2 Chronicles 12
PATwhich the Jews generally think was written when he was old: wherein he sensibly expresses the vanity of all earthly things; and particularly speaks with great detestation of bad women, by whom he had been seduced, (Eccles. vii. 20.) Here it is to be observed, that the corruption of Judah and Israel began in the fourth year of Rehoboam; (sco xii.l.) and from thence begin the three hundred and ninety years of their iniquity, mentioned by Ezekiel, iv. 5. which lasted to the Siege of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, me, and therefore Jiave I also left you in the hand of Shishak.] The Chaldee translates this, Ye have forsaken my fear; that is, his worship, and turned to.idols: therefore God gave them up into the power of an idolater.
2 Chronicles 12:1
jfliND it came to pass, when Rehoboam had established the kingdom, and had strengthened himself. When he thought himself safe, and out of all danger. He forsook the law of the LordJ] His evil inclinations began to appear; which he derived, it is likely, from his mother, who was an Ammonitess. (See 1 Kings xiv. 21.) And all Israel with him.] See 1 Kings xiv. 22 — 24.
2 Chronicles 12:2
And it came to pass, that, in the fifth year of king Rehoboam, Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem (because they had transgressed against the Lord). See 1 Kings xiv. 25. Their apostacy was in the fourth year of his reign; (after they had been three years obedient, xi. 17.) therefore God speedily corrected them, that he might reduce them to his service, before they were settled in their impiety.
2 Chronicles 12:3
With twelve hundred chariots, and threescore thousand horsemen; and the people were without number. That is, the footmen in his army. Tliat came with him out of Egypt; the Lubims, the Sukkiims, and the Ethiopians.] There is no doubt the Lubims were the people of Lybia, a famous country in Africa, adjoining to Egypt. And the Sukkiims are the people called Troglodytes, who lived near the Bed Sea: and had that name Troglodytes, because they dwelt ev rpwyXtuc, in caves and dens of the earth: which is the very signification of the Hebrew word Succha; which in that language imports not only tabernacles, but also caves or dens, as in Psal. x. 9. Job Xxxviii. 40. From this people there was a town, upon the coast of the Red Sea, called Succhce: and at this day, with a little alteration, Suachen, as Bochartus observes in his Phaleg. lib. iv. cap. 29. As for the people called Cnsh (which we translate EthiopiaTts), they wereeither those to the south of Egypt, or the Scenitse in Arabia: for I have observed elsewhere it was a name common to both. (See the same most learned author in the same book, cap. 33.)
2 Chronicles 12:4
And he took the fenced cities tvhich pertained to Judah. Where the sons of Rehoboam were governors: who, perhaps, there’ perished. And came to Jerusalem.] The frontier towns being taken, nothing hindered his coming hither. For, trusting to his fenced cities, he had raised no army to oppose Shishak: or, if he had, they durst not oppose bis progress. Ver. 5/ Tlienxdme Shemaiah the prophet to Rehoboam, audio the princes of Judah that were gathered together to Jerusalevi becaxise of Shishak.] As to a place of more safety than the country; or, perhaps, to consult what to do, in a time of sogrcat danger. And said iinto them, Thus saith the Lord; Ye have forsaken
2 Chronicles 12:6
Whereupon the princes of Israel) They are called the princes of Israel, because there were many Israelites among them; and they had all lately been comprehended under this name. And the kiitg humbled themselves; and tJtey said, TJie Lord is righteous:]; Sorrowfully confessed that the Lord had most justly punished them for their sins.
2 Chronicles 12:7
And when the Lord saw that they humbled themselves, the word of the Lord came to Shqmaiah, saying, They have humbled themselves, therefore I will not destroy them, bat 1 will grant them some deliverance; and my wrath shall not be poured out upon Jerusalem by the hand of Shishak.] Their humiliation prevailed with God so far, that he moderated his anger, and respited the destruction which was conaing upon them: promising he would not suffer Shishak to do so much mischief as he. designed. Yet he seems to intimate, that if they went on to provoke him, he would use some other hand to ruin them.
2 Chronicles 12:8
Nevertheless they shall be his se?~vants; that they may knoiv my service, and the service of the kingdoms, of the countries. He resolved to let them feel the difference between him and all other lords and masters: and how much more happy they were while they continued to worship and serve him, than when they fell under a foreign yoke.
2 Chronicles 12:9
So $hi$hak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem. Which \yas basely yielded up to.hjm, afiaxwri, without striking a stroke, as Dionysius Halicarnassus speaks. Who is thought by learned men to have respect to. this place, when he saith, that Scsostris jnade an expedition into Palestine, Aaj3u»v afxaxn^ rovg av^pdirovg iv ahr^, taking all the men there without fighting. And it was to be ascribed only to the great goodness of God, that he did not possess’himself absolutely of the whple country, and make it £ province subject and tributary to the king of Egypt. For unless God had diverted )iim; he might have done what he pleased; it being in hi$ power to. extirpate the Jewish nation. And took away the treasures of the house of the. Lord, and the treasures of the king’s house; he took all; he carried away also the shields of gold which Solomon had made.
2 Chronicles 12:10
Instead of which king Rehoboam made shields of brass, and committed them to the hands of the chief of the guard, that kept the entrance of the king’s house.
