Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 2 Kings 17:24

And the king of Assyria brought [men] from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed [them] in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel: and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof.

24 41. Of those nations which were brought to inhabit Samaria, how they were plagued with lions. The mixed character of their religion (Not in Chronicles)

24. the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon ] These would most likely be the leaders of the colony as coming from the capital of the empire.

and from Cuthah ] It is not certain what district is intended by this name. Some have thought that the country should be identified with that between the Euphrates and the Tigris, where a town Cutha is mentioned by early geographers and from which neighbourhood others of these colonists came. Others think ‘Cuthans’ is another form of ‘Cossans’, who were a tribe dwelling in the hills between Persia and Media, northward of the river Choaspes. The latter appears the more probable conjecture, but it remains only a conjecture.

and from Ava ] R.V. Avva. This is without doubt the same place as Ivah (R.V. Ivvah) of 2Ki 18:34 below. The place is not clearly identified, but opinions incline to make it the same as Ahava, which stood where the modern Hit does, on the Euphrates at some distance to the N.W. of Babylon.

and from Hamath ] This was the well-known Syrian city on the Orontes, which we read of as recovered by Jeroboam II. (2Ki 14:28, where see note) but which the Assyrians soon afterwards reconquered (2Ki 18:34), and seem now to have brought some of its population southward to Samaria.

and from Sepharvaim ] This place is mentioned also in 2Ki 18:34 among cities which had been reduced to subjection by the Assyrians (cf. also 2Ki 19:13 and Isa 37:13). It is identified with the famous town of Sippara on the Euphrates, a little distance above Babylon. The LXX. writes the name , which form favours this identification.

instead of the children of Israel ] We are not from these words to suppose that all the Israelites were taken away. We know that in the later captivity of Judah, Jerusalem was never wholly left of its old inhabitants. We read in 2Ch 34:9, in the days of Josiah, that there was still ‘a remnant of Israel’, and these must be taken to be the people left behind when their fellow-countrymen were for the most part carried away.

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

Sargon is probably the king of Assyria intended, not (as generally supposed) either Shalmaneser or Esar-haddon.

The ruins of Cutha have been discovered about 15 miles northeast of Babylon, at a place which is called Ibrahim, because it is the traditional site of a contest between Abraham and Nimrod. The name of Cuilia is found on the bricks of this place, which are mostly of the era of Nebuchadnezzar. The Assyrian inscriptions show that the special god of Cutha was Nergal (see the 2Ki 17:30 note).

Ava or Ivah or Ahava Ezr 8:15 was on the Euphrates; perhaps the city in ancient times called Ihi or Aia, between Sippara (Sepharvaim) and Hena (Anah).

On Hamath, see 1Ki 8:65 note.

Sepharvaim or Sippara is frequently mentioned in the Assyrian inscriptions under the name of Tsipar (2Ki 17:31 note). The dual form of the Hebrew name is explained by the fact that the town lay on both sides of the river. Its position is marked by the modern village of Mosaib, about 20 miles from the ruins of Babylon up the course of the stream.

The towns mentioned in this verse were, excepting Hamath, conquered by Sargon in his twelfth year, 709 B.C.; and it cannot have been until this time, or a little later, that the transplantation here recorded took place. Hamath had revolted, and been conquered by Sargon in his first year, shortly after the conquest of Samaria.

Instead of the children of Israel – This does not mean that the whole population of Samaria was carried off (compare 2Ch 34:9). The writer here, by expressly confining the new-comers to the cities of Samaria, seems to imply that the country districts were in other hands.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

2Ki 17:24-41

And the King of Assyria brought men from Babylon.

Subjects worth thinking about

This fragment of Israelitish history brings under our notice four subjects which run through all human history, and which find their illustration in the events of modern as well as ancient life.

I. The tyranny of man. Here we find the Assyrians committing two great enormities on the men of Israel, driving them out of their own land into Assyria, and taking possession of their own country and home.

