2 Crônicas 12

2 Crônicas 12

Henry: God quickly brought troubles upon them, to awaken them, and recover them to repentance, before their hearts were hardened. It was but in the fourth year of Rehoboam that they began to corrupt themselves, and in the fifth year the king of Egypt came up against them with a vast army, took the fenced cities of Judah, and came against Jerusalem, 2 Chron. 12:2, 3, 4. This great calamity coming upon them so soon after they began to desert the worship of God, by a hand they had little reason to suspect (having had a great deal of friendly correspondence with Egypt in the last reign), and coming with so much violence that all the fenced cities of Judah, which Rehoboam had lately fortified and garrisoned and on which he relied much for the safety of his kingdom, fell immediately into the hands of the enemy, without making any resistance, plainly showed that it was from the Lord, because they had transgressed against him. See Wikipedia article on Shishak ARCHAEOLOGICAL NOTE: Shishak's Invasion of Judah. Shishak's own record of this campaign is inscribed on the south wall of the great Temple of Amon at Karnak, in which he is depicted as presenting 150 "cities" of Palestine to his god Amon. A fragment of a monument he set up in Megiddo has been found. Although Shishak received tribute from Rehoboam of Jerusalem, the cities he conquered indicate that he was active north of Jerusalem, in Israel, and south of Jerusalem, in the Negev. (Halley's Bible handbook BORROW) Unfaithful (verb) (be or act unfaithful) (04603) maal means to act unfaithfully, to trespass, to violate one's duty, to break faith, to commit a violation, to act. in a manner which is untrustworthy or unreliable in relation to an agreement or relationship. It is often used in Hebrew together with the noun maal (04604 - described below), so literally it could be translated "trepasses a trespass." (NIV = "commits a violation") (following use both verb and noun forms of maal - Lev 5:15, 6:2, Nu 5:6, 27, Josh 22:20, 22:31) The idea of maal is that of a conscious act of treachery or unfaithfulness against the Lord. In fact in Ezek 39:23 and Da 9:7 maal describes the sin which resulted in Judah's exile to Babylon! They were unfaithful to their covenant with Yahweh. The Chronicler sees this as the leading sin of Israel that punctuates its history from beginning to end. NET Note - The word maal refers to some kind of overstepping of the boundary between that which is common (i.e., available for common use by common people) and that which is holy (i.e., to be used only for holy purposes because it has been consecrated to the LORD). Maal - 32v - Lev. 5:15; Lev. 6:2; Lev. 26:40; Num. 5:6; Num. 5:27; Deut. 32:51; Jos. 7:1; Jos. 22:16; Jos. 22:20; Jos. 22:31; A KEY WORD IN THE CHRONICLES 1 Chr. 2:7; 1 Chr. 5:25; 1 Chr. 10:13; 2 Chr. 12:2; 2 Chr. 26:16; 2 Chr. 26:18; 2 Chr. 28:22; 2 Chr. 29:6; 2 Chr. 30:7; Ezr. 10:2; Ezr. 10:10; Neh. 1:8; Neh. 13:27; Prov. 16:10; Ezek. 14:13; Ezek. 15:8; Ezek. 17:20; Ezek. 18:24; Ezek. 20:27; Ezek. 39:23; Ezek. 39:26; Dan. 9:7 Leviticus 26:40 ‘If they confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their forefathers, in their unfaithfulness (maal) which they committed against Me, and also in their acting with hostility against Me– 1 Chronicles 10:13 (NOTE WHAT HAPPENED TO ISRAEL'S FIRST KING BECAUSE HE WAS UNFAITHFUL) So Saul died for his trespass which he committed (MAAL) against the LORD, because (TO REASONS GIVEN TO EXPLAIN THE NATURE OF HIS UNFAITHFULNESS) of the word of the LORD which he did not keep; and also because he asked counsel of a medium, making inquiry of it, Geoffrey Kirkland: Historical Information on Shishak, King of Egypt: Before Shishak, the kingdom of Egypt didn’t really seem to be a big factor in the history of Israel once they were settled in Israel Shishak was hugely important in biblical history. He was able to bring UNITY and STRUCTURE and PURPOSE to the Egyptian nation. Shishak was Libyan, not a native Egyptian, THOUGH THIS HELPED HIM create a multinational army. And Shishak unified his army when Rehoboam SPLIT his nation apart In a king’s victory report, he even provided us with an inventory of all the towns he conquered during this operation. The INSCRIPTION in which Shishak tells the world of all his accomplishments in this Palestinian campaign, he listed 150! cities that he crushed. Even though he defeated many towns and cities, he acknowledged THAT HE DID NOT conquer — Jerusalem. This harmonizes perfectly with the biblical record. He plundered but didn’t destroy Jerusalem. Shishak, Sheshonq I (945-924 B.C.), was a Libyan who overthrew the Egyptian king and established