II Kings 3
The Character of
Jehoram’s Reign Over
1 “Now Jehoram
the son of Ahab began to reign over
the eighteenth year of Jehoshaphat King of Judah, and
reigned twelve
years.” (On chronology of the kings in II
Kings see II Kings Chronology –
this web site)
2 “And he
wrought evil in the sight of the Lord — as
did every other king
of
22:52) and after him (ch. 8:27; 10:31; 13:2, 11; 14:24;
15:9, 18, 24; 17:2) —
“but not like his father, and like his mother” —i.e.
Ahab and Jezebel, the
introducers of the Baal-worship into
Baal that his father had made.” It had not
been said previously that Ahab
had actually set up an image of Baal, but only that he had “built him a house
in
worshipped him” (I Kings 16:31-32). But an image of the god for whom a
“house” was built was so much
a matter of course in the idolatrous systems
of the East, that it might have seemed superfluous to
mention it. The actual
existence of the image appears later, when its destruction
is recorded
(ch. 10:27). It seems
that Jehoram, at the commencement of his reign, took
warning by the fates of his father and brother, so far as
to abolish the state
worship of Baal, which his father had introduced, and to
remove the image
of Baal from the temple where it had been set up. The image, however,
was
not destroyed — it
was only “put away.”
3 “Nevertheless
he cleaved unto the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat,
which made
of the calf-worship was, no doubt, viewed as a political
necessity. If the two
sanctuaries at Dan and
calf-worship brought to an end, there would, as a matter
of course, have been
a general flocking
of the more religious among the people to the great
sanctuary of Jehovah at
spiritual center would naturally have led on to its
acceptance as the general
political center of the whole Israelite people. Israel,
as a separate kingdom, a
distinct political entity, would have disappeared.
Hence every Israelite
monarch, even the Jehovistic Jehu, felt himself
bound, by the political
exigencies of his position, to keep up the calf-worship,
and maintain the
religious system of Jeroboam the son of Nebat.
The War with Moab (vs.
4-27)
The historian goes back to the origin of the war. He had
already, in ch. 1:1,
mentioned the revolt of
readers’ attention to the fact, and to some extent explains
it and accounts for it.
Moab had been treated oppressively — had been forced to pay
an
extraordinarily heavy tribute — and was in a certain sense
driven into rebellion
(vs. 4-5). Jehoram,
when he came to the kingdom, determined to make a great
Effort to put the rebellion down, and to re-establish the
authority of Israel
Over the revolted people His relations with Jehoshaphat of
Israel were so close
that he had no difficulty in persuading him to join in the
war. He was also
able to obtain the alliance of the King of Edom. Thus
strengthened, he
made no doubt of being successful, and confidently invaded
the country
(vs. 6-9). The course of the war is then related (vs.
10-27).
4 “And
Mesha king of Moab was a sheepmaster, and rended unto the
king of
rams with the wool. 5 But it
came to pass, when Ahab was dead, that
the king of
Jehoram went out of Samaria the same time” - literally, the same day –
and numbered all
“Numbering” was forbidden (II Samuel 24:1), and is not here
intended, the
verb used being dqp, and not hnm.
7 “And he went
and sent to Jehoshaphat the King of
Jehoshaphat had originally allied himself with Ahab, and
had cemented the
alliance by a marriage between his eldest son, Jehoram, and
Athaliah, Ahab’s
daughter (ch. 8:18; II Chronicles 18:1). He had
joined Ahab in his attack on
the Syrians at Ramoth-Gilead (1 Kings 22:4-36), and
had thereby incurred the
rebuke of Jehu the son of Hanani (II Chronicles
19:2). This, however, had not
prevented him from continuing his friendship with
the Israelite royal house;
he “joined himself with Ahaziah” (II Chronicles
20:35), Ahab’s successor, and
though their combined naval expedition met with
disaster ( Kings 22:48), yet
he still maintained amicable relations with the Israelite
court. Jehoram,
therefore, confidently sought his active help when he made
up his mind to
engage in a war with
me: wilt thou go with me against
go up: I am as thou art, my people as thy people, and my
horses as thy
horses.” Compare the answer which the same king had made to Ahab,
when
requested to join him in his attack on the Syrians (1 Kings
22:4). The
words were probably a common formula expressive of
willingness to enter
into the closest possible alliance. Jehoshaphat, it appears
from <142001>2
Chronicles 20:1-35, had, a little before this, been himself
attacked by the
united forces of
was only delivered by miracle. It was, therefore, much to
his advantage
that
8 “And he
said, Which way shall we go up?” Jehoram
asked Jehoshaphat’s
advice as to the plan of campaign. There ‘were two ways in
which Moab might
be approached — the direct one across the
the country east of the
between
Red Sea, and across the Arabah south of it, then northwards
through Northern
Edom, to the brook Zered, or Wady-el- Ahsy, which was the
boundary between
the north; if the latter, she would be attacked on the
south. Jehoshaphat
recommended the circuitous route. “And he answered, The
way through the
wilderness of
king, was a dependency of
Edomite country, an Edomite contingent might be added to
the invading
force;
this quarter, which was unusual, and from which she would
not anticipate
danger.