II. The retributions of life. Probably the lions had been in the land of Samaria before the settlement of the Assyrian colonists, but after their settlement these furious beasts of prey seem to have multiplied. The law of retribution is ever at work in human history, not only in the lives of nations but in the lives of individuals. No man can do a wrong thing without suffering for it in some form or other. Nemesis surely, though silently, treads on the heels of wrong. The lions of retribution track our steps as sinners; stealthily, and are ready to spring at any moment. We are far enough from saying that retribution here is adequate and complete, hence there is within all a fearful looking for of some future judgment.

III. The prostitution of religion. The Assyrian king, it would seem, in answer to the alarm which his people, whom he had settled in Samaria, felt concerning the lions, conceived the plan of adopting religion as the remedy. Here you have one of the million examples of that religion of policy that has abounded in all lands and times. In every page in history, nay, in every scene of life, we find religion taken up as a means to an end, rather than as the grand end of being.

IV. The theistic hunger of souls. All these men, both the colonists and the Israelites, would have their gods; a god seemed to them as necessary almost as their life. (David Thomas, D. D.)

Christians condemned by men of the world

The King of Assyria intended here is not Shalmaneser or Esar-haddon, as is generally supposed, but Sargon. It is not doubted that Esar-haddon sent colonists into the country, from whom the new Samaritans were, at least in part, descended. It is believed that there was a previous colonisation by the conqueror of the country. We must regard these men as strangers; and so regarding them, their judgment upon the religious condition of the people is the more remarkable. They noticed, for example, that at the beginning of their dwelling in the country, the people feared not the Lord. It should be a rule with us in life to know that even those who do not share our own religious sentiments may yet be observing how those sentiments affect our personal conduct. Probably there is hardly a deeper humiliation than that the people of God, at least nominally so regarded, should have been judged as impious by men who came from a far-off land and who professed only a heathenish religion. It is noticeable that one of the very first things observed by the Assyrians was that the people were not faithful to their religion. There is evidently something deeper than a mere form of religious faith; otherwise the Assyrians could not have noticed a discrepancy between doctrine and practice; the nominal people of God had so far descended into corruption and licentiousness as to care absolutely nothing for the opinion of heathen critics. Their piety had been displaced not only by impiety, as representing a negative condition of mind, but by absolute contempt and defiance. It is not to be supposed because our life-work lies amongst men who do not profess religion, that therefore we can afford to dispense with our own religion and not incur the disapprobation of observers. There is an honesty even apart from spiritual religion; that is to say, there is a spirit in man which instinctively revolts at inconsistency, treachery, and all forms of practical lying in reference to high religious obligations. This should be noticed by men who enjoy spiritual emoluments and advantages which they have not earned by merit or by honest labour. All kinds of religious promotion should be jealously regarded as being under the criticism of men of the world. We might so far become victims of infatuation as to suppose that men of the world would rather applaud us for so using ecclesiastical position and privilege as to consolidate our financial and social position. Men of the world, however, do nothing of the kind; although they do not profess to be pious, they yet have clear ideas as to honesty and integrity. To be condemned by men of the world for want of faithfulness to our religious convictions is one of the severest judgments which can befall our religious life. (J. Parker, D. D.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 24. The king of Assyria brought men from Babylon] He removed one people entirely, and substituted others in their place; and this he did to cut off all occasion for mutiny or insurrection; for the people being removed from their own land, had no object worthy of attention to contend for, and no patrimony in the land of their captivity to induce them to hazard any opposition to their oppressors.

By men from Babylon, we may understand some cities of Babylonia then under the Assyrian empire; for at this time Babylon had a king of its own; but some parts of what was called Babylonia might have been still under the Assyrian government.

From Cuthah] This is supposed to be the same as Cush, the Chaldeans and Syrians changing shin into tau; thus they make Cush into Cuth; and Ashshur, Assyria, into Attur. From these came the Scythae; and from these the Samaritans were called Cuthaeans, and their language Cuthite. The original language of this people, or at least the language they spoke after their settlement in Israel, is contained in the Samaritan version of the Pentateuch, printed under the Hebraeo-Samaritan in vol. i. of the London Polyglot. This Cuthah was probably the country in the land of Shinar, first inhabited by Cush.

