THIS chapter contains an account of the Babylonian embassy to Hezekiah, and of his indiscreet and ostentatious conduct, which became the occasion of a threatening message by the hands of Isaiah, predicting the Babylonian conquest and captivity, but with a tacit promise of exemption to the king himself, and to the country while he lived, which he received with humble acquiescence and thankful acknowledgment.
The chapter is evidently a direct continuation of the narrative before it, nor is there any real ground, internal or external, for suspecting its authenticity, antiquity, or genuineness.
1. In that time, Merodach Baladan, son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent letters and a gift to Hezckiah, and he heard that he was sick and was recovered. The first phrase is used with great latitude of meaning, and may either describe one event as contemporaneous with another, or as follow ing it, at once or more remotely. Knobel supposes it to mean here simply in the days of Hezekiah. Most other writers take it for granted that this mes sage of congratulation must have been sent soon after the recovery of Hezekiah. These understand satthi as equivalent in meaning to sottj ^3 2 Kings 20: 12, and explain all the verbs of the last clause as pluperfects (for he had heard etc.). Knobel, on the contrary, gives 1 its usual sense, and understands the clause to mean, that the king of Babylon heard of Hezekiah’s sickness from his ambassadors on their return. But this is inconsistent with the parallel statement, assumes a needless prolepsis or anticipation, and encumbers the narrative with a fact entirely superfluous. What the ambassadors reported to the king on their return, is of no importance to the history. Merodach occurs in Jer. 50: 2, as the name of a Babylonian idol. Grotius supposes that a man of that name had been deified; others, that it was common to name men after gods. Hitzig identifies the name with the Persian diminutive ti)o>jo little man (as a term of endearment), Gesenius with the Mars of classical mythology. In 2 Kings 20: 11, it is written Berodach, which Hiller explains as a contraction of Bar Merodach, the son of Merodach, while Knobel regards it as a mere mistake, and Gesenius as a customary variation, b and m being often interchanged. Two manuscripts read Bero dach in the case before us, and a few have the transposed form Medorach. Baladan, according to Von Bohlen, is a Persian word meaning praised; according to Gesenius, an Aramean compound meaning Bel (is his) lord. Hitzig explains bal as a connective syllable, like pol in Nabopolassar, pal in Sardanapalus, etc. Most of the modern writers agree with Vitringa in identifying this king with the Mardokempad of Berosus, as preserved in the Armenian version of Eusebius; but Knobel understands him as naming Merodach Baladan distinctly. The same authority describes these Babylonian princes, not as sovereigns, but as viceroys or tributaries subject to Assyria. In that case, it is not improbable that Merodach Baladan was meditating a revolt, and sent this embassy to gain Hezekiah’s co-operation. The congratulation on his recovery may have been a secondary object, or perhaps a mere pretext. In 2 Chron. 32: 31, a further design is mentioned, namely, to inquire of the wonder that was done in the land, whether this be understood to mean the destruction of Sennacherib’s army, or the miraculous recession of the shadow. There is no incompatibility between these different designs. Perhaps an embassy is seldom sent to such a distance with a single undivided errand.