2 Chronicles 12:11
And when the king entered into the house of the Lord, the guard came and fetched them, and brought them again into the guard-chamber. These three verses have been explained )n 1 Kings xiv. 25 — 28. Only from hence may be gathered, that the golden shields were made for state, to be used by his guard when they attended him to the house of the Lord: this being the use of the brazen shields which were made in their stead.
2 Chronicles 12:12
And when he humbled himself, the wrath of the Lord turned from him, that he would not destroy him altogether. When he saw his danger he humbled himself, before Shishak came to Jerusalem: and after he had taken and ransacked it, he humbled himself still more. And thereby diverted that utter destruction^ which such an army might have brought upon him, and which their sins doserved. For it appears, by the language of the prophet, God was most highly provoked by the defection of Judah so suddenly iron! him, to pour outfits wrath upon them. And also in Judah things went ivell.] They began again to prosper. But the words in the Hebrew being, there were good things in Judah, they may be. understood of the reformation made in the whole kingdom; many good things being found among them, in the midst of their Corruption. For the priests, I suppose, kept up the worship of God in its purity, and many good people joined in it; especially such as, had fled from the idolatry of Jeroboam.
2 Chronicles 12:13
So king Rehoboam strengthened himself in Jerusalem^ and reigned. He.repaired the fenced cities which Shishak had taken; and recovered so much strength, that he reigned with some authority. For Rehoboam was one-and-forty years old when.he began to reign, and he reigned seventeen yedrs iri JeYusalem, the city which the Lord had chosen out of all the tribes’ of Israel, to put his name there: and his mother’s name was Naamah an Ammonitess.] See 1 Kings xiv. 21;
2 Chronicles 12:14
And fie did evil, because he prepared riot his heart to seek the Lord. This seems to signify, that after his humiliation for his sins, he relapsed again into them (though it may relate to his first provocation); and the reason is here given, because his hc&rt was not intent (as the Targum expounds it) to seek instruction from the Lord.
2 Chronicles 12:15
Now the acts of Rehoboam, first and last, are they not ivritten in the book of ShemaiaK the prophet?. Which was extant when Ezra made this short abstract out of it. For prophets, as. I observed before, wrote the history of their own times; as Jarchi says, they did their own prophecies.’ > And of Iddo the seer, concerning genealdgies.] The Targum hath it, Genealogies of the house of David: which" he set down in the history he wrote of things done in his time. And there were wars between Rehoboam and Jeroboam continually.] See 1 Kings xiv. 30.
2 Chronicles 12:16
And. Rehoboam slept with his fathers, and was buried in the city of David: and Abijah his son reigned in his stead. As he had designed in his lifetime* (Sec chap, xi. 22, 23.)
And Rehoboam took him Mahalath, the daughter o/Jeremoth the son of David, to wife. We never read of Jercmoth among the sons of David, but only here. Some think he was by a concubine, who is not named. And Abihail, the daughter ofEliab the son of Jesse.] His grand-daughter; for he was David’s eldest brother.
Which bare him children; Jeush, and Shamaridh, and Zaham. He speaks, I suppose, of the latter of these wives, who bare him these children….
And after her he took Maachah, the daughter of JLbsalom, tvhich bare him Abijah, and Attai, and Ziza, and Shelomith. This wife was his first cousin (as we call such persons), being the daughter of his uncle: if this be meant of Absalom the son of David. But it is evident this was another person of tho same name of Gibeah, which was in the tribe of Benjamin, (xiii. 2.) whereas Absalom the son of David was of Judah.,.
And Rehoboam loved Maachah the daughter of Absalom above all his wives and his concubines’(f or & e t°°k eighteen wives, and threescore concubines; and begat twenty and eight sons, and threescore daughters).] So great was their desire of having abundance of children in those days, that they entrenched upon the law of God, who commanded their kings should not multiply wives. But David indulged himself in it, and Solomon a great deal more: and so did Rehoboam and Abijah, who had both of them a numerous issue. For virginity in those days was not accounted a virtue: and the greatest unhappiness in a married estate was barrenness.
And Rehoboam made Abijah the son of Maachah the chief to be ruler among his brethren. He was his eldest son by his beloved wife, whom he put in authority over all the rest, which he had by her, and by his former wives. For he thought to make him Icing.] Such power, I have observed before, they then challenged: and in order to it, he seems to have committed unto Abijah the management of all affairs under himself.
And he dealt wisely, and dispersed all his children throughout all the countries of Judah and Benjamin. Upon which words Kimchi glosses very well: He thought seriously of this thing, and, fearing a rebellion, broke all his sons (that is, did not suffer them to live together), and dispersed them into all parts of the country under his government, that he might confirm the kingdom in the hand of his son Abijah. Thus Abraham anciently sent his sons which he had by Ketufah into other countries, that they might not be troublesome to Isaac, who he intended should be his heir: and thus Jehoshaphat did in following times after this, (xxi. 3.) Unto every fenced city.] Of which, I suppose, he made them governors-in-chief, and committed a great care to them: these cities being frontier places, as I observed ver. 5. where, it is probable, he had trusted persons to watch and observe them, that they entered not into any combinations to defeat his design. And he gave them victual in abundance.] He provided for them amply, that they might not be discontented, but live at their ease. And he desired many wives.] This might possibly be for his children, that they might in their several governments live very pleasantly. But, considering his temper, most interpreters think it was for himself: being not satisfied with those wives he had already, but still desiring more.