the twenty-second dynasty. He also provided political asylum to Jeroboam, who fled to Egypt to escape King Solomon's displeasure (1 Kin. 11:40). During the fifth year of Rehoboam's reign (925 B.C.), Shishak plundered Jerusalem and removed the treasures of the temple and the palace which had been placed there by David and Solomon. When restoring the treasures, Rehoboam was unable to replace the gold items in kind, so he resorted to using bronze. The splendor of the golden age was lost in the judgment of the Lord against Rehoboam. When Rehoboam submitted himself in humble repentance (vv. 1-12), he experienced the faithfulness of the Lord to forgive and to restore His people (cf. 7:14-16), confirmation of the message of the chronicler. SHISHAK [ISBE] - shi'-shak (shishaq (1 Ki 14:25); Sousakeim): 1. Shishak, 952-930 BC: Sheshonk or Sheshenq I, as he is called on the monuments, the founder of the XXIInd Dynasty, was in all probability of Libyan origin. It is possible that his claim to the throne was that of the sword, but it is more likely that he acquired it by marriage with a princess of the dynasty preceding. On the death of Pasebkhanu II, the last of the kings of the XXIst Dynasty, 952 BC, Shishak ascended the throne, with an efficient army and a well-filled treasury at his command. He was a warlike prince and cherished dreams of Asiatic dominion. 2. Patron of Jeroboam: He had not long been seated on the throne when Jeroboam the son of Nebat, of the tribe of Ephraim, whom Solomon had promoted but afterward had cause to suspect, fled from the displeasure of his sovereign to the court of Shishak (1 Ki 11:26 ff). There Jeroboam remained till the death of Solomon, when he returned to Canaan, and, on Rehoboam's returning an unsatisfactory answer to the people's demands for relief from their burdens, headed the revolt of the Ten Tribes, over whom he was chosen king with his capital at Shechem (1 Ki 12:25 ff). Whether there was not in the XXIst Dynasty some kind of suzerainty of Egypt over Palestine, when Solomon married Pharaoh's daughter and received with her Gezer as a dowry, seems not to be clearly established. It is, however, natural that Jeroboam's patron in the day of adversity should take sides with him against Rehoboam, now that the kingdom was divided. Active support of Jeroboam would be in the line of his dreams of an eastern empire. 3. Syrian Campaign: So it came to pass that in the 5th year of Rehoboam, Shishak came up against Jerusalem with 1,200 chariots, and 60,000 horsemen, and people without number out of Egypt, the Libyans, Sukkiim, and Ethiopians, and took the fenced cities of Judah, and came to Jerusalem. At the preaching of the prophet Shemaiah, Rehoboam and his people repented, and Jerusalem was saved from destruction, though not from plunder nor from servitude, for he became Shishak's servant (2 Ch 12:8). Shishak took away the treasures of the house of the Lord and the treasures of the king's house, carrying off among the most precious of the spoils all the shields of gold which Solomon had made (1 Ki 14:25 ff; 2 Ch 12:1-9). From the Scripture narrative it does not appear that there was any occupation of Palestine by the Egyptian forces on this occasion. 4. Shishak's Record at Karnak: There is, however, a remarkable contemporary record of the campaign engraved on the south wall of the Temple of Amon at Karnak by Shishak himself. Not only is the expedition recorded, but there is a list of districts and towns of Palestine granted to his victories by Amon-Ra and the goddess of Thebes engraved there. A number of towns mentioned in the Book of Josh have been identified; and among the names of the list are Rabbath, Taanach, Gibeon, Mahanaim, Beth-horon and other towns both of Israel and Judah. That names of places in the Northem Kingdom are mentioned in the list does not imply that Shishak had directed his armies against Jeroboam and plundered his territories. It was the custom in antiquity for a victorious monarch to include among conquered cities any place that paid tribute or was under subjection, whether captured in war or not; and it was sufficient reason for Shishak to include these Israelite places that Jeroboam, as seems probable, had invited him to come to his aid. Among the names in the list was "Jud-hamalek"--Yudhmalk on the monuments--which was at first believed to represent the king of Judah, with a figure which passed for Rehoboam. Being, however, a place-name, it is now recognized to be the town Yehudah, belonging to the king. On the death of Shishak his successor assumed a nominal suzerainty over the land of Canaan. LITERATURE. Flinders Petrie, History of Egypt, III, 227 ff; Maspero, Struggle of the Nations, 772 ff; Nicol, Recent Archaeology and the Bible, 222-25. T. Nicol D A Carson - THE CHRONICLER PROVIDES SOME fascinating insights into the reign of Rehoboam, the first king of Judah after the end of the united monarchy (2 Chron. 