2 Chronicles 29:1

THE BEGINNING OF THE REIGN OF HEZEKIAH

XII. HEZEKIAH (715-687 B.C.)

HEZEKIAH'S MOVE TO RESTORE THE TRUE WORSHIP

"Hezekiah began to reign when he was five and twenty years old; and he reigned nine and twenty years in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Abijah, the daughter of Zechariah. And he did that which was right in the eyes of Jehovah, according to all that David his father had done. He in the first year of his reign, in the first month, opened the doors of the house of Jehovah, and repaired them. And he brought in the priests and the Levites, and gathered them together in the broad place on the east, and said unto them, Hear me, ye Levites; now sanctify yourselves, and sanctify the house of Jehovah, the God of your fathers, and carry forth the filthiness out of the holy place. For our fathers have trespassed, and done that which was evil in the sight of Jehovah our God, and have forsaken him, and have turned away their faces from the habitation of Jehovah, and turned their back. Also they have shut up the doors of the porch, and have put out the lamps, and have not burned incense nor offered burnt-offerings in the holy place unto the God of Israel. Wherefore the wrath of Jehovah was upon Judah and Jerusalem, and he hath delivered them to be tossed to and fro, to be an astonishment, and a hissing, as ye see with your eyes. For, lo, our fathers are fallen by the sword, and our sons and our daughters and our wives are in captivity for this. Now it is in my heart to make a covenant with Jehovah, the God of Israel, that his fierce anger may turn away from us. My sons, be not now negligent; for Jehovah hath chosen you to stand before him, to minister unto him, and that ye should be his ministers, and burn incense."

Practically all of this chapter is without parallel in Kings. It supplements the record of Hezekiah's extensive reforms that are mentioned there. We see here that his work was not merely negative, in such things as destroying the high places and cutting down the Asherim. He also did many positive things toward pointing Israel back to the true worship of God.

"Carry forth the filthiness out of the holy place" (2 Chronicles 29:5). "This was the accumulated dirt from years of neglect."[1]

"They have not burned incense nor offered burnt-offerings in the holy place unto the God of Israel" (2 Chronicles 29:7). But does not 2 Kings 16:14-16 state that Ahaz himself made offerings on that special altar? Yes, indeed; but there is no contradiction here. The Chronicler is merely telling us (and those Levites) that those sacrifices that Ahaz offered on an Assyrian altar, were, in no sense, offered unto the God of Israel, but were actually sacrifices to Assyrian gods.[2] Note the underlined words in this paragraph.

"Jehovah hath chosen you (the Levites) to stand before him" (2 Chronicles 11). Here again we find an acute consciousness of the Law of God through Moses in the Pentateuch, especially in Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers, where the choice of the Levites and the sons of Aaron was first revealed. It is the proliferation of dozens of such references as these in Chronicles that sends the radical critics into frantic screams of "Midrash"!

This single chapter is a complete contradiction of the critical denials of it with abundant proof of the existence of the whole Pentateuch in the reign of Hezekiah, generations prior to Josiah and that fairy tale about the P Code.

It is the conviction of this writer that the author of whatever source was quoted by the Chronicler here (see our introduction for a list of these) had a complete copy of the Law of Moses (the whole Pentateuch) before him when he wrote down the events related in this chapter.

UNDENIABLE REFLECTIONS OF THE PENTATEUCH IN THIS CHAPTER

(1) "The wrath of Jehovah was upon Judah" (2 Chronicles 29:8). "This word (wrath) is used in Deuteronomy 28:25,"[3] where Moses had predicted this very disaster that befell Judah.

(2) "For Jehovah hath chosen you" (2 Chronicles 29:11). This is stated in Numbers 3:6,8:6, and in Deuteronomy 10:8.

(3) "They brought seven bullocks, and seven rams, and seven lambs, and seven he-goats for a sin-offering for the kingdom" (2 Chronicles 29:21). The use of these animals for that purpose was authorized in Leviticus 1:3f; 14:20; and 16:24. "Seven victims were offered because seven was a sacred number."[4]

(4) The use of seven victims instead of one in certain sacrifices was authorized in Numbers 28:11ff.

(5) "The priests received the blood and sprinkled it upon the altar" (2 Chronicles 29:22). The ritual for this action is found in the law of Moses in Exodus 29:16, and in Leviticus 1:5,11.

(6) "The king and the assembly laid their hands upon them (the sacrifices)" (2 Chronicles 29:23). This ceremony is described in Leviticus 1:4.

(7) "And they made a sin-offering with their blood upon the altar" (2 Chronicles 29:24) In Leviticus 4:25,34 is found the description of exactly how this was done.

(8) "Come near, ... and bring thank-offerings into the house of Jehovah" (2 Chronicles 29:31) "The thanksgiving here was for the joy over the renewal of the worship of Jehovah."[5] Instructions for the offerings and ceremonies for such an occasion are found in Leviticus 7:12ff.

(9) "The burnt-offerings ... with the fat of the peace-offerings, and with the drink-offerings for every burnt-offering ... so the service for the house of Jehovah was set in order" (2 Chronicles 29:35). "The drink offerings were of wine and probably poured like the blood at the base of the altar."[6] Very complete and detailed instructions for these sacrifices, including the drink-offerings, are found in Numbers 15:1-15.

Note here that Hezekiah followed instructions for the services of the house of Jehovah, instructions that are detailed in the Mosaic writings of the Pentateuch.

Before leaving this analysis, we must ask, "How do the critics attempt to get rid of such proof as this? Curtis has this succinct statement of their only answer.

It must be remembered that the writer was drawing largely upon his imagination, and evidently cared little about accuracy of detail.[7]

To such so-called scholarship as this, we wish to say NO! It is the evil radical critics, seeking to destroy faith in the Word of God, who are drawing upon their imagination. The real Biblical Midrash is that imaginary P Code, that alleged discovery in the reign of Josiah, the Jehovist, the Elohist, the Deuteronomist, and the Second, Third, or Twentieth ISAIAH, and all the rest of those fraudulent, imaginary, ephemeral and constantly changing "documents" invented by evil men and imposed upon believers under the guise of their being scholarly. And may it be said again that until all of those alleged documents (or any single one of them, for that matter) can be produced and scientifically evaluated, the truly intelligent person may safely reject them.