2 Chronicles 35:20 - Exposition

After all this . A period of about thirteen years of happy retrospect is now the portion of the good king. This period brings itself to an unhappy and even fatal termination in the year B.C. 608; when, as it would appear by the result, King Josiah did wrong, and went out of his way, in opposing the march of Pharaoh-Necho, successor of Psammetichus King of Egypt, against Cyaxares King of Assyria ( 2 Kings 23:29 ), or King of Babylon at Circesium on the River Phrat, the head-quarters now of the united Assyrian and Babylonian power. Where the fault or sin of Josiah lay—whether he ran before he was sent, or whether, according to our following two verses, he set out against the Divine word by Necho—is certainly a question left in obscurity. Nothing is said in our history or its parallel to accredit the tale of Necho, or to discredit the heart and motive of Josiah—nothing except what silence and the result seem to say. One other clement of interest and of difficulty may be added to the question; for of the thirteen years' interval, which we have described above as one presumably of happy retrospect in certain aspects for Josiah, we know nothing from Scripture, but have every reason to suppose that during it Josiah and his kingdom had become subject, if only nominally, to Nabopolassar; so that, in offering to resist Necho of Egypt, he was offering to strengthen so far forth the royal line which did dishonour to his own country and his country's God. Upon this supposition, however, we can lay no stress.