2 Kings 10:29

of Jezreel, 2Kgs 10:7, 2Kgs 10:8. Jehu shows them to the people, and excuses himself, and states that all is done according to the word of the Lord, 2Kgs 10:9, 2Kgs 10:10. He destroys all the kindred of Ahab that remained in Jezreel, 2Kgs 10:11. He also destroys forty-two men, the brethren of Ahaziah, king of Judah, 2Kgs 10:12-14. He meets with Jehonadab, and takes him with him in his chariot, 2Kgs 10:15, 2Kgs 10:16. He comes to Samaria, and destroys all that were of the kindred of Ahab there, 2Kgs 10:17. He pretends a great zeal for the worship of Baal, and gathers all his priests together, under the pretense of a grand sacrifice, and slays them all, 2Kgs 10:18-25. He burns Baal's images, and makes his temple a draught house, 2Kgs 10:26-28. But he does not depart from the sins of Jeroboam, and does not prosper, 2Kgs 10:29-31. Hazael vexes Israel, 2Kgs 10:32, 2Kgs 10:33. Jehu dies, having reigned over Israel, in Samaria, twenty-eight years, 2Kgs 10:34-36. Verse 1 Ahab had seventy sons - As he had several wives, he might have many children. The Israelites, from the earliest part of their history, were remarkably fruitful. How amazingly did they multiply in Egypt, even under the hand of the severest oppression! And as to the individuals of whose families we have an account, they are quite remarkable: Rehoboam had thirty-eight sons; Abdon had forty; Tola had thirty; Ahab, seventy; and Gideon, seventy-one. Unto the rulers of Jezreel - It certainly should be, unto the rulers of Samaria; for to them and to that city the whole context shows us the letters were sent. See 2Kgs 10:6. To them that brought up Ahab's children - It appears that the royal children of Israel and Judah were intrusted to the care of the nobles, and were brought up by them, (see 2Kgs 10:6 ); and to these, therefore, Jehu's letters are directed. It is supposed Isaiah ( Isa 49:23 ) alludes to this custom: Kings shall be thy nursing fathers, and queens thy nursing mothers. Verse 2 A fenced city also - All here seems to refer to Samaria alone; in it were the magazines and implements of war, etc. No reader need be told that these letters were all ironical. It was the same as if he had said, "Ye have no means of defense; Israel is with me: if you yield not up yourselves and the city, I will put you all to the sword. Verse 4 Two kings stood not before him - That is Joram and Ahaziah. Verse 5 He that was over the house, etc. - Thus all the constituted authorities agreed to submit. Will do all that thou shalt bid us - They made no conditions, and stood pledged to commit the horrid murders which this most execrable man afterwards commanded. Verse 6 Come to me to Jezreel - Therefore the letters were not written to Jezreel, but from Jezreel to Samaria. Verse 7 Put their heads in baskets - What cold-blooded wretches were the whole of these people! Verse 8 Lay ye them in two heaps - It appears that the heads of these princes had arrived at Jezreel in the night time: Jehu ordered them to be left at the gate of the city, a place of public resort, that all the people might see them, and be struck with terror, and conclude that all resistance to such authority and power would be vain. Verse 9 Ye be righteous - Another irony, intended partly to excuse himself, and to involve them in the odium of this massacre, and at the same time to justify the conduct of both, by showing that all was done according to the commandment of the Lord. Verse 11 Jehu slew all - So it appears that the great men who had so obsequiously taken off the heads of Ahab's seventy sons, fell also a sacrifice to the ambition of this incomparably bad man. Verse 12 The shearing house - Probably the place where the shepherds met for the annual sheep shearing. Verse 13 The brethren of Ahaziah - The relatives of his family; for it does not appear that he had any brethren, properly so called: but we know that the term brethren among the Jews signified the relatives of the same family, and especially brothers' and sisters' children: and that these were such, see 2Chr 22:8. We go down to salute, etc. - So promptly had Jehu executed all his measures, that even the nearest relatives of the murdered kings had not heard of their death, and consequently had no time to escape. They were all taken as in a net. Verse 14 The pit of the shearing house - Probably the place where they washed the sheep previously to shearing, or the fleeces after they were shorn off. Verse 15 Jehonadab the son of Rechab - For particulars concerning this man, his ancestry, and posterity, see the notes on Jeremiah 35 (note). Is thine heart right - With me, in the prosecution of a reform in Israel; as my heart is with thy heart in the true religion of Jehovah, and the destruction of Baal? It is - I wish a reform in the religion of the country; I am his friend who shall endeavor to promote it. Give me thine hand - This has been generally considered as exacting a promise from Jehonadab; but does it mean any more than his taking him by the hand, to help him to step into his chariot, in which Jehu was then sitting? Jehonadab was doubtless a very honorable man in Israel; and by carrying him about with him in his chariot, Jehu endeavored to acquire the public esteem. "Jehu must be acting right, for Jehonadab is with him, and approves his conduct." Verse 16 Come with me, and see my zeal for the Lord - O thou ostentatious and murderous hypocrite! Thou have zeal for Jehovah and his pure religion! Witness thy calves at Dan and Bethel, and the general