9 “So the King
of
placed first — “and the King of
therefore placed second — “and the King of
importance, therefore placed last. It is to be remarked
that, when Edom
was last mentioned, she was ruled by a “deputy,” who
received his
appointment from the King of Judah (I Kings 22:47). Now,
apparently,
she has her own native “king.” The change is, perhaps, to
be connected
with the temporary revolt of
“and they fetched a compass of seven days’ journey:” The
distance from
Jerusalem, where the forces of Israel and Judah probably
united, to the
southern borders of
which is the best-watered route, and would probably be the
route taken,
does not much exceed a hundred miles; but its difficulties
are great, and it
is quite probable that the march of an army along it would
not average
more than fifteen miles a day. “and there was no water
for the host,” The
confederate army had reached the border of
probably expected to find water in the Wady-el-Ahsy, which
is reckoned a
perennial stream,
but it was dry at the time. All the streams of these parts
fail occasionally, when there has been no rain for a long
time – “and for the
cattle that followed them.” - rather, .for the beasts
that followed them - The
baggage-animals are intended (see v. 17).
10 “And the King of
three kings together, to deliver them into the hand of
first assumes, without warrant, that the expedition is one
which Jehovah has
sanctioned, and then complains that it is about to fail utterly.
As he had made
no attempt to learn God’s
will on the subject at the mouth of any prophet, he
had no ground for surprise or complaint, even had
the peril been as great as
he supposed. God had not
“called the three kings together;” they had come
together of
their own accord, guided by their
own views of earthly policy.
Yet God was not about to “deliver them into the
hands of Moab,” as in
strict justice He might have done. He was about to
deliver the three kings
from their peril.
11 “But
Jehoshaphat said, Is there not here a prophet of the Lord, that
we may inquire of the Lord by him?” The Israelite monarch despairs at once;
the Jewish monarch retains faith and hope. Undoubtedly he
ought to have had
inquiry made of the Lord before he consented to accompany
Jehoram on the
expedition. But one neglect of duty does not justify
persistence in neglect.
This he sees, and therefore suggests that even now,
at the eleventh hour, the
right course shall be taken. It may not even yet be
too late. “And one of the
king of
Jehoram was not aware of Elisha’s presence with the army.
He had to be
enlightened by one of his attendants, who happened to be
acquainted with
the fact – “the son of Shaphat, which poured
water on the hands of Elijah.”
i.e. who was
accustomed to minister to Elijah’s wants, and to attend upon him.
12 “And
Jehoshaphat said, The word of the Lord is with him.” - that is,
“he is a true prophet; he can tell us the will of God.” It
is impossible to say how
Jehoshaphat had acquired this conviction. Elijah’s
selection of Elisha to be his
special attendant (I Kings 19:19-21) was no doubt generally
known, and may
have raised expectations that Elisha would be the next
great prophet.
Jehoshaphat may have heard of the miracles recorded
in ch. 2. At any rate,
he appears to have been firmly convinced of Elisha’s
prophetic mission, and
to have accepted him as the authorized exponent of God’s
will at the time.