11–12). We note two of them. (1) Predictably, many of the Levites who lived in the north drifted south (2Ch 11:11–17). Their entire life centered on the temple, and this was the connection that Jeroboam, king over the northern ten tribes, wanted to break. Not only therefore did he establish his own idol gods, but he sacked all the Levites. The effect, at least initially, was to strengthen the hand of Rehoboam (2Ch 11:17). Sometimes the principle of “unintended consequences” is quietly used by God’s providence to bring blessings out of what at first appears to be unmitigated disaster. The most stellar example of this, of course, is the cross. (2) Rehoboam proves to be a mediocre king whose total effect is bad. Certain early elements in Rehoboam’s reign were good. He chose the right son, Abijah, to be his “chief prince” (2Ch 11:22), preparing him for the throne. Learning from the stupidity of the initial decision that had cost him the unified kingdom (2Ch 10:8; cf. 1 Kings 12:8), Rehoboam worked hard at maintaining contact with the people, dispersing his many sons around the districts and fortified cities of Judah. Sadly, once he had become comfortable, once his kingdom was more or less secure, he drifted away from the Law of the Lord, and so did his people (2Ch 12:1). God responded by unleashing Shishak, king of Egypt, against this small nation. The prophet Shemaiah thundered, “This is what the LORD says, ‘You have abandoned me; therefore, I now abandon you to Shishak’ ” (2Ch 12:5). King Rehoboam and the leaders of Israel humble themselves (2Ch 12:6, 12). The result is that God does not permit the Egyptians to destroy Judah. Nevertheless, God says that his people will “become subject to [Shishak], so that they may learn the difference between serving me and serving the kings of other lands” (2Ch 12:8). This development reminds us of God’s reaction when the people of Israel entered the Promised Land and promptly compromised their faithfulness. The result was that instead of the clean sweep they might have had, they were embroiled in squalid skirmishes for generations. There is a kind of evil that is not very bad and not very good, not too terribly rebellious yet not hungry for righteousness, a stance that drifts toward idolatry and hastily retreats at the threat of judgment. What it lacks is David’s heart, the heart of a man who, despite failures, sets himself to pursue God with passion and delight. The final verdict on Rehoboam’s reign explains the problem: “He did evil because he had not set his heart on seeking the LORD” (2Ch 12:14). (BORROW For the Love of God, Combined Edition, Volumes One and Two) John Kitto - Daily Bible Illustrations - Tuesday. The Egyptian Invasion—I Kings 14:25–28; II Chronicles 12:2–12 Our own house here, in this “wicked London,” is safe, though defenseless, and with small protection of bolts and bars, because there is little in it to tempt the spoiler; whereas the great house of the old lady in Threadneedle street is never deemed to be safe without a company of dreadful bearskin-capped grenadiers within its walls, because of the great riches it contains. Now we should not be over glad to have all that gold down in our own cellars, without the grenadiers also, to keep guard over it. What a perilous life it would be to have it, without adequate means of protecting it from the envious hands ready to clutch at it, and whose endeavors would be excited by our obviously defenseless condition! This was the case of Rehoboam. The immense treasures in gold which the temple and palace contained—the accumulations of David and Solomon—were known far and wide, and were such as required a strong power to protect from the neighboring princes, who could not but calculate, from time to time, upon the glorious spoil which might be obtained by the rapid pillage of Jerusalem alone, even apart from any views of territorial aggrandizement. Such power Solomon had possessed; and grievously as the strength which Rehoboam inherited from him had been impaired, it was still sufficient, under the judicious measures which had in the early years of his reign been adopted for putting the country in a state of defence, to withstand any attempt of the small neighboring states. Of these, the new kingdom was alone to be seriously dreaded; and the alienation had not yet become such as to render it probable that the ten tribes would dare, even if Jerusalem were in their