2 Kings 8

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:13

And Hazael said, But what, is thy servant a dog, that he should do this great thing? This rendering is generally allowed to Be incorrect. The true sense, which is well represented in the Septuagint ( τίς ἐστιν ὁ δοῦλός σου ὁ κύων ὁ τεθνηκὼς οτι ποιήσει τὸ ῥῆμα τοῦτο ;), is—"But what is thy servant, this dog, that he should do so great a thing?" Hazael does not accuse Elisha of making him out a dog in the future, but calls himself a dog in the present. "Dog" is a word of... read more

Spence, H. D. M., etc.

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:14

So he departed from Elisha, and came to his master; who said to him, What said Elisha to thee? And he answered, He told me that thou shouldest surely recover. This, as already observed , was giving half Elisha's answer, and suppressing the other half. The suppressio veri is a suggestio falsi ; and the suppression was Hazael's act, not Elisha's. Had Hazael repeated the whole of Elisha's answer, "Say unto him, Thou shalt surely recover; howbeit the Lord hath showed me that he shall... read more

Spence, H. D. M., etc.

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:15

And it came to pass on the morrow, that he took a thick cloth. Macber is a cloth of a coarse texture—a mat, or piece of carpeting. It has here the article prefixed to it ( ham-macber ), which implies that there was but one in the sick-room. We may conjecture that it was a mat used as a sort of pillow, and interposed between the head-rest (so common in Egypt and Assyria) and the head (compare the c'bir of 1 Samuel 19:13 ). And dipped it in water. The water would fill up the... read more

Spence, H. D. M., etc.

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:16

And in the fifth year of Joram the son of Ahab King of Israel, Jehoshaphat being then King of Judah ; literally, and of Jehoshaphat King of Judah . The words are wanting in three Hebrew manuscripts, in some editions of the Septuagint, in the Peshito Syriac, in the Parisian Heptaplar Syriac, in the Arabic Version, and in many copies of the Vulgate. They cannot possibly have the sense assigned to them in our version, and are most probably a gloss which has crept into the text from the... read more

Spence, H. D. M., etc.

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:16-24

THE WICKED REIGN OF JEHORAM IN JUDAH . At this point the writer, who has been concerned with the history of the kingdom of Israel hitherto in the present book, takes up the story of the kingdom of Judah from 1 Kings 22:50 , and proceeds to give a very brief account of the reign of Jehoshaphat's eldest son, Jehoram, or (by contraction) Joram. His narrative has to be supplemented from 2 Chronicles 21:1-20 ; which contains many facts not mentioned by the writer of Kings. read more

Spence, H. D. M., etc.

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:16-27

The power of bad women for evil. All the evil wrought, all the irreligion, all the licentiousness and depravity, and almost all the misery suffered during the reigns of Ahab, Ahaziah, and Jehoram in Israel, and of Jehoram and Ahaziah in Judah, were caused by the machinations and influence of two wicked women—Jezebel and her daughter Athaliah. Jezebel, a proud imperious woman, born in the purple, a "king's daughter;" and extraordinarily strong-minded and unscrupulous, obtained a complete... read more

Spence, H. D. M., etc.

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:16-29

Two kings of Judah. (On the chronology, see Exposition.) The reigns of Jehoram and Ahaziah are black spots in the history of Judah. I. JEHORAM , SON OF JEHOSHAPHAT . We may notice concerning this ruler: 1. He had a pious father . We may quote Thomas Fuller's quaint comments on this part of the Savior's genealogy: "Lord, I find the genealogy of my Savior strangely checkered with four remarkable changes in four immediate generations. I see, Lord, from hence, that my... read more

Spence, H. D. M., etc.

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:17

Thirty and two years old was he when he began to reign ; and he reigned eight years in Jerusalem. The eight years seem to be counted from his association in the kingdom by his father in his twenty-third year. He reigned as sole king only six years. read more

Spence, H. D. M., etc.

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:17-24

Lessons from the life of Jehoram. "Thirty and two years old was he [Jehoram] when he began to reign," etc. This is a short fragment of a king's history—the history of Jehoram. Brief as it is, it contains many practical truths. I. THAT PIETY IS NOT NECESSARILY HEREDITARY . Parents, as a rule, transmit their physical and intellectual qualities to their children, but not their moral characters. Jehoram was a bad man and a wicked king, but he was the son of Jehoshaphat, who was a... read more

Spence, H. D. M., etc.

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:18

And he walked in the way of the kings of Israel, as did the house of Ahab ; i.e. he introduced into Judah the Baal and Astarte worship, which Ahab had introduced into Israel from Phoenicia. The "house of Ahab" maintained and spread the Baal-worship, wherever it had influence. Ahaziah, the son of Ahab, championed it in Israel ( 1 Kings 22:53 ); Jehoram, his brother, allowed its continuance ( 2 Kings 10:18-28 ); Jehoram of Judah was induced by his wife, Athaliah, the daughter of Ahab, to... read more

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:13

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:14

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:15

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:16

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:16-24

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:16-27

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:16-29

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:17

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:17-24

The Pulpit Commentary - 2 Kings 8:18

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