2 Chronicles 15:3 - Exposition

Now for a long season . This translation is wrong; translate rather first, And many the days to Israel to not have true God, and to not have teaching priest, and to not have Law . So far no tense is limited, however naturally through the very drift of the passage it may seem that experience is being challenged, and so necessarily the past tense desiderated, not, however, in aorist shape, but in what some French grammarians call present perfect. For Azariah may well contemplate his illustration as good from long of old, to the very moment he was speaking. The unfortunate wealth of illustration to hand of his position may pardon the doubtfulness of commentators as to the source from which it may be supposed he would have drawn his most effective instances. It will not be the unlikeliest guide to follow the triple description of the alleged apostasy, misfortune, or iniquity "of Israel," e.g. (say) it happened to them to not have the true God ; happened to them to not have teaching priest ; happened to them to not have the Law (this meaning, to not have it authoritatively proclaimed, taught, ministered). When did these three things happen altogether most notoriously? They describe, not the transgressions of an individual king, but the state of the people and kingdom as a whole. If it were possible to conceive the description as a flagrant anachronism, a retrospective post-Captivity amplification, which the writer (in his glow of work and thought) was unconsciously and irresistibly betrayed into putting into the lips of the Prophet Azariah, all doubt would end; for the description would suit no state of things and no period better than that of the divided kingdoms, especially applying to the career of the separate kingdom of Israel. Our account, unfortunately, is unchecked just here by a parallel. It is, however, impossible to suppose this without any tittle of external authority for it, much less enough to proceed upon. Some so crave the illustration that they are prepared to suppose all the tenses of these verses present and future rather than past and "present perfect." But, in fact, no doubt the history of Israel since the death of Moses illustrated the language of Azariah passim to a degree beyond all "that is written" or that we know. And then we may certainly consider theft the expression chosen, "many days" (which some translate "many a day," "many a time "), even the word "years" not being employed, leaves it open to us to go to short episodes of an irreligious and disastrous character in the history of Israel. Lastly, the long stretch of fully three hundred years, extending throughout the Book of Judges (its last five chapters in right order or wrong)into the opening seven chapters of 1 Samuel, provides one running comment, superabundant almost to repetitiousness, for the illustration of our verses 3-7; in many cases absolutely picking out the very colours to match ( e.g. 5:6 ; 20:29 , 20:31 , compared with our 20:5 ). To distinguish and separate the very numerous references that might be made is merely supererogatory, and spoils the unmatched mosaic work of the history ( 2:15 , 2:18 , 2:19 ; 3:12-15 ; 4:1-3 ; 5:6 , 5:19-21 , 5:31 : 6:1-5 , 6:7-10 ; 9:32-37 ; 10:6-16 ; 11:19 , 11:20 ; 12:5 , 12:6 ; 17:5 , 17:6 , 17:13 ; 20:29 , 20:31 ; 1 Samuel 2:30 -35; 1 Samuel 4:9-22 ; 1 Samuel 7:3 , 1 Samuel 7:8 ; 1 Samuel 13:19-22 ). It is a long-stretched-out history of a practically atheistic, priest-less, lawless life; divided into narratives of invasion, oppression, servitude, smart, cry for help manifestly more the cry of pain and cowardice than of penitence and repentance, resolution and vow, and—for another trial and still another—of Divine pity, forbearance, and deliverance