed to him by a further revelation the hidden ground of the false prophecy of his 400 prophets. וגו שׁמע לכן, \"therefore, sc. because thou thinkest so, hear the word of Jehovah: I saw the Lord sit upon His throne, and all the army of heaven stand around him (עליו עמד as in Gen 18:8, etc.) on His right hand and on His left. And the Lord said, Who will persuade Ahab to go up and fall at Ramoth in Gilead? and one spake so, the other so; and the spirit came forth (from the ranks of the rest), stood before Jehovah, and said, I will persuade him...I will go out and be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets. And He (Jehovah) said, Persuade, and thou wilt also be able; go forth and do so. And now Jehovah has put a lying spirit into the mouth of all his prophets; but Jehovah (Himself) has spoken evil (through me) concerning thee.\" The vision described by Micah was not merely a subjective drapery introduced by the prophet, but a simple communication of the real inward vision by which the fact had been revealed to him, that the prophecy of those 400 prophets was inspired by a lying spirit. The spirit (הרוּח) which inspired these prophets as a lying spirit is neither Satan, nor any evil spirit whatever, but, as the definite article and the whole of the context show, the personified spirit of prophecy, which is only so far a πνεῦμα ἀκάθαρτον τῆς πλάνης (Zac 13:2; Jo1 4:6) and under the influence of Satan as it works as שׁקר רוּח in accordance with the will of God. For even the predictions of the false prophets, as we may see from the passage before us, and also from Zac 13:2 and the scriptural teaching in other passages concerning the spiritual principle of evil, were not mere inventions of human reason and fancy; but the false prophets as well as the true were governed by a supernatural spiritual principle, and, according to divine appointment, were under the influence of the evil spirit in the service of falsehood, just as the true prophets were moved by the Holy Spirit in the service of the Lord. The manner in which the supernatural influence of the lying spirit upon the false prophets is brought out in Micah's vision is, that the spirit of prophecy (רוח הנבואה) offers itself to deceive Ahab as שׁקר רוּח in the false prophets. Jehovah sends this spirit, inasmuch as the deception of Ahab has been inflicted upon him as a judgment of God for his unbelief. But there is no statement here to the effect that this lying spirit proceeded from Satan, because the object of the prophet was simply to bring out the working of God in the deception practised upon Ahab by his prophets. - The words of Jehovah, \"Persuade Ahab, thou wilt be able,\" and \"Jehovah has put a lying spirit,\" etc., are not to be understood as merely expressing the permission of God, as the fathers and the earlier theologians suppose. According to the Scriptures, God does work evil, but without therefore willing it and bringing forth sin. The prophet's view is founded upon this thought: Jehovah has ordained that Ahab, being led astray by a prediction of his prophets inspired by the spirit of lies, shall enter upon the war, that he may find therein the punishment of his ungodliness. As he would not listen to the word of the Lord in the mouth of His true servants, God had given him up (παρέδωκεν, Rom 1:24, Rom 1:26, Rom 1:28) in his unbelief to the working of the spirits of lying. But that this did not destroy the freedom of the human will is evident from the expression תּפתּה, \"thou canst persuade him,\" and still more clearly from תּוּכל גּם, \"thou wilt also be able,\" since they both presuppose the possibility of resistance to temptation on the part of man.\nZedekiah was so enraged at this unveiling of the spirit of lying by which the pseudo-prophets were impelled, that he smote Micah upon the cheek, and said (Kg1 22:24): \"Where did the Spirit of Jehovah depart from me, to speak to thee?\" To אי־זה the Chronicles add as an explanation, הדּרך: \"by what way had he gone from me?\" (cf. Kg2 3:8, and Ewald, 326, a.) Zedekiah was conscious that he had not invented his prophecy himself, and therefore it was that he rose up with such audacity against Micah; but he only proved that it was not the Spirit of God which inspired him. If he had been inspired by the Spirit of the Lord, he would not have thought it necessary to try and give effect to his words by rude force, but he would have left the defence of his cause quietly to the Lord, as Micah did, who calmly replied to the zealot thus (Kg1 22:25): \"Thou wilt see it (that the Spirit of Jehovah had departed from thee) on the day when thou shalt go from chamber to chamber to hide thyself\" (החבה for החבא, see Ges. 75, Anm. 21). This was probably fulfilled at the close of the war, when Jezebel or the friends of Ahab made the pseudo-prophets suffer for the calamitous result; although there is nothing said about this in our history, which confines itself to the main facts.