The Expositor's Bible Part 30

[496] 2 Chron. xxviii. 18.

[497] 2 Kings xviii. 8: comp. xvii. 9. Josephus says that he failed to take Gath (_Antt._, IX. xiii. 3).

[498] A.V., "treasurer" (_soken_; lit., "deputy" or "a.s.sociate": Isa.

xxii. 15). He was "over the household." The Egyptian alliance had for Judah, as Renan points out, some of the fascination that a Russian alliance has often had for troubled spirits in France (_Hist. du Peuple d'Israel_, iii. 12).

[499] Renan says that he may have been a Sebennyite, and his name Sebent.

[500] Isa. xxii. 17, 18: "Behold, the Lord shall sling and sling, and pack and pack, and toss and toss thee away like a ball into a distant land; and there thou shalt die" (Stanley). The versions vary considerably.

[501] Isa. x.x.xvii. 2. There can be little doubt that there were not _two_ Shebnas.

[502] Mic. i. 10-16. See the writer's _Minor Prophets_ ("Men of the Bible" Series), pp. 130-133, for an explanation of this enigmatic prophecy.

[503] Jer. xxvi. 8-24. He tells us that the prophecy was delivered in the reign of Hezekiah. See my _Minor Prophets_, pp. 123-140.

[504] Isa. x. 28-32. It would involve a cross-country route over several deep ravines--_e.g._, the Wady Suweinit, near Michmash. In 1 Sam. xiv. 2, Thenius, for "Migron," reads "the Precipice." Some take Aiath for Ai, three miles south of Bethel. Renan says (_Hist. du Peuple d'Israel_, iii.): "Nom d'Anathoth, arrange symboliquement."

[505] Isa. x. 14. The metaphor of a bird's nest occurs more than once in the boastful a.s.syrian records.

[506] Isa. x.x.x. 1-7. Rahab means "fierceness," "insolence." For the various uses of the word, see Job xxvi. 12; Isa. li. 9, 10, 15; Psalm lx.x.xix. 9, 10, lx.x.xvii. 4, 5.

[507] See Dr. S. c.o.x (_Expositor_, i. 98-104) on Isa. xxviii. 7-13.

[508] Acts xvii. 18.

[509] Isa. xxviii. 7-22.

[510] Professor Smith, _Isaiah_, i. 12.

[511] Bagehot, _Physics and Politics_, p. 73; Smith, _Isaiah_, 109.

CHAPTER XXVI

_HEZEKIAH'S SICKNESS, AND THE EMBa.s.sY FROM BABYLON_

2 KINGS xx. 1-19

"Thou hast loved me out of the pit of nothingness."--ISA. x.x.xviii.

17 (A.V., margin).

"See the shadow of the dial In the lot of every one Marks the pa.s.sing of the trial, Proves the presence of the Sun."

E. B. BROWNING.

In the chaos of uncertainties which surrounds the chronology of King Hezekiah's reign, it is impossible to fix a precise date to the sickness which almost brought him to the grave. It has, however, been conjectured by some a.s.syriologists that the story of this episode has been displaced, because it seemed to break the continuity of the narrative of the a.s.syrian invasion; and that, though it is placed in the Book of Kings after the deliverance from Sennacherib, it really followed the earlier incursion of Sargon. This is rendered more probable by Isaiah's promise (2 Kings xx. 6), "I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the King of a.s.syria," and by the fact that Hezekiah still possessed such numerous and splendid treasures to display to the amba.s.sadors of Merodach-Baladan. This could hardly have been the case after he had been forced to pay a fine to the King of a.s.syria of all the silver that was found in the house of the Lord, and in the treasures of the king's house, to cut off the gold from the doors and pillars of the Temple, and even to send as captives to Nineveh some of his wives, and of the eunuchs of his palace.[512] The date "in those days" (2 Kings xx. 1) is vague and elastic, and may apply to any time before or after the great invasion.

He was sick unto death. The only indication which we have of the nature of his illness is that it took the form of a carbuncle or imposthume,[513] which could be locally treated, but which, in days of very imperfect therapeutic knowledge, might easily end in death, especially if it were on the back of the neck. The conjecture of Witsius and others that it was a form of the plague which they suppose to have caused the disaster to the a.s.syrian army has nothing whatever to recommend it.

