2 Kings 11:5

5. This is the thing that ye shall do This description (2 Kings 11:5-14) of the arrangement of the Levite guards is obscure, and some parts of it difficult to harmonize with the parallel and fuller account in 2 Chronicles 23:4-13. The difficulty comes from our ignorance of some of the terms employed. The gate of Sur and the gate behind the guard are matters of conjecture, on which it is needless to posit a decided opinion. But so long as these gates are unknown, there must rest an obscurity upon the whole passage. We attempt merely to point out what seems to be the most natural and plausible meaning of the words.

You that enter in on the sabbath Those Levites whose turn to enter upon their week of service in the temple came on the particular Sabbath here indicated. The different kinds of service in which they were employed are described in 1 Chronicles 9:17-33, from which passage it appears that a large body of the Levites were constantly required in the temple, and that they relieved each other by turns, one company entering in on the Sabbath when another company, having filled their week, went forth. 2 Kings 11:7. “By choosing the Sabbath day,” says Wordsworth, “and by retaining those of the Levitical course whose turn it was to retire from its allotted service, Jehoiada doubled the number of the official forces of the temple without exciting suspicion.”

Shall even be keepers of the watch of the king’s house The king’s house must certainly mean the royal palace, from which there was a magnificent passageway leading up to the house of the Lord. 1 Kings 10:5, note. A third part of the Levites here specified, instead of entering the temple as usual, were to stay outside, and guard this way to the royal residence, lest some satellite of Athaliah should discover or interrupt the plot. They are the ones who in 2 Chronicles 23:5 are to be at the king’s house.