\nKg1 22:26-27\nBut Ahab had Micah taken back to Amon the commander of the city, and to Joash the king's son, with the command to put him in prison and to feed him with bread and water of affliction, till he came safe back (בּשׁלום) from the war. From the expression השׁיבהוּ, \"lead him back,\" it evidently follows that Micah had been fetched from the commander of the city, who had no doubt kept him in custody, as the city-prison was probably in his house. The opposite cannot be inferred from the words \"put him into the prison;\" for this command, when taken in connection with what follows, simply enjoins a more severe imprisonment.\nKg1 22:28\nIn his consciousness of the divine truth of his announcement, Micah left the king with these words: \"If thou come back safe, Jehovah has not spoken by me. Hear it, all ye nations.\" עמּים does not mean people, for it is only in the antique language of the Pentateuch that the word has this meaning, but nations; and Micah thereby invokes not only the persons present as witnesses of the truth of his words, but the nations generally, Israel and the surrounding nations, who were to discern the truth of his word from the events which would follow (see at Mic 1:2).\nKg1 22:29-40\nThe issue of the war, and death of Ahab. - Kg1 22:29. Ahab, disregarding Micah's prophecy, went on with the expedition, and was even joined by Jehoshaphat, of whom we should have thought that, after what had occurred, he at any rate would have drawn back. He was probably deterred by false shame, however, from retracting the unconditional promise of help which he had given to Ahab, merely in consequence of a prophetic utterance, which Ahab had brought against his own person from Micah's subjective dislike. But Jehoshaphat narrowly escaped paying the penalty for it with his life (v. 32), and on his fortunate return to Jerusalem had to listen to a severe reproof from the prophet Jehu in consequence (Ch2 19:2).\nKg1 22:30-31\nAnd even Ahab could not throw off a certain fear of the fulfilment of Micah's prophecy. He therefore resolved to go to the battle in disguise, that he might not be recognised by the enemy. ובא התהפּשׂ (\"disguise myself and go into the battle,\" i.e., I will go into the battle in disguise): an infin. absol., - a broken but strong form of expression, which is frequently used for the imperative, but very rarely for the first person of the voluntative (cf. Ewald, 328, c.), and which is probably employed here to express the anxiety that impelled Ahab to take so much trouble to ensure his own safety. (Luther has missed the meaning in his version; in the Chronicles, on the contrary, it is correctly given.) לבשׁ ואתּה, \"but do thou put on thy clothes.\" These words are not to be taken as a command, but simply in this sense: \"thou mayest (canst) put on thy (royal) dress, since there is no necessity for thee to take any such precautions as I have to take.\" There is no ground for detecting any cunning, vafrities, on the part of Ahab in these words, as some of the older commentators have done, as though he wished thereby to divert the predicted evil from himself to Jehoshaphat. but we may see very clearly that Ahab had good reason to be anxious about his life, from the command of the Syrian king to the captains of his war-chariots (Kg1 22:31) to fight chiefly against the king of Israel. We cannot infer from this, however, that Ahab was aware of the command. The measure adopted by him may be sufficiently accounted for from his fear of the fulfilment of Micah's evil prophecy, to which there may possibly have been added some personal offence that had been given on his part to the Syrian king in connection with the negotiations concerning the surrender of Ramoth, which had no doubt preceded the war. The thirty-two commanders of the war-chariots and cavalry are, no doubt, the commanders who had taken the place of the thirty-two kings (Kg1 21:24). \"Fight not against small and great, but against the king of Israel only,\" i.e., endeavour above all others to fight against the king of Israel and to slay him.\nKg1 22:32-33\nAnd when the leaders of the war-chariots saw Jehoshaphat in the battle in his royal clothes, they took him for the king of Israel (Ahab), and pressed upon him. Then Jehoshaphat cried out; and from this they perceived that he was not the king of Israel, and turned away from him. וגו אך אמרוּ והמּה, \"and they thought, it is only (i.e., no other than) the king of Israel.\" עליו יסרוּ, \"they bent upon him.