View 2nd Chronicles 28 in the note window.
Ahaz reigns ill, ver. 1 - 4.
Is smitten by the Syrians and Israelites, ver. 5 - 8.
who send back the captives they had taken, ver. 9 - 15.
Ahaz sends for help to the king of Asyria, but in vain, ver. 16 - 21.
Yet he continues in idolatry, ver. 22 - 25.
and dies, ver. 26, 27.
5: His God - God was his God, tho' not by special relation,
(which Ahaz had renounced) yet by his sovereign dominion over him:
for God did not forfeit his right by Ahaz's denying it.
6: Forsaken - Ahaz walked in the ways of the kings of Israel,
and God chose the king of Israel for his scourge: it is just with
God, to make them a plague to us, whom we have made our patterns,
or partners in sin.
9: A rage - An unbounded rage, which cries to God for vengeance,
against such bloody men.
10: To keep under - It ill becomes sinners to be cruel. Shew mercy
to them, for you are undone, unless God shew you mercy.
14: Left the captives - And herein they shewed a more truly heroic
bravery, than they did in taking them. It is true honour for a man to
yield to reason and religion even in spite of interest.
15: Were expressed - Who were appointed to take care about the
management of this business.
16: Kings - Princes, who may be called kings in a more general
signification of the word.
19: Low - As high as they were before in wealth and power. They
that will not humble themselves under the word of God will be humbled by
his judgments. Naked - Taking away their ornament and their defence and
strength, namely their treasures, which he sent to the Assyrian to no
purpose; their frontier towns, and other strong holds, which by his folly
and wickedness were lost; their religion, and the Divine protection, which
was their great and only firm security.
20: Distressed - Or, straitened him, by robbing him of his
treasures. Strengthened not - A most emphatical expression: for tho'
he weakened his present enemy the Syrian, yet all things considered,
he did not strengthen Ahaz and his kingdom, but weaken them; for by
removing the Syrian, who, tho' a troublesome neighbour, was a kind
of bulwark to him, he smoothed the way for himself, a far more dangerous
enemy, as appears in the very next king's reign.
22: That Ahaz - That monster and reproach of mankind, that
unteachable and incorrigible prince, whom even grievous afflictions
made worse, which commonly make men better. This is he, whose name
deserves to be remembered and detested for ever.