Seeing the fatal character of his illness, Isaiah came to the king with the dark message, "Set thine house in order; for thou shalt die, and not live."

The message is interesting as furnis.h.i.+ng yet another proof that even the most positive announcements of the prophets were, and were always meant to be, to some extent hypothetical and dependent on unexpressed conditions. This was the case with the famous prophecy of Micah that Zion should be ploughed down into a heap of ruins. It was never fulfilled; yet the prophet lost none of his authority, for it was well understood that the doom which would otherwise have been carried out had been averted by timely penitence.

But the message of Isaiah fell with terrible anguish on the heart of the suffering king. He had hoped for a better fate. He had begun a great religious reformation. He had uplifted his people, at least in part, out of the moral slough into which they had fallen in the days of his predecessor. He had inspired into his threatened capital something of his own faith and courage. Surely he, if any man, might claim the old promises which Jehovah in His loving-kindness and truth had sworn to his father David and his father Abraham, that he being delivered out of the hand of his enemies should serve G.o.d without fear, walking in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of his life. He was but a young man still--perhaps not yet thirty years old; further, not only would he leave behind him an unfinished work, but he was childless,[514] and therefore it seemed as if with him would end the direct line of the house of David, heir to so many precious promises. He has left us--it is preserved in the Book of Isaiah--the poem which he wrote on his recovery, but which enshrines the emotion of his agonising antic.i.p.ations[515]:--

"I said, In the noontide of my days I shall go into the gates of Sheol.

I am deprived of the residue of my years.

I said, I shall not see Yah, Yah, in the land of the living, I shall behold no man more, when I am among them that cease to be.

Mine habitation is removed, and is carried away from me like a shepherd's tent.

Like a weaver I have rolled up my life; he will cut me from the thrum.

Like a swallow or a crane, so did I chatter; I did mourn as a dove; mine eyes fail with looking upward.

O Lord, I am oppressed; be Thou my surety."

We must remember, as we contemplate his utter prostration of soul, that he was not blessed, as we are, with the sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life. All was dim and dark, to him in the shadowy world of _eidola_ beyond the grave, and many a century was to elapse before Christ brought life and immortality to light. To enter Sheol meant to Hezekiah to pa.s.s beyond the cheerful suns.h.i.+ne of earth and the felt presence of G.o.d. No more wors.h.i.+p, no more gladness there!

"For Sheol cannot praise Thee, Death cannot celebrate Thee; They that go down into the pit cannot hope for Thy truth."

On every ground, therefore, the feelings of Hezekiah, had he not been a wors.h.i.+pper of G.o.d, might have been like those of Mycerinus, and, like that legendary Egyptian king, he might have cursed G.o.d before he died.

"My father loved injustice, and lived long; I loved the good he scorned and hated wrong-- The G.o.ds declare my recompense to-day.

I looked for life more lasting, rule more high; And when six years are measured, lo, I die!

Yet surely, O my people, did I ween Man's justice from the all-just G.o.ds was given, A light that from some upper point did beam, Some better archetype whose seat was heaven: A light that, s.h.i.+ning from the blest abodes, Did shadow somewhat of the life of G.o.ds."

The indignation of Mycerinus often finds an echo on Pagan tombstones, as in the famous epitaph on the grave of the girl Procope:--

"I, Procope, lift up my hands against the G.o.ds, Who took me hence undeserving, Aged nineteen years."

It was far otherwise with Hezekiah. There was anguish in his heart, but no rebellion or defiance. He wept sore; he turned his face to the wall and wept;[516] but as he wept he also prayed, and said,--

"O Lord, remember now how I have walked before Thee in truth, and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in Thy sight."