profligacy of thy conduct. He who can call another to witness his zeal for religion, or his works of charity, has as much of both as serves his own turn. Verse 18 Ahab served Baal a little - Jehu had determined to have no worship in Israel but that of the golden calves at Dan and Bethel; therefore he purposes to destroy all the worshippers of Baal: and that he may do it without suspicion, he proclaims a great sacrifice; and that he may do it the more easily, he gathers them all together into one place. Verse 19 Whosoever shall be wanting, he shall not live - Because, as he will thereby show himself without zeal for the service of his God, he will justly forfeit his life. All this was done in the very spirit of deceit. Verse 22 He said unto him that was over the vestry - The word vestry comes from vestiarium, and that from vestes, garments, from vestio, I clothe; and signifies properly the place where the sacerdotal robes and pontifical ornaments are kept. The priests of Baal had their robes as well as the priests of the Lord; but the garments were such that one could be easily distinguished from the other. Verse 23 None of the servants of the Lord - Though he was not attached to that service, yet he would tolerate it; and as he was led to suppose that he was fulfilling the will of Jehovah in what he was doing, he would of course treat his worship and worshippers with the more respect. He might have ordered the search to be made on pretense of expelling any of those whom they would consider the profane, especially as this was "a solemn assembly for Baal," as was the custom with the heathen when any extraordinary exhibition of or for their god was expected; thus Callimachus, (Hymn to Apollo), after imagining the temple and its suburbs to be shaken by the approach of Apollo, cries out, Εκας, ἑκας, ὁστις, αλιτρος. To prevent any suspicion of his real design, such might have been Jehu's plea, else alarm must have been excited, and perhaps some would have escaped. Verse 25 As soon as he had made an end of offering - Had Jehu been a man of any conscientious principle in religion, he would have finished the tragedy before he offered the burnt-offering; but to a man of no religion, the worship of Jehovah and of Baal are alike. If he prefers either, it is merely as a statesman, for political purposes. To the guard and to the captains - לרצים ולשלשים leratsim uleshalashim; to the couriers or runners, and the shalashim, the men of the third rank, those officers who were next to the nobles, the king and these being only their superiors. The runners were probably a sort of light infantry. The city of the house of Baal - Does not this mean a sort of holy of holies, where the most sacred images of Baal were kept? A place separated from the temple of Baal, as the holy of holies in the temple of Jehovah was separated from what was called the holy place. Verse 27 Made it a draught house - A place for human excrement; so all the versions understand it. Nothing could be more degrading than this; he made it a public necessary. Verse 30 Thy children of the fourth generation - These four descendants of Jehu were Jehoahaz, Jehoash, Jeroboam the second, and Zechariah; see 2 Kings 14 and 15. This was all the compensation Jehu had in either world, as a recompense of his zeal for the Lord. Verse 31 Jehu took no heed - He never made it his study; indeed, he never intended to walk in this way; it neither suited his disposition nor his politics. Verse 32 The Lord began to cut Israel short - The marginal reading is best: The Lord cut off the ends; and this he did by permitting Hazael to seize on the coasts, to conquer and occupy the frontier towns. This was the commencement of those miserable ravages which Elisha predicted; see 2Kgs 8:12. And we find from the next verse that he seized on all the land of Gilead, and that of Reuben and Gad, and the half tribe of Manasseh; in a word, whatever Israel possessed on the east side of Jordan. Verse 34 Are they not written in the book of the chronicles - We have no chronicles in which there is any thing farther spoken of this bad man. His reign was long, twenty-eight years; and yet we know nothing of it but the commencement. For barbarity and hypocrisy Jehu has few parallels; and the cowardliness and baseness of the nobles of Samaria have seldom been equalled. Ahab's bloody house must be cut off; but did God ever design that it should be done by these means? The men were, no doubt, profligate and wicked, and God permitted their iniquity to manifest itself in this way; and thus the purpose of God, that Ahab's house should no more reign, was completely accomplished: see 1Kgs 21:19, 1Kgs 21:21, 1Kgs 21:29. And by this conduct Jehu is said to have executed what was right in God's eyes, 2Kgs 10:30. The cutting off of Ahab's family was decreed by the Divine justice; the means by which it was done, or at least the manner of doing, were not entirely of his appointing: yet the commission given him by the young prophet, 2Kgs 9:7, was very extensive. Yet still many things seem to be attributed to God, as the agent, which he does not execute, but only permits to be done. Introduction Athaliah destroys all that remain of the seed royal of Judah, 2Kgs 11:1. Jehosheba hides Joash the son of Ahaziah, and he remains hidden in the house of the Lord six years; and Athaliah reigns over the land, 2Kgs 11:2, 2Kgs 11:3

Jehu departed not - So that it is plain, his religion was but superficial: otherwise it would not have given way to his policy.