power, to pillage the temple of the Lord. There was, however, in the distance, a more powerful and dangerous enemy, not to be restrained by any such considerations, and who had for some time beheld with longing eyes the treasures of the sacred city. This was the king of Egypt. As long as Rehoboam continued in a right course, this powerful prince was restrained by the Lord from the measures he contemplated; but no sooner had the king, with his people, sinned against Jehovah, than the hands of the Egyptian monarch were loosened, and he proceeded to invade the land with a mighty host levied from the different African territories subject to his scepter. This was the first time the Egyptians had appeared in the sacred land with hostile purposes against the Hebrews; and it is probable that so formidable a body of chariots, horsemen, and infantry had never before invaded the country. The appearance of this new enemy, whose power and resources they knew, must have filled the Judahites with dread,—the rather, as their unfaithfulness had disentitled them to the right of looking to the Lord for his protection. Probably, in the first instance, the king placed some hope in the strong fortresses he had built towards the southern frontier; but these fell, one after another, before the might of the invaders,—and the Egyptians, having cleared their rear from obstruction, marched direct upon Jerusalem. At this juncture, the same prophet Shemaiah, who had before interposed to prevent Rehoboam’s army from marching against Jeroboam, again appeared, and delivered to the king and his princes the short but awfully emphatic message,—“Thus saith the Lord, Ye have forsaken me; and therefore have I also left you in the hands of Shishak.” At this they were conscience-stricken, and acted exactly as became them, and as was best suited to turn the Lord’s anger aside. They admitted the justice of the punishment they had brought upon themselves, and they humbled themselves, and said,—“The Lord is righteous,”—an admission as brief and significant as the reproof. This humiliation was graciously received in heaven; and it was intimated that for this they should be spared some portion of the ignominy they had incurred. This seems to have meant that their lives would be spared, and that the city would not be destroyed by the Egyptian host; yet they should for a time feel that these overbearing foreigners were their masters, that they might know the difference between the service of the Lord and that of strange princes. It was probably as an act of submission to this doom that no defence of Jerusalem was attempted; and He in whose hand is the heart of kings so mollified the stern purposes of Shishak, that he was content with the spoils of the temple and the palace, without molesting the inhabitants, or damaging the city, or attempting to retain the country in subjection. Indeed, recollecting the prodigious quantities of precious metal lavished by Solomon on these buildings, this spoil must have been amply sufficient to fulfill the greedy expectations of the invaders, and satisfy the wishes of then nation. It has indeed been urged that no such spoil could have proved an adequate return for the costs of the expedition, and that it was unlikely that its objects should be satisfied by the plunder of a palace and a temple. But it may be answered, that, under ancient military arrangements, an army was a less costly instrument than—happily for the peace of the world—it has now become; and that the balance of profit and loss, in expeditions furnishing an immediate access of plunder and glory, was less nicely calculated in former times than it is now,—although, indeed, modern history has furnished examples, not few nor far between, of expeditions costing millions of money being employed upon objects not worth as many shillings. Besides, to allege that the plunder of a temple is not an adequate object of military action is against the facts of history, and is to forget that riches equal to the wealth of a nation were often in ancient times lavished upon or treasured up in temples. The reader will call to mind the celebrated temple in Elymais of Persia,—the rich treasures of which were the objects of attention to two of the greatest of the Seleucidian kings of Syria, one of whom (Antiochus the Great) lost his life in a commotion created in the attempt to seize them; and whose son (Antiochus Epiphanes) was engaged in the same distant quarter, quelling the disturbances created by the actual plunder of the temple to recruit his exhausted finances, when he received the news respecting the Jewish successes over his officers, which made him hastily quit the place with