Commentari biblici

And Ahab had seventy sons in Samaria. And Jehu wrote letters, and sent to Samaria, unto the rulers of Jezreel, to the elders, and to them that brought up Ahab’s [children], saying,

And Ahab had seventy sons. — By several wives. God had threatened to root out his house, yet he promised himself the establishment of his house; and thereupon so followed the work of generation that he left seventy sons behind him.

In Samaria. — The chief city, where they were for safety and for noble education.

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Now as soon as this letter cometh to you, seeing your master’s sons [are] with you, and [there are] with you chariots and horses, a fenced city also, and armour;

Now as soon as this letter cometh to you. — A concise and stately kind of writing, much like that of the king of Syria to the king of Israel. 2 Kings 5:6 So the Hebrews note of Esau, in his meeting with Jacob, Genesis 33:4-15 that he uttereth his mind in few words, whenas Jacob is more full and fuse in his expressions. But ornamentum epistolae est ornamentis carere, saith a master of rhetoric, Politian. Plainness is the greatest grace of an epistle.

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Look even out the best and meetest of your master’s sons, and set [him] on his father’s throne, and fight for your master’s house.

Look even out the best, … — All this Jehu speaketh ironice, or, at least, tentative: that he might feel their pulses and find how they stood affected.

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But they were exceedingly afraid, and said, Behold, two kings stood not before him: how then shall we stand?

But they were exceedingly afraid. — Such was their pusillanimity and perfidy, that they yield upon a little entreaty, and betray their trust. But God had an overruling hand in it, for the rooting out of Ahab’s progeny.

Behold, two kings, …: how then shall we stand? — Say we the same of God’s irresistible power. Ten thousand kings cannot stand before him; and how should we?

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And he that [was] over the house, and he that [was] over the city, the elders also, and the bringers up [of the children], sent to Jehu, saying, We [are] thy servants, and will do all that thou shalt bid us; we will not make any king: do thou [that which is] good in thine eyes.

We are thy servants, and will do all that thou shalt bid us, … — Surely it is meet to be said thus unto God, and to him alone. "Be not ye the servants of men" in St Paul’s sense. 1 Corinthians 7:23

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Then he wrote a letter the second time to them, saying, If ye [be] mine, and [if] ye will hearken unto my voice, take ye the heads of the men your master’s sons, and come to me to Jezreel by to morrow this time. Now the king’s sons, [being] seventy persons, [were] with the great men of the city, which brought them up.

Then he wrote a letter the second time. — Not with black, but with blood; like that letter of Mithridates, king of Pontus, written to the ruin of fourscore thousand Romans trading in his dominions. But it was just in God, that as Ahab and Jezebel, by a letter sent to the elders of Jezreel, shed the blood of Naboth and his sons; so they should have the blood of all their sons shed by a letter sent from Jezreel to the elders of Samaria. God loveth to retaliate.

Take ye the heads of the men. — This was but policy to root out all Ahab’s seed, that there might be no avenger. The poet could say,

“ Nηπιος ος κατερα κτεινας, παιδας υπολειπει . ” - Arist., Rhet., lib. i. cap. 15.

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And it came to pass, when the letter came to them, that they took the king’s sons, and slew seventy persons, and put their heads in baskets, and sent him [them] to Jezreel.

And put their heads in baskets. — Apposite ad culpam Achab, saith A Lapide: this was suitable to Ahab’s sin. He had sent for baskets of grapes out of Naboth’s vineyard at Jezreel; and now the heads of his sons are brought thither in baskets. Oh, doleful burden!

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And there came a messenger, and told him, saying, They have brought the heads of the king’s sons. And he said, Lay ye them in two heaps at the entering in of the gate until the morning.

Lay ye them in two heaps. — a Here some hard hearted Hannibal would have cried out, O formosum spectaculum! Oh, brave sight! Or, O rem regiam! as another, when he had slain three hundred. I am ready to say as one did on a like occasion -

“ Tu quibus ista legas incertum est, Lector, ocellis:

Ipse quidem siccis scribere vix potui. ”

a The world is like this heap of heads, that had never a heart amongst them.

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