2. And Hezekiah was glad of them, and showed them his house of rarities, the silver, and the gold, and the spices, and the good oil (or oint ment), and all his house of arms, and all that was found in his treasures; there was not a thing which Hezekiah did not show them, in his house and in all his dominion. The parallel passage (2 Kings 20: 13) has sais^i smbs, which Knobel understands to mean that he heard of them, but which seems to be more correctly rendered in the English Bible, and he hearkened unto them. There is no need of regarding either as an error of transcription, or as the correction of a later writer. Nothing could be more natural than such a variation on the part of the original writer, describing Hezekiah’s feelings in the one case and his conduct in the other. He hearkened to them courteously because he was glad of their arrival. Henderson says, he was delighted with them; but the context seems to show that it was not so much the company or manners of the men that he was pleased with, as the honour done him by the king of Babylon in sending them. The practice of exhibiting the curiosities and riches of a palace to distinguished visitors, Vitringa illustrates by the parallel case of Croesus and Solon, as recorded by Herodotus, PSS has been commonly regarded as identical with the niK=a of Gen. 37: 43, and the whole phrase interpreted accordingly, as meaning properly a house of spices, and then by a natural extension of its import, a depository of rare and precious things in general. The former meaning is retained by Aquila (zov otxov rwv aQWfidv&v) and the Vulgate (cellam aromatum). The other is given in the Targum and Peshito, and by most modern writers. The Septuagint retains the Hebrew word (vs^oj&a). Abulwalid derives it from P35 to bite, and applies it to provisions; Lorsbach from a Persian verb meaning to deposit; Hitzig from a Hebrew root of similar import. fiiba rna is not a house of jewels or vessels, but of arms, i. e. an arsenal, most probably the same that is mentioned in ch. 22: 8. Luther has all his arse nals, but this would be expressed in Hebrew by the plural. Lowth more correctly has whole arsenal, which is also the meaning of the common ver sion, all the house of his armour. The goodly or precious oil is supposed by Barnes to have been that used in the unction of kings and priests, or perhaps applied to more ordinary purposes in the royal household. Knobel explains ipV-Baa as meaning in his power or possession. So the LXX.
It is more commonly explained, however, as a local noun denoting realm or dominions. Hitzig gives mix’s the specific sense of store-rooms or treasure-chambers, which is unnecessary. Even on the usual hypothesis, the a need not be translated among, but may have its usual! and proper sense of in.
3. Then came Isaiah the prophet to the Icing Hezekiah, and said to him, What said these men, and whence came they unto thee? And Hezc- Jciah said, From a far country came they unto me, from Babylon. The Prophet was not sent for by the king, as in ch. 37: 2; but he was no doubt sent by God, and came in his official character. The older writers seem to regard as the occasion of his visit the vainglory which the king had dis played in his entertainment of the strangers. The moderns lay the chief stress on the political negotiations which had passed between them, and which could not be regarded by the Prophet but with strong disapprobation. The statement in Chronicles is that God left him, to try him, to know all in his heart (2 Chr. 32: 31). This may include the sins of vain ostentation and of distrust in God, showing itself in a longing after foreign alliances. There is no sufficient ground for Hendewerk’s assumption, that a treaty had actually been concluded. Gesenius observes that Hezekiah answers only the second of the Prophet’s questions, as if he shrunk from answering the first. But this mode of replying to the last interrogation, when there is more than one, is natural and common in cases where there can be no motive for concealment. It is unnecessary, therefore, to suppose with CJericus> that a part of Hezekiah’s answer is omitted in the narrative. In the last clause, Calvin understands the king as boasting of the distance from which the embassy had come, as implying the extent of his own fame and political importance. Vitringa supposes the distance to be mentioned as an excuse for his hospitable attentions. Knobel thinks it was intended to disarm Isai ah’s suspicion of a league, as if he had said, too distant to admit of any intimate communion or alliance. All these interpretations seem to strain the words beyond their natural and obvious import, according to which a far country is nothing more than a familiar designation of Babylon or Babylonia.
4. And he said, What have they seen in thy house? And Hezekiah said, AH that is in my house have they seen; there is not a thing that 1 have not showed them in my treasures. Some of the later Germans say that Hezekiah, finding evasion and concealment impossible, now frankly tells the truth. But the frankness of the answer here recorded rather shows, that there was no attempt at concealment from the first. It was not, as Calvin well observes, until the Prophet questioned him, that Hezekiah became aware of the error which he had committed. Knobel gratuitously asserts that the Prophet here shifts his ground from finding fault with what had passed in words to blaming what had passed in act, between the king and the ambassadors.
5. And Isaiah said to Hezekiah, Hear the word of Jehovah of Hosts. This form of expression gives to what follows the solemnity and authority of a divine decree. The parallel passage (2 Kings 20: 16) omits nnsax, which Vitringa regards as emphatic here, implying a signal exercise of divine providence and power.
