2 Kings 15:29

29. Tiglath-pileser From the various sources of information concerning this Assyrian monarch we learn that he was a usurper, and by a successful revolution became the founder of a new dynasty. He reigned about eighteen years, and was engaged most of the time in wars to recover the losses which the kingdom seems to have suffered through the weakness of his predecessors. His principal campaigns were in Babylonia, Syria, and Palestine. Unfortunately the monuments of this king, though numerous, have been wantonly defaced, mutilated, and in many instances destroyed, by his successors, and used to build and adorn later structures. Still they yield much evidence to confirm the Scripture records. Of his league with Ahaz, and his smiting the Syrian power, see 2 Kings 16:7, ff.

Ijon See note on 1 Kings 15:20.

Abel-bethmaachah See note on 2 Samuel 20:14. Janoah is identified by some with the Janohah of the tribe of Ephraim, (see Joshua 16:6;) but as that lies far out of the line of Tiglath-pileser’s march, it is more commonly believed that this Janoah must have been in Northern Palestine, and not far from these other cities in connexion with which it is named; but no place of this name has yet been found in that locality,

Kedesh See note on Joshua 12:22.

Hazor See note on Joshua 11:1.

Gilead The mountainous region east of the Jordan, (see note on Judges 10:17,) from which, according to 1 Chronicles 5:26, Tiglath-pileser carried away “the Reubenites, and the Gadites, and the half tribe of Manasseh.”

Galilee This name, signifying a circle, seems to have been originally applied to a circular plain in the vicinity of Kedesh, and in the time of Joshua was limited to the region around that ancient sanctuary of Naphtali. Gradually the name came to indicate a larger region, till at this invasion of Tiglath-pileser it embraced all the land of Naphtali, for these words, not being connected by and with the preceding, we take to be explanatory of Galilee. At a later period Galilee became the name of one of the three provinces into which Palestine was divided, and embraced all northern Palestine between Samaria and Syria. Keil regards the enumeration of names in this verse as “purely historical, that is, following the actual order of the conquests.

Tiglath-pileser first took the several partly fortified cities adjacent to the Sea of Merom, then turned to Gilead, conquered this district, and on his return thence the remaining part of Galilee, namely, the whole land of Naphtali.”

Carried them captive This was the second Assyrian captivity of any considerable number of Israelites, the first having been under Pul. (1 Chronicles 5:26;) but in the reign of the next king, Hoshea, all northern Israel was carried into exile. 2 Kings 17:6.