Bible In One Year Day 187 (2 Kings 21, 2 Chronicles 32, Psalm 145)

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Agape Bible Study 
2 Kings 21 

Chapter 21: King Manasseh and his Son King Amon

2 Kings 21:1-9 ~ The reign of Manasseh in Judah (687-642 BC)

See the parallel passage in 2 Chronicles 33:1-20, parts of which are quoted in the ancient catechism known as the "Apostolic Constitutions" or "Constitutions of the Holy Apostles" in section 2.22.

Since Hezekiah reigned for twenty-nine years and Manasseh became king when he was only twelve years old, either Hezekiah's elder sons had all predeceased him and Manasseh was his youngest son, or it is more likely that Hezekiah's sons had died and Manasseh was a grandson. In any case, it appears that young Manasseh did not have the benefit of being raised by a righteous father and was not guided in his youth by righteous advisors, since he came to the throne in his minority and would have had regents appointed along with his mother.

Question: What did Manasseh do to undo the good work of his father Hezekiah, and what other sins did he commit? See 2 Kng 21:3-9 and 16.

Answer:

1. He rebuilt the altars to Yahweh in the high places, thus encouraging illicit worship outside the Temple.
2. He reinstituted pagan worship including the worship of Baal.
3. He built pagan altars within the inner and outer courts of Yahweh's Temple and put a statue of Asherah inside the Temple, perhaps in the Sanctuary.
4. He sacrificed his own son to a pagan god.
5. He practiced soothsaying and divination and approved consulting mediums and spirit guides.
6. He shed the blood of the innocent.

That Jerusalem was the site God chose for His name to dwell (i.e., see 1 Kng 11:13b; 2 Kng 23:27). In Deuteronomy 12:5-12, Yahweh told the Israelites that He would choose the site for permanent worship when they were settled in the Promised Land. That site was where David received a divine vision and was commanded to build an altar on Mt. Moriah in Jerusalem (2 Sam 24:16-19; 2 Chr 3:1). It was Yahweh's promise that so long as the Israelites were obedient to His covenant that He would make them secure in the Promised Land (Lev 26:3-13; Dt 28:1-14). But God also told them: "You will not make idols for yourselves; you will not erect statues or cultic stones, or erect carved stones in your country, for you to worship; for I Yahweh, am your God. You shall keep my Sabbaths and revere my sanctuary. I am Yahweh" (Lev 26:1-2; also see 19:4).

2 Kings 21:10-16 ~ Yahweh's warnings to Judah

Two images are used in verse 13: a measuring line and a dish wiped clean. A measuring line and plummet are tools of construction and a dish is a receptacle for holding food.
Question: What is the significance of the measuring line?
Answer: This is a metaphor for divine judgment. In the construction of buildings or walls, the end of a line was attached to a weight and was suspended to see if a wall was vertical. In this case, the line and the weight are used for the rigorous measurement of the integrity and faithfulness of Jerusalem which is found to be defective.

The same standard for judging Samaria, the capital of the Northern Kingdom, will be used for judging Jerusalem, the capital of the Southern Kingdom. Failure in the integrity of the city will mean destruction as in the case of a wall that was judged to be out of plum. Prophets prior to the destruction of Samaria and Jerusalem and afterwards had visions and made prophecies concerning Samaria and Jerusalem being measured by a divine plumb line:

• The prophet Amos, during the reign of Jeroboam II of Israel had a vision of the Lord standing by a wall with a plumb-line in his hand ready to judge the Northern Kingdom (Amos 7:7-9).
• The prophet Isaiah gave a prophecy concerning a measuring line of chaos being stretched across Jerusalem (Is 34:11).
• The inspired writer of the Book of Lamentations (credited to Jeremiah in 2 Chr 35:25) writes of Yahweh's resolve to destroy the walls of Jerusalem by "stretching out the line, not staying his hand until he has engulfed everything ..." (Lam 2:8).
• Zechariah will have a vision of a mysterious figure with a measuring line sent to measure the restored Jerusalem (Zec 2:5-9/2:1-5).

The second symbolic image is a dish. When the last remnant of food is removed from a dish, the dish can be wiped clean and turned upside down. Turning a dish upside down is a sign that the person who was eating is now satiated.
Question: What is the significance of the dish metaphor in 13b?
Answer: There are two statements conveyed by the dish that is an image of total destruction:

1. Not only are the city and its people wiped out, but Yahweh has had His fill of Judah's sinning and can take no more.
2. Yahweh will judge Judah and when He has finished He will turn Judah upside down, divesting the country of all it once contained.

15 because they have done what is displeasing to me and have provoked my anger from the day their ancestors came out of Egypt until now.
The point is that Manasseh's behavior is not unique but is rather the culmination of all the unfaithful rebellion of the Israelites from the generation of the Exodus onward.

The shedding of innocent blood probably refers to the murder of the prophets and others of the faithful who opposed Manasseh's abominations against the Temple and other profane practices against the covenant. The Jewish historian Josephus wrote: "...he barbarously slew all the righteous men that were among the Hebrews; nor would he spare the prophets, for every day he slew some of them, till Jerusalem was overflown with blood" (Antiquities of the Jews, 10.3.1 [38]). According to Jewish tradition, the prophet Isaiah was martyred during this time. The apocryphal Martyrdom of Isaiah records that Manasseh had Isaiah sawed in two in c. 668 BC.