From Ava] The Avim were an ancient people, expelled by the Caphtorim from Hazerim, De 2:23.

From Hamath] This was Hemath or Emath of Syria, frequently mentioned in the sacred writings.

From Sepharvaim] There was a city called Syphera, near the Euphrates; others think the Saspires, a people situated between the Colchians and the Medes, are meant. There is much uncertainty relative to these places: all that we know is, that the Assyrians carried away the Israelites into Assyria, and placed them in cities and districts called Halah and Habor by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes, 2Kg 17:6; and it is very likely that they brought some of the inhabitants of those places into the cities of Israel.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

The king of Assyria; either Shalmaneser, or rather his son and successor, Esar-haddon, Ezr 4:2, because this was a work of some time; and as his father had projected, and possibly begun this, so he executed or finished it; whence it is ascribed to him, rather than to his father. Babylon then was subject to the Assyrian monarch; but a few years after revolted from him, and set up another king; as appears both from sacred and profane histories.

Cuthah, Ava, Hamath, and Sepharvaim; several places then in his dominion.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

24-28. the king of Assyria broughtmen from Babylon, etc.This was not Shalmaneser, butEsar-haddon (Eze 4:2). Theplaces vacated by the captive Israelites he ordered to be occupied byseveral colonies of his own subjects from Babylon and otherprovinces.

from Cuthahthe Chaldeeform of Cush or Susiana, now Khusistan.

Avasupposed to beAhivaz, situated on the river Karuns, which empties into the head ofthe Persian Gulf.

Hamathon the Orontes.

SepharvaimSiphara, acity on the Euphrates above Babylon.

placed them in the cities ofSamaria, c.It must not be supposed that the Israelites wereuniversally removed to a man. A remnant was left, chiefly however ofthe poor and lower classes, with whom these foreign colonists mingledso that the prevailing character of society about Samaria washeathen, not Israelite. For the Assyrian colonists became masters ofthe land; and, forming partial intermarriages with the remnant Jews,the inhabitants became a mongrel race, no longer a people of Ephraim(Isa 7:6). These people,imperfectly instructed in the creed of the Jews, acquired also amongrel doctrine. Being too few to replenish the land, lions, bywhich the land had been infested (Jdg 14:5;1Sa 17:34; 1Ki 13:24;1Ki 20:36; Son 4:8),multiplied and committed frequent ravages upon them. Recognizing inthese attacks a judgment from the God of the land, whom they had notworshipped, they petitioned the Assyrian court to send them someJewish priests who might instruct them in the right way of servingHim. The king, in compliance with their request, sent them one of theexiled priests of Israel [2Ki17:27], who established his headquarters at Beth-el, and taughtthem how they should fear the Lord. It is not said that he took acopy of the Pentateuch with him, out of which he might teach them.Oral teaching was much better fitted for the superstitiouspeople than instruction out of a written book. He could teach themmore effectually by word of mouth. Believing that he would adopt thebest and simplest method for them, it is unlikely that he took thewritten law with him, and so gave origin to the Samaritan copy of thePentateuch [DAVIDSON,Criticism]. Besides, it is evident from his being one of theexiled priests, and from his settlement at Beth-el, that he was not aLevite, but one of the calf-worshipping priests. Consequently hisinstructions would be neither sound nor efficient.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