6. Behold, days (are) coming, when all that (is) in thy house, and that which thy fathers have hoarded until this day, shall be carried to Babylon; there shall not be left a thing (literally a word), saith Jehovah. Jarchi directs attention to the exact correspondence of the punishment with the offence. As the Babylonians had seen all, they should one day take all; as nothing had been withheld from them now, so nothing should be withheld from them hereafter. The German interpreters are at a loss, whether to make this explicit prophecy a proof of later date, or to explain it as a sagacious conjecture founded on the previous fate of the ten tribes, and on the actual relations of the Babylonian monarchy to Judah and Assyria. The scale preponderates in favour of the latter supposition, not withstanding its absurd assumption of a mere political conjecture as to events which did not happen for a hundred years. To those who are under no unhappy necessity of explaining away the clearest proofs of inspiration and prophetic foresight, this passage affords a striking instance of the gradual development of prophecy. The general threatening of expatriation had been uttered seven hundred years before by Moses (Lev. 26: 33. Deut. 28: 64-67. 30: 3). Five hundred years later, Ahijah had declared that Israel should be rooted up and scattered beyond the river (1 Kings 14: 15). Within a hundred years, they had been threatened by Amos with captivity beyond Damascus (Am. 5: 27). Isaiah himself had obscurely intimated a future connexion between the fortunes of Israel and Babylon (oh. 14: 1. 21: 10). But here, for the first time, the Babylonish exile is explicitly foretold, unless the similar prediction of the contemporary prophet Micah (4: 10) be considered earlier. The fulfilment of the prophecy began in the deportation of Manasseh (2 Chron. 33: 11), but was described as something still prospective by Jeremiah (20: 5), in whose days, and the reign of Zedekiah, it was at length fully accomplished (2 Chron. 36: 18). To the objection, that a national calamity of this description bears no proportion to the fault of Hezekiah, there is no need of any other answer than the one already given by Vitringa, to wit, that Hezekiah’s fault was not the cause but the occasion of the punishment which fell upon the people, or rather of its being so explicitly predicted in the case before us. For, as Calvin says, the punishment of Hezekiah’s individual fault was included in the punishment of Israel for national offences.
7. And of thy sons that shall issue from thee, which thou shalt beget, shall they take away, and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the Icing of Babylon. The future form of the expression in the first clause has respect to the fact that Hezekiah had as yet no children. (See above on ch. 38: 2.) Hendewerk regards the terms used as inapplicable to any but immediate descendants, in which case the prophecy must be restricted to Manasseh (2 Chron. 33: 11). But Hitzig and Knobel justify the wider application of the terms by the analogy of ch. 51: 2, and by the constant use of father and 507i in reference to remote descendants or progenitors. The “,73 at the beginning of the verse is universally admitted to be partitive. They shall take may either be an indefinite construction, or agree with the Babylonians understood. d^b’nb is strictly understood by the Septuagint (anddovTas) and the Vulgate (eunuchi), but explained by the Targum to mean nobles (•pmm absurdly rendered in the London Polyglot, nutriti), i. e. courtiers or household-officers, an extension of the meaning which agrees well with the usages of oriental courts. *the latter explanation is approved by Gesenius in his Commentary for a specified reason. In his earlier Lexicons he leaves it doubtful; but in the Theasurus he contends for the strict sense, even in Gen. 37: 36, as well as in the case before us, with respect to which he answers his own argument upon the other side, by a counter argument of equal strength. Instead of inp% the parallel passage (2 Kings 20: 17) has the singular np^, which is equally correct and regular, in a case of indefinite construction. The fulfilment of this prophecy is recorded in 2 Kings 24: 12-16 and Dan. 1: 1-7, and that so clearly, that the neologists are driven to their usual supposition of an interpolation, or of such an alteration as to make the terms of the prediction more determinate.