\" Instead of this we have in the Chronicles עליו יסבּוּ, \"they surrounded him,\" and Thenius proposes to alter our text to this; but there is no necessity for doing so, as סוּר also occurs in a similar sense and connection in Kg1 20:39. How far Jehoshaphat was saved by his crying out, is not precisely stated. He probably cried out to his followers to come to his aid, from which the Syrians discovered that he was not the king of Israel, whom they were in search of. The chronicler adds (Kg1 2:18, Kg1 2:31): \"and the Lord helped him and turned them off from him;\" thus believingly tracing the rescue of the king to its higher causality, though without our having any right to infer from this that Jehoshaphat cried aloud to God for help, which is not implied in the words of the Chronicles.\nKg1 22:34\nBut notwithstanding the precaution he had taken, Ahab did not escape the judgment of God. \"A man drew his bow in his simplicity\" (לתמּו as in Sa2 15:11), i.e., without trying to hit any particular man, \"and shot the king of Israel between the skirts and the coat of mail.\" דּבקים are \"joints by which the iron thorax was attached to the hanging skirt, which covered the abdomen\" (Cler.). The true coat of mail covered only the breast, to somewhere about the last rib; and below this it had an appendage (skirts) consisting of moveable joints. Between this appendage and the true coat of mail there was a groove through which the arrow passed, and, entering the abdomen, inflicted upon the king a mortal would; so that he said to his charioteer: ידיך הפך, verte manus tuas, i.e., turn round (cf. Kg2 9:23). The Chethb ידיך (plural) is the only correct reading, since the driver held the reins in both his hands. החליתי כּי: for I am wounded.\nKg1 22:35\n\"And the conflict ascended,\" i.e., became more violent. The use of the verb עלה in this sense may be accounted for on the supposition that it is founded upon the figure of a rising stream, which becomes more and more impetuous the higher it rises (vid., Isa 8:7). \"And the king was stationed (i.e., remained or kept himself in an upright posture) upon the chariot before the Syrians,\" that he might not dishearten his soldiers, \"and died in the evening, and poured the blood of the wounds in the middle hollow (חיק) of the chariot.\" \nKg1 22:36-37\nTowards sunset the cry went through the army (המּחנה, the army drawn up in battle array), \"Every one into his city and into his land!\" - In Kg1 22:37 the historian shows how the word of the Lord was fulfilled in the case of Ahab. \"Thus the king died and came to Samaria:\" equivalent to, thus the king reached Samaria dead; and he was buried there.\nKg1 22:38\nWhen they washed the chariot at the pool of Samaria, the dogs licked his blood, while the harlots were bathing (in the pool). והזּנות רחצוּ is a circumstantial clause, and רחץ means to bathe, as in Exo 2:5. This explanation, which is sustained by the grammar and is the only tenable one, disposes of the several arbitrary interpretations of these words, together with the emendations of the text of which Thenius is so fond. In this way was the word of the Lord through Elijah (Kg1 21:19) and the unknown prophet (Kg1 20:42) fulfilled; also the prediction of Micah (Kg1 22:17). Ahab had paid the penalty with his own life for sparing the life of Benhadad (Kg1 20:42), and his blood was licked up by the dogs (Kg1 21:19). The fact that the dogs licked up the blood and the harlots were bathing in the pool, when the chariot that was stained with the blood of Ahab was being washed, is mentioned as a sign of the ignominious contempt which was heaped upon him at his death.\nKg1 22:39-40\nClose of Ahab's history. We have no further account of his buildings. \"The ivory palace,\" i.e., the palace inlaid with ivory, he had probably built in his capital Samaria (cf. Amo 3:15). \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":41,"content":["Reign of Jehoshaphat of Judah. - The account of this in the books before us is a very condensed one. Beside the two campaigns in which he joined with Ahab and Joram of Israel against the Syrians and Moabites, and which are described in the history of the kingdom of Israel (1 Kings 22:1-35 and 2 Kings 3), we have simply a short notice of his attempt to restore the trade with Ophir, and a general statement of the spirit of his reign; whereas we learn from the extract preserved in the Chronicles from the annals of the kings, that he also carried on a victorious war against the Edomites and Ammonites (2 Chron 20), and did a great deal to promote the spread of the knowledge of the law among his people, and to carry out the restoration of a better administration of justice, and to improve the condition of the army (Ch2 16:1-14 and Ch2 19:1-11).\nKg1 22:41-42\nKg1 22:41-44, which give the age of Jehoshaphat when he ascended the throne, and the duration and character of his reign, are also found with slight deviations in Ch2 20:31-33, in the closing summary of the history of his reign.