“So the King of Israel and Jehoshaphat and the
King of Edom went down
to him.” Prophets were commonly summoned into the king’s presence,
or, if
they had a message to him, contrived a meeting in some
place where they
knew he would be. That the kings should seek Elisha out and
visit him was a
great sign both of the honor in which he was held, and also
of the extent to
which they were humbled by the danger which threatened
them.
13 “And Elisha said
unto the King of
with thee? get thee to the prophets of thy father, and to
the prophets
of thy mother.” Despite Jehoram’s self-humiliation, Elisha regards it as
incumbent on him to rebuke the monarch, who, though he had “put away
the image of Baal which his father had made,” still “wrought evil in the
sight of the Lord,” and “cleaved to the sins of Jeroboam the son
of Nebat”
(vs. 2-3). Jehoram must not be allowed to suppose that he
has done enough
by his half-repentance and partial reformation; he must be
rebuked and
shamed, that he may, if possible, be led on to a better
frame of
mind. “What,” says the prophet, “have I to do with thee?
What common
ground do we occupy? What is there that justifies thee in
appealing to me
for aid? Get thee to the prophets of thy father” — the four
hundred whom
Ahab gathered together at Samaria, to advise him as to
going up against
Ramoth-Gilead (I Kings 22:6) — “and the prophets of thy
mother,”
the Baal-prophets, whom Jezebel, who was still alive, and
held the position
of queen-mother, still maintained (ch. 10:19) — “get thee to
them,
and consult them. On them thou hast some claim; on
me, none.” “And the
King of Israel said unto him; Nay: for the Lord hath called
these
three kings together, to deliver them into the hand of
soft and meek answer — one well calculated to “turn away
wrath.” “Nay,”
says the king; “say not so. Let not that be thy final
answer. For it is not I
alone who am in danger. We are three kings who have
come down to thee
to ask thy aid; we are all in equal danger; have respect
unto them, if thou
wilt not have respect unto me; and show them a way of
deliverance.”
14 “And Elisha said,
As the Lord of hosts liveth, before whom I stand,
surely, were it not that I regard the presence of
Jehoshaphat, the king of
Judah, I would not look toward thee, nor see thee.” Jehoshaphat’s
conduct
had not been blameless; he had twice incurred the rebuke
of a prophet for
departures from the line of strict duty — once for “helping
the ungodly”
Ahab at Ramoth-Gilead (II Chronicles 19:2); and a
second time for “joining
himself with Ahaziah to make ships to go to Ophir”
(Ibid. ch. 20:36-37;
compare I Kings 22:48). Even now he was engaged in
an expedition which
had received no Divine sanction, and was allied with two idolatrous monarchs.
But Elisha condones these derelictions of duty in
consideration of the king’s
honesty of purpose and steady attachment to Jehovah,
which is witnessed to
by the authors both of Kings (I Kings 22:43; here -
v.11) and Chronicles (II
Chronicles 17:3-6; 19:4-11; 20:5-21). He “regards the presence of
Jehoshaphat,” and therefore
consents to return an answer to the three
kings, and announce to them the mode of their deliverance.
The adjuration
wherewith he opens his speech is one of great solemnity,
only used upon
very special occasions (see I Kings 17:1; ch. 5:16), and
adds great force to his
declaration.
15 “But now bring me
a minstrel.” A player on the harp
seems to be
intended. Music was cultivated in the schools of the
prophets (I Samuel 10:5;
I Chronicles 25:1-3), and was employed to soothe and quiet
the soul, to help
it to forget things earthly and external, and bring it into
that ecstatic condition
in which it was most open to the reception of Divine
influences. As David’s
harping refreshed Saul, and tranquillized his spirit (I
Samuel 16:23), so the
playing of any skilled minstrel had a soothing effect on
those possessing
the prophetic gift generally, and enabled them to shut out
the outer world,
and concentrate their whole attention on the inward voice
which
communicated to them the Divine messages. “And it came to pass, when
the minstrel played, that the hand of the Lord came upon him.” By
“the hand of the Lord” is
meant the power of the Spirit of God, the Divine
effluence, whatever it was, which acquainted the prophets
with the Divine
will, and enabled them to utter it.
16 “And he
said, Thus saith the Lord, Make this valley full of ditches.”
