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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - 2 Chronicles 20:1 - 20:1
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By אַהֲרֵי־כֵן, postea, the war which follows is made to fall in the latter part of Jehoshaphat's reign, but certainly not in the last year in which he reigned alone, two years before his death, but only somewhat later than the events in 2 Chron 18 and 2Ch 19:1-11, which occurred six or seven years before his death. Along with the Moabites and Ammonites there marched against Jehoshaphat also מֵהָעַמֹּונִים. This statement is obscure. Since מִן has unquestionably a partitive or local signification, we might take the word to signify, enemies who dwelt aside from the Ammonites (מִן as in 1Sa 20:22, 1Sa 20:37), which might possibly be the designation of tribes in the Syro-Arabic desert bordering upon the country of the Ammonites on the north and east; and מֵאֲרָם in 2Ch 20:2 would seem to favour this idea. But 2Ch 20:10 and 2Ch 20:22. are scarcely reconcilable with this interpretation, since there, besides or along with the sons of Ammon and Moab, inhabitants of Mount Seir are named as enemies who had invaded Judah. Now the Edomites dwelt on Mount Seir; but had the Edomites only been allies of the Ammonites and Moabites, we should expect simply אֱדֹם בְּנֵי or אֱדֹומִים, or שֵׂעִיר בְּנֵי (cf. 2Ch 25:11, 2Ch 25:14). Nor can it be denied that the interpretation which makes מֵהָעַמֹּונִים to denote peoples dwelling beyond the Ammonites is somewhat artificial and far-fetched. Under these circumstances, the alteration proposed by Hiller in Onomast. p. 285 commends itself, viz., the change of מהעמונים into מֵהַמְּעוּנִים, Maunites or Maonites, - a tribe whose headquarters were the city Maan in the neighbourhood of Petra, to the east of the Wady Musa; see on 1Ch 4:41. Maan lay upon Mount Seir, i.e., in the mountainous district to the west of the Arabah, which stretches upwards from the head of the Dead Sea to the Elanitic Gulf, now called Jebâl (Gebalene) in its northern part, and es-Sherah in the south. The Maunites were consequently inhabitants of Mount Seir, and are here mentioned instead of the Edomites, as being a people dwelling on the southern side of the mountain, and probably of non-Edomitic origin, in order to express the idea that not merely the Edomites took part in the campaign of the Ammonites and Moabites, but also tribes from all parts of Mount Seir. In 2Ch 26:7 the מְעוּנִים are mentioned along with Arabs and Philistines as enemies of Israel, who had been conquered by Uzziah. These circumstances favour the proposed alteration; while, on the contrary, the fact that the lxx have here ἐκ τῶν Μιναίων for מֵהָעַמֹּונִים proves little, since these translators have rendered הָעַמֹּונִים in 2Ch 26:8 also by οἱ Μιναῖοι, there erroneously making the Ammonites Minaiites.