Isaiah, after delivering his dark message, and doubtless adding to it such words of human consolation as were possible--if under such circ.u.mstances any were possible--had left the king's chamber. On every ground his feelings must have been almost as overwhelmed with sorrow as those of the king. Hezekiah was personally his friend, and the hope of his nation. Doubtless the prophet's prayers rose as fervently and as effectually as those of Luther, which s.n.a.t.c.hed his friend Melanchthon back from the very gates of death. By the time that he had reached the middle of the court,[517] he felt borne in upon him, by that Divine intuition which const.i.tuted his prophetic call, the certainty that G.o.d would withdraw the immediate doom which he had been commissioned to announce. It has been conjectured by some that the conviction was deepened in his mind by observing on the steps of Ahaz one of those remarkable but rare effects of refraction--or, as some have conjectured, of a solar eclipse, involving an obscuration of the upper limb of the sun--which had seemed to take the advancing shadow ten steps backwards; and that this was to him a sign from heaven of the promise of G.o.d and the prolongation of the king's life. Awestruck and glad, he hastened back into the presence of the dying king with the life-giving message that G.o.d had heard his prayer, and seen his tears, and would add fifteen years to his life, and would defend him, and deliver him and Jerusalem out of the hand of the King of a.s.syria. And this should be the sign to him from Jehovah--Jehovah would bring again the shadow ten steps up the stairs of Ahaz. To this sign--if it was visible from the chamber-window--he called the attention of the astonished king.[518]

We here naturally follow the narrative of Isaiah himself, as more authoritative than that of the historian of the Kings as to details in which they differ.[519] Not only is it quite in accordance with all that we know of history that slight variations should occur in the traditions of long-past times, but the text of the Book of Kings suggests some difficulty. There we read that Hezekiah asked Isaiah what should be the sign of the promise--not mentioned in Isaiah--that he should go up to the House of the Lord the third day. Isaiah then asked him whether the sign should be that the shadow should advance ten steps, or recede ten steps. But there is no interrogation in the Hebrew, which rather means, "The shadow hath advanced ten steps ... if it shall recede ten steps?" or if we insert the interrogation in the first clause, "Hath the shadow advanced ten steps?"[520] The king's natural answer to so strange an alternative would be that for the shadow to advance ten steps was nothing; whereas its retrogression would be a sign indeed. Then Isaiah cried unto Jehovah, and the shadow went backward. In the obvious divergence of details we naturally follow Isaiah himself; and if it be a true and understood rule of all theology, "_Miracula non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem_," the miracle in this case--in the opportuneness of its occurrence, and the issues which it inspired--was none the less a miracle because it was carried out in direct accordance with G.o.d's unseen, perpetual, miraculous Providence, which none but unbelievers will nickname Chance. That we are here dealing with an historic incident is certain; and they who see and acknowledge G.o.d in all history find no difficulty at all in seeing His dealings with men in striking interpositions. But these, by the a.n.a.logy of His whole Divine economy, would naturally be out in accordance with natural laws.

The words rendered "the sun-dial of Ahaz" mean no more than "the steps [_ma'aloth_] of Ahaz." Ahaz evidently was a king of aesthetic tastes, who was fond of introducing foreign novelties and curiosities into Jerusalem.[521] Steps, with a staff on the top of them as a gnomon, to serve as sun-dials had been invented at Babylon, and Ahaz may probably have become acquainted with their form and use when he paid his visit to Tiglath-Pileser at Damascus. No one could blame him--it was indeed a meritorious act--to introduce to his people so useful an invention. The word "hour" first occurs in Dan. iii. 6, and it was doubtless from Babylon that the Hebrews borrowed the division of days into hours. This is the earliest instance in the Bible of the mention of any instrument to measure time. That the recession of the shadow could be caused by refraction is certain, for it has been observed in modern days. Thus, as is mentioned by Rosenmuller, on March 27th, 1703, Pere Romauld, prior of the monastery at Metz, noticed that the shadow on his dial deviated an hour and a half, owing to refraction in the higher regions of the atmosphere.[522] Or again, according to Mr. Bosanquet, the same effect might have been produced by the darkening shadow of an eclipse. But while he appealed to Divine indications the great prophet did not neglect natural remedies. He ordered that a cake of figs should be laid on the imposthume. It was a recognised and an efficient remedy, still recommended, centuries later, by Dioscorides, by Pliny, and by St.

Jerome. By G.o.d's blessing on man's therapeutic care, the king was speedily rescued from the gates of death. Constantly in Scripture what we call the miraculous and what we call the providential are mingled together. To those who regard the providential as a constant miracle, the question of the miraculous becomes subordinate.[523]

With intense joy and grat.i.tude the king hailed the respite which G.o.d had granted him. In fifteen years much might be done, much might be hoped for. All this he acknowledged with deep feeling in the song which he wrote on his recovery.

"I shall go as in solemn procession[524] all my years because of the bitterness of my soul.

O Lord, by these things men live, And wholly therein is the life of my spirit.