- rather, full of pits – The object was to detain the
water which would
otherwise have all run off down the torrent-course in
a very little time.
17 “For thus
saith the Lord, Ye shall not see wind, neither shall ye see
rain;” - Wind and rain
usually go together in the East, especially when there
is sudden heavy rain after a time of drought. What Elisha promises is a
heavy storm of wind accompanied by violent rain, which,
however, will be
at such a distance that the Israelites will see nothing of
it, but whereof they
will experience the effects when the torrent-course that
separates them from
the Moabite country suddenly becomes a rushing stream as
the rain flows
off down it. Their “pits,” or trenches, will retain a
portion of the water, and
furnish them with a sufficient supply for their wants. It
was necessary that
the storm should be distant, that the Moabites might know
nothing of it,
and so fall under the delusion (v. 23), which led to their
complete defeat.
“yet that valley shall be filled with water,” - Travelers
tell us that, in
certain circumstances, it takes but ten minutes or a
quarter of an hour for a
dry water-course in the East to become a raging torrent
quite impassable –
“that ye may drink, both ye, and your cattle” — i.e., the animals which
you have brought with you for food — “and your beasts”; i.e. your
beasts
of burden, or baggage-animals. Animals, except camels, suffer from drought
even more than men, and die sooner. The Israelites do not
appear to have ever
employed camels.
18 “And this is
but a light thing in the sight of the Lord:”
God, the Author
of nature, (and as El Shaddai – can go contrary to nature –
I recommend
Genesis 17 - Names of God – El Shaddai by Nathan Stone - this web site –
CY – 2011) has full
control over nature, and it is an easy matter for Him to
produce at will any natural phenomena. It is otherwise when
the stubborn
element of the human will is brought into play. Then
difficulty may arise.
“He will deliver the Moabites also into your hand.” It
would be
better to translate, he will also deliver (see the
Revised Version).
19 “And ye
shall smite every fenced city, and every choice city, and shall
fell every good tree,” - It has been said that the Law forbade this but there is
no general prohibition of the cutting down of fruit trees,
but only a prohibition
of their being cut down for siege works. That prohibition rests on prudential,
not on moral, grounds, and is thus practically
limited to cases where the
conquest of the country attacked, and its occupation
by the conquerors, are
looked forward to. The words are, “When thou shalt
besiege a city.... thou
shalt not destroy the trees thereof by forcing an
axe against them: for thou
mayest eat of them,
and thou shalt not cut them down (for the tree of the
field is man’s life) to employ them in the siege.” (Deuteronomy
20:19) –
The destruction of the fruit trees in an enemy’s country
was a common
feature of the wars of the period, and was largely
practiced, both By the
Assyrians and the Egyptians – “and stop all wells of
water,” - The stoppage
of springs and wells was another common practice in ancient
times, often
employed against enemies and aliens. The Philistines
stopped the Hebrew
wells in the days of Isaac (Genesis 26:18). Hezekiah stopped
the springs of
water outside
(II Chronicles 32:3-4).
The practice was regarded as quite legitimate – “and
mar every good piece of land with stones.” -
literally, grieve every good
piece of land. To clear the stones off a piece of ground
was the first step
towards preparing it for cultivation in the stony
regions on either side of the
Jordan. The
clearance was generally effected by collecting the stones into
heaps. When
it was wished to “mar the land,” the stones were there to be
spread over it afresh.
20 “And it came to pass in the
morning, when the meat offering was
offered” — i.e. about sunrise, which was the time of the morning
sacrifice —
“that, behold, there came
water by the way of
Ahsy drains a portion of
Southern Moab, and also a considerable tract of
Northern Edom. The nocturnal
storm had burst, not in the Moabite
country, where it would have
attracted the attention of the Moabites, but
in some comparatively distant
part of the Idumaean territory, so that the
Moabites were not aware of it.
Josephus says that the storm burst at a
distance of three days’ journey
from the Israelite camp (‘Ant. Jud.,’ 9:3. § 2);
but this can only be his
conjecture – “and the country was filled, with
water.” By “the country” (ha-arets) must be meant here the
bed
or channel of the water-course. This was suddenly filled
with a rushing
stream, which, however, rapidly ran off, leaving the
water-course dry,
excepting where the pits had been made by the Israelites.