And the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon,…. Which was at this time under the dominion of the king of Assyria; though in a little time after this it revolted, and had a king of its own, 2Ki 20:12, this king of Assyria was either Shalmaneser, who carried Israel captive, or it may be rather his son Esarhaddon, see Ezr 4:2,

and from Cuthah; which, according to Josephus k, was a city in Persia, where was a river of the same name; but it was rather a place in Erech, in the country of Babylon, [See comments on Ge 10:10],

and from Ava; the same with Ivah, Isa 37:13, where perhaps a colony of the Avim had settled, De 2:23

and from Hamath; a city of Syria, which lay on the northern borders of the land of Canaan, Nu 34:8

and from Sepharvaim; thought by some to be the Sippara of Ptolemy, or the Sippareni of Abydenus, in Mesopotamia; though Vitringa takes it to be a city in Syro-Phoenicia, [See comments on Isa 36:19],

and placed them in the cities of Samaria, instead of the children of Israel; not in Samaria, which was now destroyed, according to the prophecy in Mic 1:6 as Abarbinel and other Jewish writers note:

and they possessed Samaria; as an inheritance; sowed it with corn, and planted vineyards there:

and dwelt in the cities thereof; in the several parts of the kingdom.

k Antiqu. l. 9. c. 14. sect. 1.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

The Samaritans and Their Worship. – After the transportation of the Israelites, the king of Assyria brought colonists from different provinces of his kingdom into the cities of Samaria. The king of Assyria is not Salmanasar, for it is evident from 2Ki 17:25 that a considerable period intervened between the carrying away of the Israelites and the sending of colonists into the depopulated land. It is true that Salmanasar only is mentioned in what precedes, but the section vv. 24-41 is not so closely connected with the first portion of the chapter, that the same king of Assyria must necessarily be spoken of in both. According to Ezr 4:2, it was Esarhaddon who removed the heathen settlers to Samaria. It is true that the attempt has been made to reconcile this with the assumption that the king of Assyria mentioned in our verse is Salmanasar, by the conjecture that one portion of these colonists was settled there by Salmanasar, another by Esarhaddon; and it has also been assumed that in this expedition Esarhaddon carried away the last remnant of the ten tribes, namely, all who had fled into the mountains and inaccessible corners of the land, and to some extent also in Judaea, during Salmanasar’s invasion, and had then collected together in the land again after the Assyrians had withdrawn. But there is not the smallest intimation anywhere of a second transplantation of heathen colonists to Samaria, any more than of a second removal of the remnant of the Israelites who were left behind in the land after the time of Salmanasar. The prediction in Isa 7:8, that in sixty-five years more Ephraim was to be destroyed, so that it would be no longer a people, even if it referred to the transplantation of the heathen colonists to Samaria by Esarhaddon, as Usher, Hengstenberg, and others suppose, would by no means necessitate the carrying away of the last remnant of the Israelites by this king, but simply the occupation of the land by heathen settlers, with whom the last remains of the Ephraimites intermingled, so that Ephraim ceased to be a people. As long as the land of Israel was merely laid waste and deprived of the greater portion of its Israelitish population, there always remained the possibility that the exiles might one day return to their native land and once more form one people with those who were left behind, and so long might Israel be still regarded as a nation; just as the Judaeans, when in exile in Babylon, did not cease to be a people, because they looked forward with certain hope to a return to their fatherland after a banishment of seventy years. But after heathen colonists had been transplanted into the land, with whom the remainder of the Israelites who were left in the land became fused, so that there arose a mixed Samaritan people of a predominantly heathen character, it was impossible to speak any longer of a people of Ephraim in the land of Israel. This transplantation of colonists out of Babel, Cutha, etc., into the cities of Samaria might therefore be regarded as the point of time at which the nation of Ephraim was entirely dissolved, without any removal of the last remnant of the Israelites having taken place. We must indeed assume this if the ten tribes were deported to the very last man, and the Samaritans were in their origin a purely heathen people without any admixture of Israelitish blood, as Hengstenberg assumes and has endeavoured to prove. But the very opposite of this is unmistakeably apparent from 2Ch 34:6, 2Ch 34:9, according to which there were not a few Israelites left in the depopulated land in the time of Josiah. (Compare Kalkar, Die Samaritaner ein Mischvolk, in Pelt’s theol. Mitarbeiten, iii. 3, pp. 24ff.). – We therefore regard Esarhaddon as the Assyrian king who brought the colonists to Samaria. The object to may be supplied from the context, more especially from , which follows. He brought inhabitants from Babel, i.e., from the country, not the city of Babylon, from Cuthah, etc. The situation of Cuthah or Cuth (2Ki 17:30) cannot be determined with certainty. M. v. Niebuhr ( Gesch. p. 166) follows Josephus, who speaks of the Cuthaeans in Ant. ix. 14, 3, and x. 9, 7, as a people dwelling in Persia and Media, and identifies them with the Kossaeans, Kissians, Khushiya, Chuzi, who lived to the north-east of Susa, in the north-eastern portion of the present Khusistan; whereas Gesenius ( thes. p. 674), Rosenmller (bibl. Althk. 1, 2, p. 29), and J. D. Michaelis (Supplem. ad Lex. hebr. p. 1255) have decided in favour of the Cutha (Arabic kth or ktha) in the Babylonian Irak, in the neighbourhood of the Nahr Malca, in support of which the fact may also be adduced, that, according to a communication from Spiegel (in the Auslande, 1864, No. 46, p. 1089), Cutha, a town not mentioned elsewhere, was situated by the wall in the north-east of Babylon, probably on the spot where the hill Ohaimir with its ruins stands. The greater number of colonists appear to have come from Cutha, because the Samaritans are called by the Rabbins.