horrid purposes of vengeance against the Jews, which he lived not to accomplish. It may also be observed, that Shishak was not allowed to accomplish all the purposes of his expedition, as is clearly shown by the promise given on the repentance of the king and the princes. What that intention was it is difficult to see. The fact that he did not march into the territory of the territory of the ten tribes, coupled with Jeroboam’s previous sojourn in Egypt, and his favorable reception there, may suggest that he acted at the instance of Jeroboam, with the view of weakening the rival power, if not of adding the dominions of Rehoboam to those of the sovereign of the ten tribes—or of holding them as a dependency of his own Egypt. The subsequent reflection which led him, under Divine influence, to alter his views, and to be content with the treasures of the palace and temple, may have been found in the consideration that it might not be good policy for Egypt to push its frontier in this direction—thus destroying politically the desert barrier which separated it from other nations,—and still less to reconstruct and render once more formidable the kingdom which had been weakened by separation into two; for although, perhaps, he might count on the subserviency of Jeroboam, he could not know but that the united kingdom might in no long time acquire such strength, and lapse into such hands, as might render its neighborhood inconvenient to Egypt. In old times, as in our own, thinking politicians—and there were thinking politicians even in those days—must have seen the futility of basing political arrangements on personal considerations. Men die, and men change; but political action has permanent effects, which survive the men by whose hands it was wrought. That the result was not inadequate to the extent and importance of the expedition—that it was, in fact, regarded as a memorable event in Egypt—is shown by the circumstance that the successful results of the campaign are celebrated in a series of sculptures on the north external wall of the temple at Karnak. The king, as usual, presents his prisoners to the deity of the temple; and to each figure is attached an oval, indicating the town or district he represents; one of which is concluded to be Yooda Melchi, or “kingdom of Judah.” It is not to be supposed that Rehoboam was actually carried captive to Egypt, but that the figure is a symbol of the king’s triumph over him. Whether the figure be a portrait or not, is uncertain; but, as the Egyptian artists were used to make as near a likeness as they could of the objects they intended to represent, it doubtless presents a general resemblance, if not of the king, of as much of the Jewish physiognomy and costume as it discloses. We introduce it, together with the head of Shishak himself. The preservation of this figure is a notable circumstance, especially as the picture is so much mutilated that nothing remains but three captives bound to a stake, which forms, as usual, a sort of title-page at the beginning, and a portion of the triumphal procession at the end, which is so much mutilated that only the names of the captives are legible. This defaced condition of the monument is much to be deplored, as it might very possibly have presented details, not only confirmatory but illustrative of the sacred narrative. 2 Chronicles 12:3 with 1,200 chariots and 60,000 horsemen. And the people who came with him from Egypt were without number: the Lubim, the Sukkiim and the Ethiopians. twelve hundred: Judges 4:13 1Sa 13:5 2Sa 10:18 without number: 2Ch 14:9 Judges 6:5 Rev 9:16 Lubims: Lubim, apparently the same with Lehabim (Ge 10:13,) were probably the ancient inhabitants of Lybia, (called Lubi in the Syriac version, Ac 2:10,) a district of Africa, adjoining to Egypt, and extending along the shore of the Mediterranean as far as the city of Cyrene. 2Ch 16:8 Eze 30:5 Na 3:9 the Sukkiims: The Sukkiim, (from {sachach,} "to cover,") are supposed to have been the Troglodites, as the LXX. and Vulgate render, a people of Egypt, on the west of the Red Sea, so called because they dwelt [en troglais,] in caves. Ethiopians: These Cushim were probably the inhabitants of Ethiopia, south of Egypt. 2Ch 14:12 16:8 Isa 43:3 Da 11:43 Na 3:9, Cushim, Heb. Ge 10:6-8 SHISHAK'S FORMIDABLE FORCE with 1,200 chariots and 60,000 horsemen. And the people who came with him from Egypt were without number: the Lubim, the Sukkiim and the Ethiopians - Yes he had chariots and horsemen and people...without number (probably mercenaries), but that is not why he defeated Judah! He defeated Judah because God had given them over into his hands as "payment" for their unfaithfulness.