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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - 2 Chronicles 30:13 - 30:13
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
The celebration of the passover. - 2Ch 30:13. The assembly of the people at Jerusalem to celebrate the feast became a great congregation.
2Ch 30:14
Before the slaying of the passover, in order to purify and sanctify the city for the feast, they removed the (illegal) altars and places for offering incense which had been erected under Ahaz (2Ch 28:24), and threw them into the Kidron (2Ch 29:16). מְקַטְּרֹות is here a substantive: places for incense-offerings (cf. Ew. §160, e), and denotes altars intended for the offering of the קְטֹרֶת.
2Ch 30:15
When they slaughtered the passover on the 14th, the Levites and priests also were ashamed, i.e., had sanctified themselves under the influence of a feeling of shame, and offered the sacrifice in the house of the Lord; i.e., they performed the sacrificial functions incumbent upon them at the passover in the temple, as is stated more in detail in 2Ch 30:16. The clause וגו וְהַכֹּהֲנִים is a circumstantial clause, and the statement points back to 2Ch 30:3. The mention of Levites along with the priests here is worthy of remark, since in 2Ch 29:34 it is said that at the celebration of the dedication of the temple the Levites had sanctified themselves more zealously than the priests. But these two statements do not contradict each other. In 2Ch 29:34 it is the Levites and priests then present in or dwelling in Jerusalem who are spoken of; here, on the contrary, it is the priests and the Levites of the whole kingdom of Judah. Even though, at the former period, the Levites were more zealous in sanctifying themselves for the dedication of the temple, yet there must certainly have been many Levites in Judah, who, like many of the priests, did not immediately purify themselves from their defilement by the worship in the high places, and were only impelled and driven to sanctify themselves for the service of the Lord by the Zeal of the people who had come to Jerusalem to hold the passover.
2Ch 30:16-17
Standing in their place, according to their right, i.e., according to the prescribed arrangement (see on 1Ch 6:17), the priests sprinkled the blood (of the paschal lambs) from the hand of the Levites, they handing it to them. This was not the rule: in the case of the paschal lamb, the father of the family who slew the lamb had to hand the blood to the priest, that it might be sprinkled upon the altar; here the Levites did it for the reasons given in 2Ch 30:17. Because many in the assembly had not sanctified themselves, the Levites presided over the slaying of the paschal lambs for every one who was unclean, to sanctify (the lambs) to the Lord (see also on 2Ch 35:6, 2Ch 35:11). רַבַּת, stat. constr. before the noun with a preposition, stands as neuter substantively: there was a multitude in the assembly who...רַבַּת, in 2Ch 30:18 is to be taken in a similar manner, not as an adverb (Berth.). וגו מֵאֶפְרַיִם רַבַּת is in apposition to הָעָם מַרְבִּית, a multitude of people, viz.: Many of Ephraim ... had not purified themselves, but ate the passover in an illegal fashion, not according to the precept (cf. Num 9:6). This clause explains how it happened that the Levites presided at the slaying of the passover for those who had not sanctified themselves, i.e., they caught the blood and gave it to the priests. Had this been done by persons levitically unclean, the expiatory sacrificial blood would have been defiled. The eating of the paschal lamb or the participation in the passover meal was indeed allowed only to the clean; but yet it was not so holy an act, i.e., did not bring the people into such immediate contact with God, who was present at His altar, that those who were not clean might not, under some circumstances, be admitted to it. Here it was allowed, for Hezekiah had prayed for them that God might forgive the transgression of the law.
2Ch 30:18-19
2Ch 30:18 ends, according to the Masoretic verse-division, with the preposition בְּעַד; but that division seems merely to have arisen from ignorance of the construction heekiyn כָּל-l|baabow, of the fact that בְּעַד stands before a relative sentence without אֲשֶׁר, like אֶל in 1Ch 15:12, and is certainly wrong. If we separate בְּעַד from what follows, we must, with Aben Ezra, supply אֵלֶּה, and make הֵכִין (2Ch 30:19) refer to Hezekiah, both being equally inadmissible. Rightly, therefore, the lxx, Vulg., and also Kimchi, with the majority of commentators, have given up this division of the verses as incorrect, and connected the words in this way: May the good Jahve atone, i.e., forgive every one who has fixed his heart (cf. 2Ch 12:14) to seek God, Jahve, the God of his fathers, but not in accordance with the purity of the sanctuary. This intercession of Hezekiah's is worthy of remark, not only because it expresses the conviction that upright seeking of the Lord, which proceeds from the heart, is to be more highly estimated than strict observance of the letter of the law, but also because Hezekiah presumes that those who had come out of Ephraim, etc., to the passover had fixed their heart to seek Jahve, the God of their fathers, but had not been in a position to comply with the precept of the law, i.e., to purify themselves up to the day appointed for the passover.
2Ch 30:20
God heard this intercession, and healed the people. רָפָא, sanare, is not to be explained by supposing, with Bertheau, that first sickness, and then even death, were to be expected as the results of transgression of the law, according to Lev 15:31, and that the people might be already regarded as sick, as being on the point of becoming so. The use of the word is explained by the fact that sin was regarded as a spiritual disease, so that רפא is to be understood of healing the soul (as Psa 41:5), or the transgression (Hos 14:5; Jer 3:22).
2Ch 30:21
And the Israelites that were present at Jerusalem kept the feast of unleavened bread seven days with great gladness; and the Levites and priests praised the Lord day by day, singing to the Lord ליהוה עֹז בִּכְלֵי, “with instruments of power to the Lord,” i.e., with which they ascribed power to the Lord; or, to express it more clearly, which they played to the praise of the power of the Lord. The stringed instruments played by the Levites, and the trumpets blown by the priests, to accompany the psalm-singing, are meant. The singing of praise in connection with the sacrificial service took place on the seventh day of the feast.
2Ch 30:22
Hezekiah spoke to the heart of all the Levites, i.e., spoke encouraging words of acknowledgment to all the Levites, “who showed good understanding in regard to Jahve,” i.e., not qui erant rerum divinarum peritiores aliosque instruere poterant, but, as Clericus has already said, those who had distinguished themselves by intelligent playing to the honour of the Lord. “And they ate” - not merely the Levites and priests, but all who took part in the festival - the festal sacrifices, seven days. The expression אֶת־הַמֹּועֵד אָכַל, to hold the festal sacrificial meal, is formed after אֶת־הַפֶּסַח אָכַל, to eat the passover = the passover meal. This we gather from the following participial clause, “offering peace-offerings,” of which the sacrificial meals were prepared. וּמִתְוַדִּים, and acknowledged the Lord, the God of their fathers. הדַַוַתֽהִ denotes here neither “to make confession of sin,” nor “to approach with thank-offerings” (Berth.), but simply to acknowledge the Lord with heart and mouth, word and deed, or by prayer, praise, thanks, and offering of sacrifice.