, Avva, is almost always, and probably with correctness, regarded as being the same place as the ( Ivvah) mentioned in 2Ki 18:34 and 2Ki 19:13, as the conjecture naturally suggests itself to every one that the Avvaeans removed to Samaria by Esarhaddon were inhabitants of the kingdom of Avva destroyed by the Assyrian king, and the form is probably simply connected with the appellative explanation given to the word by the Masoretes. As Ivvh is placed by the side of Henah in 2Ki 18:34 and 2Ki 19:13, Avva can hardly by any other than the country of Hebeh, situated on the Euphrates between Anah and the Chabur (M. v. Niebuhr, p. 167). Hamath is Epiphania on the Orontes: see at 1Ki 8:65 and Num 13:21. Sepharvaim is no doubt the Sippara ( ) of Ptolem. (v. 18, 7), the southernmost city of Mesopotamia on the Euphrates, above the Nahr Malca, the or , which Berosus and Abydenus mention (in Euseb. Praepar, evang. ix. 12 and 41, and Chronic. Armen. i. pp. 33, 36, 49, 55) as belonging to the time of the flood. – : this is the first time in which the name is evidently applied to the kingdom of Samaria.

2Ki 17:25-29

In the earliest period of their settlement in the cities of Samaria the new settlers were visited by lions, which may have multiplied greatly during the time that the land was lying waste. The settlers regarded this as a punishment from Jehovah, i.e., from the deity of the land, whom they did not worship, and therefore asked the king of Assyria for a priest to teach them the right, i.e., the proper, worship of God of the land; whereupon the king sent them one of the priests who had been carried away, and he took up his abode in Bethel, and instructed the people in the worship of Jehovah. The author of our books also looked upon the lions as sent by Jehovah as a punishment, according to Lev 26:22, because the new settlers did not fear Him. : the lions which had taken up their abode there. : that they (the priest with his companions) went away and dwelt there. There is no need therefore to alter the plural into the singular.

The priest sent by the Assyrian king was of course an Israelitish priest of the calves, for he was one of those who had been carried away and settled in Bethel, the chief seat of Jeroboam’s image-worship, and he also taught the colonists to fear or worship Jehovah after the manner of the land. This explains the state of divine worship in the land as described in 2Ki 17:29. “Every separate nation ( : see Ewald, 313, a.) made itself its own gods, and set them up in the houses of the high places ( : see at 1Ki 12:31, and for the singular , Ewald, 270, c.) which the Samaritans ( , not the colonists sent thither by Esarhaddon, but the former inhabitants of the kingdom of Israel, who are so called from the capital Samaria) had made (built); every nation in the cities where they dwelt.”

