2 Kings 7:6 - Exposition

For the Lord had made the host of the Syrians to hear a noise of chariots, and a noise of horses, even the noise of a great host. קוֹל , voice, is used for noises of any kind (see Exodus 20:18 ; Psalms 42:7 ; Psalms 93:4 ; Jeremiah 47:3 ; Ezekiel 1:24 ; Ezekiel 3:13 ; Joel 2:5 ; Nahum 3:2 ), though generally for those in which the human voice preponderated. A noise like that of chariots and of horses and of a great host ( צַאילִ גָדוֹל ) was borne in upon the ears of the Syrians about nightfall of the day on which Jehoram had determined to put Elisha to death; and, as they expected no reinforcements, they naturally concluded that succor had arrived to help their enemy. How the noise was produced it is impossible to say. Na-rural causes are insufficient; and the writer evidently regards the event as miraculous: "The Lord had made the host of the Syrians to hear a noise," etc. Nothing can be more weak and irrelevant than to remark, with Bahr," There are instances, even nowadays, that people in certain mountainous regions regard a rushing and roaring sound, such as is sometimes heard there, as a sign of coming war." The Syrians thought they heard the actual arrival of a vast army. And they said one to another, Lo, the King of Israel hath hired against us the kings of the Hittites. This supposition has been thought "strange," almost inexplicable. "No such nation as the Hittites any longer existed," says Mr. Sumner. But the Assyrian records of the ninth and eighth centuries B.C. make it evident, not only that the Hittites still existed at that date, but that they were among the most powerful enemies of the Ninevite kings, being located in Northern Syria, about Carchemish (Jerabus) and the adjacent country. It is also apparent that they did not form a centralized monarchy, but were governed by a number of chiefs, or "kings," twelve of whom are mentioned in one place. It was no very improbable supposition on the part of the Syrians that Jehoram had called in the aid of the Hittite confederacy, and that they had marched an army to his assistance . And the kings of the Egyptians . "The plural, kings of the Egyptians," says Keil, "is not to be pressed. It is probably occasioned only by the parallel expression,' kings of the Hittites.'" But Egyptian history shows us that about this date Egypt was becoming disintegrated, and that two or three distinct dynasties were sometimes ruling at the same time, in different parts of the country—one at Bubastis another at Thebes, a third at Tanis, occasionally a fourth at Memphis. The writer thus shows a knowledge of the internal condition of Egypt which we should not have expected. To come upon us; i.e. to fall upon us from the north and from the south at the same time. In their panic, the Syrians did not stop to weigh probabilities, or to think how unlikely it was that such a simultaneous attack could have been arranged between powers so remote one from the other.