But this supply
was ample for the army.
21 “And when
all the Moabites heard that the kings were come up to fight
against them,” - The
Hebrew has no pluperfect tense; but the verbs have here a
pluperfect force. Translate, When all the Moabites
had heard that the kings were
come up to fight against them, they had gathered all that were able,
etc. The
muster of the troops had long preceded the storm – “they
gathered all that
were able to put on amour;” - literally, there
had been gathered together
all that girded themselves with girdles; i.e. all the male population of full age.
And upward — i.e., and all above the age when
the girdle was first assumed —
and stood in the border; took up a position near the
extreme border of their
territory, on the northern bank of the Wady-el-Ahsy.
22 “And they
rose up early in the morning, and the sun shone upon the
water, and the Moabites saw the water on the other side as
red as blood.”
Some think that the red hue of the water was due to the red
tinge of the soil
in the part of
of the freshly dug trenches,” or pits but the only
cause of the redness
mentioned either in Kings or in Josephus is the ruddy hue
of the sunrise.
A ruddy sunrise is common in the East, more especially in
stormy weather
(see Matthew 16:3); and the red light, falling upon the water
in the pits, and
reflected thence to the opposite side of the wady, would
quite sufficiently
account for the mistake of the Moabites, without supposing
that the water
was actually stained and discolored. The Moabites
concluded that the red-
looking liquid was blood, from knowing that the wady
was dry the day
before, and from not suspecting that there had been
any change in the night,
as the storm which had caused the change was at such
a distance. (I would
like to strongly emphasize that the error of the Moabites can be/will be
duplicated in the end days, especially when the
whole worldly system
is built on “A LIE” – no telling what the wicked imaginations will come
up
with, especially in light of II Thessalonians 2:11 – “for this cause God
shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie.” We are
talking the 21st century here, not the Stone Age or Iron Age here! – CY –
2011)
23 “And they said, This is
blood: the kings are surely slain, and they have
smitten one another:”
- There were rivalries and
jealousies subsisting between
Judah, Israel, and Edom, which made it quite possible that
at any time open
quarrel might break out among them. Edom especially was, it
is probable, a
reluctant member of the confederacy, forced to take her
part in it by her
suzerain, Jehoshaphat. The Moabites, moreover, had recently
had personal
experience how easily the swords of confederates might be
turned against each
other, since their last expedition against Judah (II
Chronicles 20:1-25) had
completely failed through such a sudden disagreement and
contention – “now
therefore,
kings had come to blows, and the hosts destroyed each
ether,
have nothing to do but to fly upon the spoil, to strip the
slain, and plunder
the camp of the confederates. A disorderly rush took place
for this purpose
(see Josephus, ‘Ant. Jud.,’ 9:3. § 2).
24 “And when
they came to the camp of
The first rush of the main body would be upon the camp,
where they would
expect to find the richest spoil. It was near at hand; and
the occupants kept
themselves concealed in it, expecting the disorderly attack
which actually
took place. They then “rose
up,” and fell upon the crowd of assailants,
who
were off their guard, and expecting nothing less. A confused
rout followed –
“and smote the Moabites, so that they fled before
them:” Josephus says,
“Some of the Moabites were cut to pieces; the others
fled, and dispersed
themselves over their country.” – “but they went
forward, smiting the
Moabites even in their country.”
25 “And they
beat down the cities” — i.e. destroyed
them — leveled them
with the ground — “and on every good piece of land cast
every man his
stone (see v. 19 and
the comment ad loc.), and filled it” [with stones]. “And
they stopped all the wells of water, and felled all the good trees — i.e.