2Ki 17:30

The people of Babel made themselves , daughters’ booths. Selden (de Diis Syr. ii. 7), Mnter (Relig. der Babyl. pp. 74, 75), and others understand by these the temples consecrated to Mylitta or Astarte, the , or covered little carriages, or tents for prostitution (Herod. i. 199); but Beyer (Addit. ad Seld. p. 297) has very properly objected to this, that according to the context the reference is to idols or objects of idolatrous worship, which were set up in the . It is more natural to suppose that small tent-temples are meant, which were set up as idols in the houses of the high places along with the images which they contained, since according to 2Ki 23:7 women wove , little temples, for the Asherah, and Ezekiel speaks of patch-work Bamoth, i.e., of small temples made of cloth. It is possible, however, that there is more truth than is generally supposed in the view held by the Rabbins, that signifies an image of the “hen,” or rather the constellation of “the clucking-hen” (Gluckhenne), the Pleiades, – simulacrum gallinae coelestis in signo Tauri nidulantis , as a symbolum Veneris coelestis , as the other idols are all connected with animal symbolism. In any case the explanation given by Movers, involucra seu secreta mulierum , female lingams, which were handed by the hierodulae to their paramours instead of the Mylitta-money ( Phniz. i. p. 596), is to be rejected, because it is at variance with the usage of speech and the context, and because the existence of female lingams has first of all to be proved. For the different views, see Ges. thes. p. 952, and Leyrer in Herzog’s Cycl. – The Cuthaeans made themselves as a god, , Nergal, i.e., according to Winer, Gesenius, Stuhr, and others, the planet Mars, which the Zabians call n e rg, Nerig, as the god of war (Codex Nasar, i. 212, 224), the Arabs mrrx, Mirrig; whereas older commentators identified Nergal with the sun-god Bel, deriving the name from , light, and , a fountain = fountain of light (Selden, ii. 8, and Beyer, Add. pp. 301ff.). But these views are both of them very uncertain. According to the Rabbins (Rashi, R. Salomo, Kimchi), Nergal was represented as a cock. This statement, which is ridiculed by Gesenius, Winer, and Thenius, is proved to be correct by the Assyrian monuments, which contain a number of animal deities, and among them the cock standing upon an altar, and also upon a gem a priest praying in front of a cock (see Layard’s Nineveh). The pugnacious cock is found generally in the ancient ethnical religions in frequent connection with the gods of war (cf. J. G. Mller in Herzog’s Cycl.). , Ashima, the god of the people of Hamath, was worshipped, according to rabbinical statements, under the figure of a bald he-goat (see Selden, ii. 9). The suggested combination of the name with the Phoenician deity Esmun, the Persian Asuman, and the Zendic amano, i.e., heaven, is very uncertain.

2Ki 17:31

Of the idols of the Avvaeans, according to rabbinical accounts in Selden, l.c., Nibchaz had the form of a dog ( , latrator , from ), and Tartak that of an ass. Gesenius regards Tartak as a demon of the lower regions, because in Pehlwi tar – thakh signifies deep darkness or hero of darkness, and Nibchaz as an evil demon, the of the Zabians, whom Norberg in his Onomast. cod. Nasar. p. 100, describes as horrendus rex infernalis: posito ipsius throno ad telluris, i.e., lucis et caliginis confinium, sed imo acherontis fundo pedibus substrato, according to Codex Adami, ii. 50, lin. 12. – With regard to the gods of the Sepharvites, Adrammelech and Anammelech, it is evident from the offering of children in sacrifice to them that they were related to Moloch. The name which occurs as a personal name in 2Ki 19:37 and Isa 37:38, has been explained either from the Semitic as meaning “glorious king,” or from the Persian dr , zr , in which case it means “fire-king,” and is supposed to refer to the sun (see Ges. on Isaiah, ii. p. 347). is supposed to be Hyde ( de relig. vett. Persarum, p. 131) to be the group of stars called Cepheus, which goes by the name of “the shepherd and flock” and “the herd-stars” in the Oriental astrognosis, and in this case might answer to the Arabic gnm = . Movers, on the other hand ( Phniz. i. pp. 410, 411), regards them as two names of the same deity, a double-shaped Moloch, and reads the Chethb as the singular , the god of Sepharvaim. This double god, according to his explanation, was a sun-being, because Sepharvaim, of which he was , is designated by Berosus as a city of the sun. This may be correct; but there is something very precarious in the further assumption, that “Adar-Melech is to be regarded as the sun’s fire, and indeed, since Adar is Mars, that he is so far to be thought of as a destructive being,” and that Anammelech is a contraction of , oculus Molechi, signifying the ever-watchful eye of Saturn; according to which Adrammelech is to be regarded as the solar Mars, Anammelech as the solar Saturn. The explanations given by Hitzig (on Isa. p. 437) and Benfey (die Monatsnamen, pp. 187, 188) are extremely doubtful.

