--- title: "Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible · Volume 1: Genesis to Jeremiah" author: "Adam Clarke" languages: [en] shelf: "Commentaries" section: 433 of 914 url: https://scriptura.si/works/adam-clarke-commentary-volume-1-genesis-to-jeremiah/433/ cite: "Adam Clarke, Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible · Volume 1: Genesis to Jeremiah, section 433. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/adam-clarke-commentary-volume-1-genesis-to-jeremiah/433/" --- # Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible · Volume 1: Genesis to Jeremiah *Adam Clarke* Clarke's learned notes on the Hebrew and Greek, verse by verse, from Genesis to Revelation: volume 1 of 2. ## 433. 2 Chronicles · 15 of 24 Source: https://scriptura.si/works/adam-clarke-commentary-volume-1-genesis-to-jeremiah/433/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/adam-clarke-commentary-volume-1-genesis-to-jeremiah/433/#p-N ### Verse 17 [¶1] Save Jehoahaz the youngest - This person had at least three names, Jehoahaz, Ahaziah, ([2Chr 22:1]), and Azariah, ([2Chr 22:6]). ### Verse 18 [¶3] The Lord smote him - "And after all these things the Word of the Lord smote his bowels," etc. - Targum. ### Verse 19 [¶5] After the end of two years, his bowels fell out - The Targum seems to intimate that he had a constipation and inflammation in his bowels; and that at last his bowels gushed out. [¶6] No burning - "His people made no burning of aromatic woods for him, as they had done for his forefathers." - Targum. See on [2Chr 16:14] (note). ### Verse 20 [¶8] Departed without being desired - He was hated while he lived, and neglected when he died; visibly cursed of God, and necessarily execrated by the people whom he had lived only to corrupt and oppress. No annalist is mentioned as having taken the pains to write any account of his vile life. This summary mention of him consigns him to the execration of posterity, and holds in the view of every prudent governor, the rock on which he split and wrecked the state. ### Introduction [¶10] Ahaziah beans to reign; and reigns wickedly under the counsels of his bad mother, [2Chr 22:1-4]. He is slain by Jehu, who destroys all the house of Ahab, [2Chr 22:5-9]. Athaliah destroys all the seed royal of Judah, except Joash, who is hidden by his nurse in the temple six years, [2Chr 22:10-12]. ### Verse 1 [¶12] Made Ahaziah his youngest son king - All the others had been slain by the Arabians, etc.; see the preceding chapter, [2Chr 21:17] (note). ### Verse 2 [¶14] Forty and two years old was Ahaziah - See the note on [2Kgs 8:26]. Ahaziah might have been twenty-two years old, according to [2Kgs 8:26] (note), but he could not have been forty-two, as stated here, without being two years older than his own father! See the note there. The Syriac and Arabic have twenty-two, and the Septuagint, in some copies, twenty. And it is very probable that the Hebrew text read so originally; for when numbers were expressed by single letters, it was easy to mistake מ mem, Forty, for כ caph, Twenty. And if this book was written by a scribe who used the ancient Hebrew letters, now called the Samaritan, the mistake was still more easy and probable, as the difference between caph and mem is very small, and can in many instances be discerned only by an accustomed eye. [¶15] The reading in [2Kgs 8:26] is right, and any attempt to reconcile this in Chronicles with that is equally futile and absurd. Both readings cannot be true; is that therefore likely to be genuine that makes the son two years older than the father who begat him? Apage hae nugae! ### Verse 3 [¶17] His mother was his counsellor - Athaliah, the wicked daughter of a wicked parent, and the wicked spouse of an unprincipled king. ### Verse 5 [¶19] Went with Jehoram - See on [2Kgs 8:28] (note). ### Verse 9 [¶21] He sought Ahaziah - See a different account [2Kgs 9:27] (note), and the note there, where the accounts are reconciled. ### Verse 10 [¶23] All the seed royal of the house of Judah - Nothing but the miraculous intervention of the Divine providence could have saved the line of David at this time, and preserved the prophecy relative to the Messiah. The whole truth of that prophecy, and the salvation of the world, appeared to be now suspended on the brittle thread of the life of an infant of a year old, (see [2Chr 24:1]), to destroy whom was the interest of the reigning power! But God can save by few as well as by many. He had purposed, and vain were the counter-exertions of earth and hell. ### Verse 12 [¶25] Hid in the house of God - "In the house of the sanctuary of God." - Targum. Or, as he says on [2Chr 22:11], בקודש קודשיא bekudash kudeshaiya "in the holy of holies." To this place Athaliah had no access, therefore Joash lay concealed, he and his affectionate aunt-nurse. - See on [2Kgs 11:1] (note). ### Introduction [¶27] Jehoiada the priest, after having taken counsel with the captains, Levites, etc., proclaims Joash, and anoints him king, [2Chr 23:1-11]. Athaliah, endeavoring to prevent it, is slain, [2Chr 23:12-15]. He makes the people enter into a covenant, that they would serve the Lord, [2Chr 23:16]. The people break down the temple of Baal, and slay Mattan his priest, [2Chr 23:17]. Jehoiada makes several alterations, and remodels the kingdom, [2Chr 23:18-21]. ### Verse 1 [¶29] And in the seventh year - See on [2Kgs 11:4] (note), etc. ### Verse 9 [¶31] Spears and bucklers - See on [2Kgs 11:10] (note). ### Verse 11 [¶33] God save the king - May the king live! See on [2Kgs 11:12] (note). ### Verse 14 [¶35] And whoso followeth her, let him be slain with the sword - He who takes her part, or endeavors to prevent the present revolution, let him be immediately slain. ### Verse 15 [¶37] Of the horse-gate - See on [2Kgs 11:16] (note). ### Verse 16 [¶39] Made a covenant between him - The high priest was, on this occasion, the representative of God; whom both the people and the king must have had in view, through the medium of his priest. ### Verse 17 [¶41] Mattan the priest - The Targum will not prostitute the term priest, but calls him כומרא cumera, priestling. ### Verse 21 [¶43] The city was quiet - There was no attempt at a counter-revolution. Concerning the coronation of Joash, there is a curious circumstance mentioned by the Targumist on [2Chr 23:11], it is as follows: - "And they brought forth the son of the king, and put on him the royal crown which David took from the head of the king of the children of Ammon. In it was inserted the precious attracting stone, in which was engraven and expressed the great and honorable Name [יהוה] which David had placed there by the Holy Spirit: and it was of the weight of a talent of gold; it was therefore a testimony to the house of David that no king who was not of the seed of David should be able to put it on his head, nor be able to bear its weight. When, therefore, the people saw it placed on the head of Joash, and that he was able to bear this crown, they believed him to be of the seed of David, and immediately constituted him king. Therefore Jehoiada and his sons anointed him, and said, May the king be prosperous in his kingdom!" [¶44] The Jews say that this was the crown of the king of the Ammonites; and that it was always worn afterwards by the kings of the house of Judah. See Jarchi on this place.