2 Kings 14:26 - Exposition

For the Lord saw the affliction of Israel, that it was very bitter . The repetition is perhaps to be accounted for by the desire of the writer to explain how it came to pass that so great a deliverance was granted to Israel under a king who maintained the worship of the calves. He views it as the consequence of God's infinite compassion, and of the extreme bitterness of Israel's sufferings under the Syrians. For there was not any shut up, nor any left (see the comment on 1 Kings 14:10 ), nor any helper for Israel. Apart from Jehovah, Israel had no one to come to her aid. Judah would not help her, for Judah had just suffered at her hands ( 2 Kings 14:11-14 ); still less would Philistia, or Moab, or Ammon, who were her constant enemies. Her isolation rendered her all the more an object for the Divine compassion.