2Ki 17:32

In addition to these idols, Jehovah also was worshipped in temples of the high places, according to the instructions of the Israelitish priest sent by the king of Assyria. : “and they were (also) worshipping Jehovah, and made themselves priests of the mass of the people” ( as in 1Ki 12:31). : “and they (the priests) were preparing them (sacrifices) in the houses of the high places.”

2Ki 17:33

2Ki 17:33 sums up by way of conclusion the description of the various kinds of worship.

2Ki 17:34-39

This mixed cultus, composed of the worship of idols and the worship of Jehovah, they retained till the time when the books of the Kings were written. “Unto this day they do after the former customs.” can only be the religious usages and ordinances which were introduced at the settlement of the new inhabitants, and which are described in 2Ki 17:28-33. The prophetic historian observes still further, that “they fear not Jehovah, and do not according to their statutes and their rights, nor according to the law and commandment which the Lord had laid down for the sons of Jacob, to whom He gave the name of Israel” (see 1Ki 18:31), i.e., according to the Mosaic law. and “their statutes and their right,” stands in antithesis to which Jehovah gave to the children of Israel. If, then, the clause, “they do not according to their statutes and their right,” is not to contain a glaring contradiction to the previous assertion, “unto this day they do after their first (former) rights,” we must understand by the statutes and the right of the ten tribes, i.e., the worship of Jehovah under the symbols of the calves, and must explain the inexactness of the expression “their statutes and their right” from the fact that the historian was thinking of the Israelites who had been left behind in the land, or of the remnant of the Israelitish population that had become mixed up with the heathen settlers (2Ki 23:19-20; 2Ch 34:6, 2Ch 34:9, 2Ch 34:33). The meaning of the verse is therefore evidently the following: The inhabitants of Samaria retain to this day the cultus composed of the worship of idols and of Jehovah under the form of an image, and do not worship Jehovah either after the manner of the ten tribes or according to the precepts of the Mosaic law. Their worship is an amalgamation of the Jehovah image-worship and of heathen idolatry (cf. 2Ki 17:41). – To indicate the character of this worship still more clearly, and hold it up as a complete breach of the covenant and as utter apostasy from Jehovah, the historian describes still more fully, in 2Ki 17:35-39, how earnestly and emphatically the people of Israel had been prohibited from worshipping other gods, and urged to worship Jehovah alone, who had redeemed Israel out of Egypt and exalted it into His own nation. For 2Ki 17:35 compare Exo 20:5; for 2Ki 17:36, the exposition of 2Ki 17:7, also Exo 32:11; Exo 6:6; Exo 20:23; Deu 4:34; Deu 5:15, etc. In 2Ki 17:37 the committal of the thorah to writing is presupposed. For 2Ki 17:39, see Deu 13:5; Deu 23:15, etc.

