Keil and Delitzsch Commentary - 2 Chronicles 34:6 - 34:6

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Keil and Delitzsch Commentary - 2 Chronicles 34:6 - 34:6


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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

2Ch 34:6 and 2Ch 34:7 form a connected sentence: And in the cities of Manasseh ..., in their ruins round about, there he pulled down the altars, etc. The tribe of Simeon is here, as in 2Ch 15:9, reckoned among the tribes of the kingdom of Israel, because the Simeonites, although they belonged geographically to the kingdom of Judah, yet in religion remained attached to the worship on the high places practised by the ten tribes; see on 2Ch 15:9. “And unto Naphtali” is added, to designate the kingdom of Israel in its whole extent to the northern frontier of Canaan. The form בֹתֵיהֶם בְּחַר (in the Keth. divided into two words) gives no suitable sense. R. Sal. explains, timentes in planitie habitare, sed fixerunt in monte domicilia, rendering it “in their mountain-dwellings.” This the words cannot mean.

(Note: The lxx translate ἐν τοῖς τόποις αὐτῶν, expressing merely the בתיהם. The Targ. has צַדְיוּתְהֹון בְבֵית, in domo (s. loco) desolationis eorum.)

The Keri בְּחַרְבֹתֵיהֶם, “with their swords,” is suggested by Eze 26:9, and is accepted by D. Kimchi, Abu Melech, and others, and understood to denote instruments with which the altars, groves, and images were cut down. But this interpretation also is certainly incorrect. The word is rather to be pointed בְּחַרְבֹתֵיהֶם, in their wastes (ruins) (cf. Psa 109:10), and to be taken as an explanatory apposition to בְּעָרֵי: in the cities of Manasseh ..., namely, in their ruins round about; for the land had been deserted since the times of Shalmaneser, and its cities were in great part in ruins. The statement as to the locality precedes in the form of an absolute sentence, and that which is predicated of it follows in the form of an apodosis with ו consec. (וַיְנַתֵּץ). לְהֵדַק כִּתֵּת, he dashed to pieces to crush; the form הֵדַק is not a perfect after לְ, but an infinitive which has retained the vowel of the perfect; cf. Ew. §238, d.