Manasseh's repentance; as in 2 Chronicles 33:1-13
(illustration from a Bible card published in 1904 by the Providence Lithograph)

The Repentance of Manasseh

When God spoke to the king and to the people they would not listen and continued in their perverse practices. In judgment, Yahweh sent the Assyrians against Manasseh and Judah. The result was that the king's capture and imprisonment. His suffering brought about his repentance: Yahweh then brought down on them the generals of the king of Assyria's army who captured Manasseh with hooks, put him in chains and took him to Babylon. While in his distress, he placated Yahweh his God by genuinely humbling himself before the God of his ancestors. When he prayed to him, he was moved by the entreaty, heard his supplication and brought him back to Jerusalem to his kingdom. Manasseh realized then that Yahweh is God (2 Chr 33:11-13).

A little humble repentance goes a long way with God. God forgave Manasseh his sins, brought about his release from prison, and his restoration to kingship in Judah. Manasseh demonstrated his repentance and his gratitude to God in good works: Afterwards, he rebuilt the outer wall of the City of David, to the west of Gihon, in the valley, up to the Fish Gate and round the Ophel, and made it very much higher. And he stationed military governors in all the fortified towns of Judah. He also removed the foreign gods and the idol from the Temple of Yahweh, as well as all the altars which he had built on the mountain of the Temple of Yahweh and in Jerusalem, and threw them out of the city. He repaired the altar of Yahweh and offered communion sacrifices and thanksgiving offerings on it, and commanded Judah to serve Yahweh, God of Israel. The people, however, went on sacrificing at the high places, although only to Yahweh their God (2 Chr 33:14-17).

Question: What good works, both civil and religious, were accomplished by Manasseh to atone for his past evil deeds? What was his only failure?
Answer:

1. He expanded the walls of the city of Jerusalem.
2. He established governors in all the major cities.
3. He removed all the foreign gods, the idol of Asherah, and the other altars from the Temple.
4. He repaired the altar of Yahweh in the Temple.
5. He reestablished right liturgical worship.
   He did not, however, end the practice of illicit worship of Yahweh in sites outside the Jerusalem Temple.

2 Kings 21:17-18 ~ Summary of Manasseh's reign
See the parallel passage in 2 Chronicles 33:18-20. Manasseh was probably buried in the garden of His great-great-great-grandfather Uzziah (Uzza being a shortened form of the name); this was probably because there was no more room in the normal burial site for the Davidic kings.

2 Kings 21:19-28 ~ The reign of Amon in Judah
See the parallel passage in 2 Chronicles 33:21-25. Unfortunately, Amon followed the example of Manasseh prior to his conversion. He returned idol worship to Judah and abandoned Yahweh and His covenant. His own palace officials assassinated him in a palace coup, but the people resisted the usurpers and killed them, placing Amon's son on the throne of David. His son, Josiah, will become one of the two most righteous kings of Judah since David.

It is significant that the people continued to support the Davidic heirs. Their actions in giving their loyalty to the Davidic kings attest to their belief in the Davidic covenant. It was to David of Judah that God revealed both the plan of the Temple (1 Chr 28:11-19) and the plan of the eternal covenant that is the "charter for humanity" by which the coming of the Messianic priest-king was to bring the blessings of Abraham to all nations (2 Sam 7:18-29; 23:2-5; 1 Chr 17:16-27; Ps 16; 110; Acts 2:25-36).

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A Daily Defense

DAY 187 Details in the Gospels

CHALLENGE: “The Gospels were written long after the fact. They aren’t historically reliable.”

DEFENSE: On the contrary, the details in the Gospels show they are very reliable.

In John, when Jesus is about to miraculously feed the five thousand, he asks Philip where it would be possible to buy bread (John 6:5–6). This is surprising since Philip was not a major apostle.  

However, John also records that Philip was from Bethsaida—the town from which Peter and Andrew originally hailed (John 1:44, 12:21). The feeding of the five thousand occurred in a desolate place near the town of Bethsaida (Luke 9:10–13). That would explain why Jesus might ask Philip where bread could be bought, but since Peter and Andrew also came from Bethsaida, and since they were among the most prominent apostles, we would expect him to ask them.

The matter is clarified in Mark, which indicates Peter and Andrew were now living in the village of Capernaum (Mark 1:21–29). They no longer lived in Bethsaida and would not have up-to-date knowledge of where bread could be bought. Jesus thus asked Philip.

It is striking that each fact is mentioned in only one of the Gospels:

• Only John mentions that Jesus asked Philip where to buy bread.

• Only John mentions that Philip was from Bethsaida.

• Only Luke mentions that the feeding of the five thousand took place near Bethsaida.

• Only Mark mentions that Peter and Andrew were now living in Capernaum.

Yet when careful attention is paid to the details of each Gospel, a coherent picture emerges of why Jesus asked a lesser apostle like Philip where bread could be bought. This is not the kind of situation that would arise if the evangelists were making up details at random. The Gospels are all too short for chance to explain the matter. Neither does the situation reflect a collusion of authors, for the relevant details are mentioned only in passing and nothing is ever made of them.

This indicates that the evangelists are accurately recording historical details, whose integrity is shown when their accounts are compared.

Jimmy Akin, A Daily Defense: 365 Days (Plus One) to Becoming a Better Apologist