the fruit trees, (Josephus) — only in Kir-haraseth left they the stones
thereof;” - literally, until in Kir-haraseth — i.e.,
in Kir-haraseth only —
left he the stones thereof. He (i.e. the
commander, or the army) went on
destroying and leveling the cities, until he came to
Kir-haraseth, which
proved too strong for him. There he was obliged to leave
the stones
untouched. Kir-haraseth, which is not mentioned among the
early Moabite
towns, nor even upon the Moabite Stone, and which is
therefore thought to
have been a newly constructed fortress, was, in the later
times, one of the most
important of the strongholds of
It was sometimes called Kir-Moab, “the fortress of
got the name of Kerak is uncertain; but we find it spoken
of as
Ptolemy (about A.D. 150), and by Stephen of
It was a place of much importance in the time of the
Crusades. The situation is
one of great strength. The fortress is built upon the top
of a steep hill, surrounded
on all sides by a deep arid narrow valley, which again is
completely enclosed by
mountains, rising higher than the fort itself. It is
undoubtedly one of the strongest
positions within the territory anciently possessed by the
Moabites. “Howbeit the
slingers went about it, and smote it.” It
has been suggested that by “slingers”
are meant, not mere ordinary slingers, but persons who
worked more elaborate
engines, as catapults and the like. All sorts of elaborate modes of attacking
fortifications were very early known in
the Hebrew word used (μy[iL;Q"h") can mean anything but “slingers” in the
usual sense. The situation is one which would allow of “slingers,” in the
ordinary sense, sending their missiles into the place, and
grievously harassing it.
26 “And when the King of
— i.e. that he could not hope to maintain the
defense much longer, but would be
forced to surrender the fortress — “he took with him
seven hundred men that
drew swords, to break through even unto the King of
regarded the King of Edom as the weakest of the
three confederates, and the
least likely to offer effectual resistance; perhaps
he viewed him as a traitor, since
wreak his vengeance on him – “but they could
not.” The attempt failed;
was too strong, and he was forced to throw himself
once more into the
beleaguered town.
27 “Then he took his eldest son, that should
have reigned in his stead” –
the throne of
(cf. Moabite Stone, lines 2 and 3, “My father reigned over
and I reigned after my father”) — “and offered him for a
burnt offering” –
Human sacrifice was widely practiced by the idolatrous nations
who bordered
on
when in a sore strait, had asked, “Shah I give my
firstborn for my transgression,
the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?” (Micah
6:7); and there is reason to
believe that a chief element in the worship of
Chemosh was the sacrifice of young
children by their unnatural parents. The practice
rested on the idea that God was
best pleased when men offered to Him what was
dearest and most precious to
them; but it was in glaring contradiction to the character of
God as
revealed by His
prophets, (I will say once again, that
the
God of the Universe,
who is Omnipotent, Omnipresent and Omniscient, who knows all things, has
testified that abortion never came
into His mind, (Jeremiah 7:31; 19:5;
32:35) –
another evidence that ABORTION ON
DEMAND IS SIN AND THE
PERSON WHO DOES SO A VILE SINNER – Leviticus 20:3 and 5 says
that God will set His face against that man and his
family - CY – 2011) and
it did violence to the best and
holiest instincts of human nature. The Law
condemned it in the strongest terms as a profanation of the
Divine Name
(Leviticus 18:21; 20:1-5), and
neither
Jeroboam nor Ahab ventured to introduce it
when they established their idolatrous systems. The King of Moab, undoubtedly,
offered the sacrifice to his god Chemosh (see Moabite Stone, lines 3, 4, 8, 12),
hoping to propitiate him, and by his aid to escape from the peril in
which he found
himself placed. His motive for offering the sacrifice “upon
the wall” - is not
so clear. It was evidently done to attract the notice of
the besiegers, but
with what further object is uncertain. Some think
the king’s intention was
to confound the enemy by the spectacle of the frightful
deed to which they
had forced him, and thus to effect a change in their
purposes, but perhaps
it is as likely that he hoped to work upon their fears, and
induce them to retire
under the notion that, if they did not, Chemosh would do
them some terrible injury.
“And there was great indignation against
seems necessary to connect these clauses, and to regard
them as assigning cause
and effect. The deed done aroused an indignation against
siege being raised. The terrible act of their king, to
which they considered that
Israel had driven him, stirred up such a feeling of fury
among the residue of
the Moabite nation, that the confederates quailed before
it, and came to the
conclusion that they had best give up the siege and retire.