Jehu's Inconsistency. ( b. c. 884.) 29 Howbeit from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin, Jehu departed not from after them, to wit, the golden calves that were in Beth-el, and that were in Dan. 30 And the Lord said unto Jehu, Because thou hast done well in executing that which is right in mine eyes, and hast done unto the house of Ahab according to all that was in mine heart, thy children of the fourth generation shall sit on the throne of Israel. 31 But Jehu took no heed to walk in the law of the Lord God of Israel with all his heart: for he departed not from the sins of Jeroboam, which made Israel to sin. 32 In those days the Lord began to cut Israel short: and Hazael smote them in all the coasts of Israel; 33 From Jordan eastward, all the land of Gilead, the Gadites, and the Reubenites, and the Manassites, from Aroer, which is by the river Arnon, even Gilead and Bashan. 34 Now the rest of the acts of Jehu, and all that he did, and all his might, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel? 35 And Jehu slept with his fathers: and they buried him in Samaria. And Jehoahaz his son reigned in his stead. 36 And the time that Jehu reigned over Israel in Samaria was twenty and eight years. Here is all the account of the reign of Jehu, though it continued twenty-eight years. The progress of it answered not to the glory of its beginning. We have here, I. God's approbation of what Jehu had done. Many, it is probable, censured him as treacherous and barbarous—called him a rebel, a usurper, a murderer, and prognosticated ill concerning him, that a family thus raised would soon be ruined; but God said, Well done ( v. 30 ), and then it signified little who said otherwise. 1. God pronounced that to be right which he had done. It is justly questionable whether he did it from a good principle and whether he did not take some false steps in the doing of it; and yet (says God), Thou hast done well in executing that which is right in my eyes. The extirpating of idolaters and idolatry was a thing right in God's eyes, for it is an iniquity he visits as surely and severely as any: it was according to all that was in his heart, all he desired, all he designed. Jehu went through with his work. 2. God promised him a reward, that his children of the fourth generation from him should sit upon the throne of Israel. This was more than what took place in any of the dignities or royal families of that kingdom; of the house of Ahab there were indeed four kings, Omri, Ahab, Ahaziah, and Joram, but the last two were brothers, so that it reached but to the third generation, and that whole family continued but about forty-five years in all, whereas Jehu's continued in four, besides himself, and in all about 120 years. Note, No services done for God shall go unrewarded. II. Jehu's carelessness in what he was further to do. By this it appeared that his heart was not right with God, that he was partial in his reformation. 1. He did not put away all the evil. He departed from the sins of Ahab, but not from the sins of Jeroboam—discarded Baal, but adhered to the calves. The worship of Baal was indeed the greater evil, and more heinous in the sight of God, but the worship of the calves was a great evil, and true conversion is not only from gross sin, but from all sin—not only from false gods, but from false worships. The worship of Baal weakened and diminished Israel, and made them beholden to the Sidonians, and therefore he could easily part with that; but the worship of the calves was a politic idolatry, was begun and kept up for reasons of state, to prevent the return of the ten tribes to the house of David, and therefore Jehu clave to that. True conversion is not only from wasteful sins, but from gainful sins—not only from those sins that are destructive to the secular interest, but from those that support and befriend it, in forsaking which is the great trial whether we can deny ourselves and trust God. 2. He put away evil, but he did not mind that which was good ( v. 31 ): He took no heed to walk in the law of the Lord God of Israel. He abolished the worship of Baal, but did not keep up the worship of God, nor walk in his law. He had shown great care and zeal for the rooting out of a false religion; but in the true religion, (1.) He showed no care, took no heed, lived at large, was not at all solicitous to please God and to do his duty, took no heed to the scriptures, to the prophets, to his own conscience, but walked at all adventures. Those that are heedless, it is to be feared, are graceless; for, where there is a good principle in the heart, it will make men cautious and circumspect, desirous to please God and jealous of doing any thing to offend him. (2.) He showed no zeal; what he did in religion he did not do with his heart, with all his heart, but did it as if he did it not, without any liveliness or concern. It seems, he was a man that had little religion himself, and yet God made use of him as an instrument of reformation in Israel. It is a pity but that those that do good to others should always be good themselves. III. The judgment that came upon Israel in his reign. We have reason to fear that when Jehu took no heed himself to walk in God's law the people were generally as careless as he, both in their devotions and in their conversations. There was a general decay of piety and increase of profaneness; and therefore it is not strange that the next news we hear is, In those days the Lord began to cut Israel short, v. 32 . Their neighbours encroached upon them on every side; they were short in their duty to God, and therefore God cut them short in their extent, wealth, and power. Hazael king of Syria was, above any other, vexatious and mischievous to them, smote them in all the coasts of Israel, particularly the countries on the other side Jordan, which lay next him, and most exposed; on these he made continual inroads, and laid them waste. Now the Reubenites and Gadites smarted for the choice which their ancestors made of an inheritance on that side Jordan, which Moses reproved them for, Num. xxxii. Now Hazael did what Elisha foresaw and foretold he would do. Yet, for doing it, God had a quarrel with him and with his kingdom, as we may find, Amos i. 3, 4 . Because those of Damascus have threshed Gilead with threshing instruments of iron, therefore (says God) I will send a fire into the house of Hazael, which shall devour the palaces of Benhadad. Lastly, The conclusion of Jehu's reign, v. 34-36 . Notice is taken, in general, of his might; but, because he took no heed to serve God, the memorials of his mighty enterprises and achievements are justly buried in oblivion.