8. And Hezekiah said to Isaiah, Good is the word of Jehovah which thou hast spoken. And he said, For there shall be peace and truth in my days. The word good is here used, neither in the sense of gracious nor in that of just exclusively, but in that of right, as comprehending both. While the king acquiesces in the threatening prophecy as righteous and deserved, he gratefully acknowledges the mercy with which it is tempered. That he looked upon the woes denounced against his children as a personal misfortune of his own, is clear from his regarding the postponement of the execution as a mitigation of the sentence on himself. The expression of thankfulness at this exemption shows how true the narrative is to nature and experience. Umbreit has the good sense and feeling to describe it as a natural and childlike acknowledgment. The purer taste and loftier morality of other German writers can regard it only as naiv-egoistisch (Gesenius), or as an expression of true oriental egoismus (Hitzig). According to these philosophical interpreters, Hezekiah, instead of being thankful for the mercy which was mingled with God’s judgments, ought to have rejected the pro mise of peace and truth in his own days, unless extended to his children also. This sentimental magnanimity may answer well enough in plays and novels, but is equally at variance with human nature and the word of God. It was not more clearly Hezekiah’s duty to submit without a murmur to God’s threatening, than it was to accept with gratitude the exemption promised to himself. Quamvis enim haec poena aliud seculum maneret, tamen praesentem gratiam amplecti debuit; et certe nostro potissimum seculo servire debemus, ejusque praecipue ratio habenda est; futurum non est negligendum, sed quod praesens est atque instat magis offidum nostrum requirit. (Calvin). Nothing, therefore, as the same great writer well says, can be further from the spirit of this answer, than that of the Greek sentence, Ipov ftavovroe yala ^tf^TM TIVQI, or the Latin, mihimortuo omnes mortui sunt. Calvin is also of opinion that the words, which thou hast spo- Jcen, are emphatic, and intended to recognise Isaiah as an authoritative messenger from God. There is no need of supposing that the second IESTI means, he said in his heart (Hitzig), or after Isaiah was gone (Knobel), much less that it simply means he thought (Hendewerk). The obvious sense of the expression is that these words were added to explain his previous acquiescence in the divine determination. The repetition of the verb he said implies a pause or interval however short. The various explanations of the particle n=>, as meaning well, yes, provided, only, yet, oh that, etc. are mere substitutions of what the interpreters think Hezekiah ought to have said for what he did say, which is simply this, (Icall it good) because there is to be etc. This exact sense of the words is retained in the Targum and the English Version. The optative meaning is expressed in the Septuagint (JSVW&G) dij) and the Vulgate (fiat tantum). The Peshito simplifies the syntax by omitting and he said, and connecting the two clauses directly: good is the word of the Lord which thou hast spoken, that there shall be peace and truth in my days. But this, besides its arbitrary mutilation of the text, impairs the force of Hezekiah’s language by restricting it wholly to the promise. Peace may be here taken in the wide sense of prosperity, but with special reference to its proper import, as denoting exemption from war. Truth is understood by Henderson and Barnes in its modern religious sense of true religion. Cocceius even restricts it to the preaching of the truth. Hendewerk gives it the sense of goodness, as the Septuagint does that of righteousness. Hitzig supposes it to mean the mutual fidelity of men in their relations to each other. But the best interpretation seems to be the one approved by Calvin, Vitringa, and Gesenius, who take the word in its primary etymological sense of permanence, stability, in which the ideas of fidelity and truth may be included, as effects necessarily imply their cause.
From the foregoing exposition of chapters xxxvi-xxxix, it may safely be inferred, as a legitimate if not an unavoidable deduction, that they form a continuous unbroken narrative by one and the same writer: that this writer may as well have been Isaiah as any other person, if we regard internal evidence, and can have been no other, if we regard the immemorial tradition of the Hebrew Canon; and that these four chapters, far from having been inserted here at random or through ignorance, are in their proper place, as a connecting link between the Earlier and Later Prophecies, the threatening in ch. 39: 6 being really the theme or text of the long prophetic dis course, with which the remainder of the book is occupied. THE END