They therefore
departed from him — i.e. the King of Moab — and
returned to their own
land; severally to
ADDITIONAL
THOUGHTS
Jehoram was better than his father and his mother, very
considerably better
than his brother (l Kings 22:52-53). He “put away the image
of Baal that
his father had made,” lowered the Baal-worship from
the position of the
state religion to that of (at the most) a tolerated cult,
and professed himself
a worshipper of Jehovah. But his
heart was not whole with God. He
“cleaved unto the
sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat; and departed not
therefrom.” (v. 3) - At Dan and
homage of both king and people; priests, not of the blood
of Aaron, offered
the sacrifices of unrighteousness before the insensible
images; and ritual
practices were maintained which had no Divine sanction. Jehoram’s
reformation stopped half-way. He repented of what Ahab
and Jezebel and
Ahaziah had done, but not of what Jeroboam had done. His
was a halfhearted
repentance. Jesus
said, “No
servant can serve two masters: for
either
he will hate the
one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one,
and despise the other. YE CANNOT
SERVE GOD AND MAMMON.”
(Luke 16:13)
A people that delights in human sacrifice, and offers
to its deities tender
and innocent
children, drowning their cries with the loud din of drums and
tom-toms, must
have depraved its conscience by long persistence in evil,
and departed
very far indeed from original righteousness, (the
and
Diodorus Sicalus
describes the ceremony as it took place at
Carthage,
a Phoenician colony. There was in the
great temple there, he says, an image
of Saturn (Moloch), which was a human figure
with a bull’s head
and
outstretched arms. This image of metal was made
glowing hot by a fire
kindled within it; and the children, laid in
its arms, rolled from thence into
the fiery lap below. If the children cried, the
parents stopped their noise by
fondling and kissing them; for the victim ought
not to weep, and the sound
of complaint was drowned in the din of flutes
and kettle-drums. Mothers
stood by without tears or sobs; if they wept or
sobbed, they lost the honor
of the act, and the children were sacrificed notwithstanding.” The only
doubtful point is whether the children were placed alive in the glowing arms of the
image, or whether they were first killed and afterwards burnt in sacrifice;
but the description of Diodorus seems to imply the more cruel of the two
proceedings –
THAT WHILE SIN
MAY ONLY BE IN THE FORM OF NEGLECT OF
DUTY, IT MAY IN
THE CASE OF ONE MAN ENTAIL SERIOUS EVILS
ON POSTERITY.
“And Mesha King of
rendered unto the King of
thousand rams, with the wool. But it came to
pass, when Ahab was dead, that
the
King of
tributary
to the
but
in cattle, or in wool, but not the less valuable
on that account. But now a
rebellion had broken out, and a serious revolt was threatened. Why was this?
Matthew Henry ascribes it to the neglect of Ahaziah, the former king, the brother
of
Jehoram. He made no attempt to avoid such a catastrophe. Ah! Sins of
omission entail
serious evils. The neglect of one generation brings miseries
on another. (If time was to go on, think of what our grandchildren and great grand
children will have to deal with by the neglect of voters and lawmakers of the last
U. S.
Congress – CY – 2011) - The neglect of parents often brings ruin on the
children. Negative sins are curses. “We have left undone the things we ought to
have done;” and who shall tell the result on all future times?
EVIL IS EVIL
STILL. Even though Jehoram made a stab at reformatioin,
the foundation of his character was still evil — “ he wrought evil
in the sight
of the Lord” (v. 2). This is the great fact which God looks at,
and in the light
of which He judges us.
Herod “did many things” to
please John the Baptist,
but his bad heart remained unchanged (Mark 5:20). The cardinal necessity of
the heart is not reformation (new resolutions) but renewal — regeneration —
“Ye must be Born
Again!” – (John
3:3) – It is the founding of the life on a
spiritual basis — “God is a Spirit and they that worship Him
must worship
Him in Spirit and in Truth” – (John 4:24) (Once again I recommend
How to Be Saved! - # 5 – this web site – CY – 2011)
Jesus described the person and results of one who preferred to go the
reformed route as opposed to Salvation in the Lord when He said:
“When the
unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through
dry places,
seeking rest, and findeth none. Then he
saith, I will return
into my house
from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it
empty, swept,
and garnished. Then goeth he, and taketh
with himself
seven other
spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell
there: and the
last state of that man is worse than the first. Even so shall it
be also unto this wicked generation.” (Matthew 12:43-45)
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