2 Chronicles 16

Notes on the verses

Chap. XVI. Ver. 1—14. Asa seeks to Ben-hadad for protection against Baasha king of Israel, for which he is reproved by a prophet, whom he imprisons, and himself dies soon after.— The first six verses of this chapter have already been noticed, (2 Kings 15:17-22). We only add, that it seems very extraordinary that Asa, after having been so remarkably rescued from the immense host of Zerah, should be so soon terrified by the threats of Baasha, whose conduct only went to cut off all communication between the two kingdoms, which, as they Ver. 16—19. Concerning Maachah, &c.—These four verses correspond to (1 Kings 15:13-15).

Ver. 19. The five and thirtieth year.—“It seems impossible to reconcile this verse and the date of the ensuing chapter with the other history, except by allowing a trivial error of the transcribers, and reading the 25th instead of the 35th year in this verse, and the 26th instead of the 36th in ver. 1. of the chapter following. This is the date which Josephus affixes to these events, — it is very probable in itself."—Scott. So Dr. Hales, and most modern commentators.

Chap. XVI. Ver. 1. In the six and thirtieth year.—Baasha died in the 26th year of Asa, and therefore could not come up against him in the 36th; on put him in a prison-house; for he was in a rage with him because of this thing. And Asa oppressed some of the people the same time. 11 { And, behold, the acts of Asa, first and last, lo, they are written in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel.

In going through these very ancient histories, in an obsolete language, we have many obscurities to explain, and many seeming inconsistencies to reconcile; but nothing is so hard to reconcile or explain, as the conduct of some men, and particularly of some public and religious characters. What can be more inexplicable, for instance, than the conduct of Asa, who, after having been so remarkably rescued by the hand of Jehovah, flies for aid to the natural enemy of his country? and who, after putting down idolatry with so much zeal, sends the sacred treasures of the temple to purchase the protection of an idolatrous prince? Nor is this all; being reproved for this inconsistency of conduct, by a prophet of the Lord, instead of receiving his message with becoming reverence, he commits the holy seer to the prison-house and to the stocks, for presuming to address him in the name of that God to whom he had himself sworn obedience.

However, he goes not unpunished.—He had fettered the prophet, and the Lord fetters him with some painful disease, which confines him to his couch; and to whom shall he now apply? Not, surely, to the seer in prison, but to the physicians; very proper persons, certainly, to consult in such a case, were it not that this was in opposition to his applying to the Lord; but when they are consulted, he should not be neglected. Asa had his reward. He trusted to the physicians, and they consigned him to the tomb. He received, indeed, great posthumous honours. Commentators are not agreed whether his body was burned on a funeral pyre, which account, Usher, agreeably to the marginal note, reckons it the 36th, after the division of the kingdoms of Judah and Israel, but many authors, from Josephus to Houbigant, are of opinion, that an error has crept into the text, and that it was the 26th year of Asa, and the last of Baasha, that he went up against Judah.

—Bagster.

Ver. 10. In a prison-house.—Literally, “A house of stocks;” for this was one method of securing their prisoners. (Acts 15:24), _ =

Ver. 12. Diseased in his feet—C. Taylor thinks the original term implies a disorder ascending upwards; i.e. from the feet to the vital parts which was apply either to gout or dropsy, both of which often become fatal when they reach the stomach.