Bible Commentaries

Hezekiah's good reign, 2 Chronicles 29:1, 2 Chronicles 29:2. He opens and repairs the doors of the temple, 2 Chronicles 29:3. He assembles and exhorts the priests and Levites, and proposes to renew the covenant with the Lord, 2 Chronicles 29:4-11. They all sanctify themselves and cleanse the temple, 2 Chronicles 29:12-17. They inform the king of their progress, 2 Chronicles 29:18, 2 Chronicles 29:19. He collects the rulers of the people: and they offer abundance of sin-offerings, and burnt-offerings, and worship the Lord, 2 Chronicles 29:20-30. Every part of the Divine service is arranged, and Hezekiah and all the people rejoice, 2 Chronicles 29:31-36.

He did that which was right - See the note on 2 Kings 18:3.

He hath delivered them to trouble, to astonishment - He probably refers here chiefly to that dreadful defeat by the Israelites in which a hundred and twenty thousand were slain, and two hundred thousand taken prisoners; see the preceding chapter, 2 Chronicles 28:6-8 (note).

To make a covenant - To renew the covenant under which the whole people were constantly considered, and of which circumcision was the sign; and the spirit of which was, I will be your God: Ye shall be my people.

And the priests went - The priests and Levites cleansed first the courts both of the priests and of the people. On this labor they spent eight days. Then they cleansed the interior of the temple; but as the Levites had no right to enter the temple, the priests carried all the dirt and rubbish to the porch, whence they were collected by the Levites, carried away, and cast into the brook Kidron; in this work eight days more were occupied, and thus the temple was purified in sixteen days.

On the first day - "They began on the first day of the first month Nisan." - Targum.

All the vessels, which King Ahaz - The Targum says, "All the vessels which King Ahaz had polluted and rendered abominable by strange idols, when he reigned in his transgression against the Word of the Lord, we have collected and hidden; and others have we prepared to replace them; and they are now before the Lord."

They brought seven bullocks, etc. - This was more than the law required; see Leviticus 4:13, etc. It ordered one calf or ox for the sins of the people, and one he-goat for the sins of the prince; but Hezekiah here offers many more. And the reason appears sufficiently evident: the law speaks only of sins of ignorance; but here were sins of every kind and every die - idolatry, apostasy from the Divine worship, profanation of the temple, etc., etc. The sin-offerings, we are informed, were offered, first for the Kingdom - for the transgressions of the king and his family; secondly, for the Sanctuary, which had been defiled and polluted, and for the priests who had been profane, negligent, and unholy; and, finally, for Judah - for the whole mass of the people, who had been led away into every kind of abomination by the above examples.