\nKg1 22:43\n\"He walked entirely in the way of his father Asa and departed not from it, to do what was well-pleasing to the Lord,\" whereas Asa's heart had become more estranged from the Lord in the last years of his reign (see Kg1 15:18.). - On the worship of the high places (Kg1 22:43), see at Kg1 15:14.\nKg1 22:44\nHe maintained peace with the king of Israel, i.e., with every one of the Israelitish kings who were contemporaneous with him, viz., Ahab, Ahaziah, and Joram, whereas hitherto the two kingdoms had assumed an attitude of hostility towards each other. Even if this friendly bearing towards Israel was laudable in itself, Jehoshaphat went beyond the bounds of what was allowable, since he formed a marriage alliance with the house of Ahab, by letting his son Joram marry a daughter of Ahab and Jezebel (Ch2 18:1).\nKg1 22:45-46\nThe brave deeds (הגּבוּרה) which he performed include both his efforts to strengthen his kingdom, partly by raising fortifications and organizing the military force, and partly by instructing the people in the law and improving the administration of justice (Ch2 17:7-19 and Ch2 19:4-11), and also the wars which he waged, viz., the expeditions already mentioned. - For Kg1 22:46 see Kg1 15:12.\nKg1 22:47\n\"There was (then) no (real) king in Edom; a vicegerent was king,\" i.e., governed the country. This remark is introduced here merely on account of what follows, namely, to show how it was that Jehoshaphat was able to attempt to restore the maritime trade with Ophir. If we observe this connection between the verse before us and what follows, we cannot infer from it, as Ewald does (Gesch. iii. pp. 464 and 474ff.), that the Edomites with Egyptian help had forced from Rehoboam both their liberty and also their right to have a king of their own blood, and had remained in this situation till Jehoshaphat completely subjugated them again. (See the remarks on Kg1 11:21-22.) All that can be gathered from 2 Chron 20 is, that the Edomites, in league with the Ammonites and other desert tribes, made an incursion into Judah, and therefore tried to throw off the supremacy of Judah, but did not succeed in their attempt.\nKg1 22:48-50\nThe brief notice concerning Jehoshaphat's attempt to build Tarshish ships (for the word, see pp. 105f) for the voyage to Ophir is expanded in Ch2 20:36-37, where we learn that Jehoshaphat had allied himself with Ahaziah of Israel for this purpose, and that the prophet Eliezer predicted the destruction of his ships on account of this alliance. When the ships had been broken in pieces in Eziongeber, no doubt by a storm, Ahaziah made this fresh proposal to him: \"Let my people sail with thy people;\" but Jehoshaphat would not. Ahaziah evidently wanted to persuade Jehoshaphat to make another attempt, after the destruction of the ships which were first built; but Jehoshaphat did not agree to it any more, because it was impossible for him, after the fulfilment of Eliezer's prediction, to expect a more favourable result. Thus the two accounts can be harmonized in a very simple manner, with the exception of the words \"to go to Tarshish,\" which we find in the Chronicles in the place of \"to go to Ophir,\" the reading in our text, and which sprang from an erroneous interpretation of the expression \"ships of Tarshish\" (see above, pp. 105f). The Chethb עשׂר is an error of the pen for עשׂה (Keri); but נשׁבּרה (Chethb) is not to be altered into נשׁבּרוּ, since the construction of a singular verb with the subject following in the plural is by no means rare (vid., Ewald, 317, a.). On Eziongeber and Ophir, see at Kg1 9:26 and Kg1 9:28. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":51,"content":["Reign of Ahaziah of Israel. - Kg1 22:51. For the datum \"in the seventeenth year of Jehoshaphat,\" see at Kg2 1:17.\nKg1 22:52-53\nAhaziah walked in the way of his father and his mother, who had introduced the worship of Baal into the kingdom, and in the way of Jeroboam, who had set up the calves (cf. Kg1 16:30-33). - In Kg1 22:53 it is again expressly added, that he adored and worshipped Baal, as in Kg1 16:31. - With this general description of his character not only is the chapter brought to a close, but the first book of Kings also, - very unsuitably, however, since the further account of Ahaziah's reign and of his death is given in 2 Kings 1 of the following book. It would have been incomparably more suitable to commence a fresh chapter with Kg1 22:52, and indeed to commence the second book there also.\n\n"]}]},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/1KI/22.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"1KI","chapter":22},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/2KI/1.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"2KI","chapter":1},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/keil-delitzsch/1KI/21.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"keil-delitzsch","book":"1KI","chapter":21},"numberOfVerses":3}