2Ki 17:40-41

They did not hearken, however (the subject is, of course, the ten tribes), but they (the descendants of the Israelites who remained in the land) do after their former manner. is their manner of worshipping God, which was a mixture of idolatry and of the image-worship of Jehovah, as in 2Ki 17:34. – In 2Ki 17:41 this is repeated once more, and the whole of these reflections are brought to a close with the additional statement, that their children and grandchildren do the same to this day. – In the period following the Babylonian captivity the Samaritans relinquished actual idolatry, and by the adoption of the Mosaic book of the law were converted to monotheism. For the later history of the Samaritans, of whom a small handful have been preserved to the present day in the ancient Sichem, the present Nablus, see Theod. Guil. Joh. Juynboll, commentarii in historiam gentis Samaritanae, Lugd. Bat. 1846, 4, and H. Petermann, Samaria and the Samaritans, in Herzog’s Cycl.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

The Samaritans’ Idolatry.

B. C. 720.

      24 And the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel: and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof.   25 And so it was at the beginning of their dwelling there, that they feared not the LORD: therefore the LORD sent lions among them, which slew some of them.   26 Wherefore they spake to the king of Assyria, saying, The nations which thou hast removed, and placed in the cities of Samaria, know not the manner of the God of the land: therefore he hath sent lions among them, and, behold, they slay them, because they know not the manner of the God of the land.   27 Then the king of Assyria commanded, saying, Carry thither one of the priests whom ye brought from thence; and let them go and dwell there, and let him teach them the manner of the God of the land.   28 Then one of the priests whom they had carried away from Samaria came and dwelt in Beth-el, and taught them how they should fear the LORD.   29 Howbeit every nation made gods of their own, and put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made, every nation in their cities wherein they dwelt.   30 And the men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, and the men of Cuth made Nergal, and the men of Hamath made Ashima,   31 And the Avites made Nibhaz and Tartak, and the Sepharvites burnt their children in fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim.   32 So they feared the LORD, and made unto themselves of the lowest of them priests of the high places, which sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places.   33 They feared the LORD, and served their own gods, after the manner of the nations whom they carried away from thence.   34 Unto this day they do after the former manners: they fear not the LORD, neither do they after their statutes, or after their ordinances, or after the law and commandment which the LORD commanded the children of Jacob, whom he named Israel;   35 With whom the LORD had made a covenant, and charged them, saying, Ye shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice to them:   36 But the LORD, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt with great power and a stretched out arm, him shall ye fear, and him shall ye worship, and to him shall ye do sacrifice.   37 And the statutes, and the ordinances, and the law, and the commandment, which he wrote for you, ye shall observe to do for evermore; and ye shall not fear other gods.   38 And the covenant that I have made with you ye shall not forget; neither shall ye fear other gods.   39 But the LORD your God ye shall fear; and he shall deliver you out of the hand of all your enemies.   40 Howbeit they did not hearken, but they did after their former manner.   41 So these nations feared the LORD, and served their graven images, both their children, and their children’s children: as did their fathers, so do they unto this day.

      Never was land lost, we say, for want of an heir. When the children of Israel were dispossessed, and turned out of Canaan, the king of Assyria soon transplanted thither the supernumeraries of his own country, such as it could well spare, who should be servants to him and masters to the Israelites that remained; and here we have an account of these new inhabitants, whose story is related here that we may take our leave of Samaria, as also of the Israelites that were carried captive into Assyria.

      I. Concerning the Assyrians that were brought into the land of Israel we are here told, 1. That they possessed Samaria and dwelt in the cities thereof, v. 24. It is common for lands to change their owners, but sad that the holy land should become a heathen land again. See what work sin makes. 2. That at their first coming God sent lions among them. They were probably insufficient to people the country, which occasioned the beasts of the field to multiply against them (Exod. xxiii. 29); yet, besides the natural cause, there was a manifest hand of God in it, who is Lord of hosts, of all the creatures, and can serve his own purposes by which he pleases, small or great, lice or lions. God ordered them this rough welcome to check their pride and insolence, and to let them know that though they had conquered Israel the God of Israel had power enough to deal with them–that he could have prevented their settling here, by ordering lions into the service of Israel, and that he permitted it, not for their righteousness, but the wickedness of his own people–and that they were now under his visitation. They had lived without God in their own land, and were not plagued with lions; but, if they do so in this land, it is at their peril. 3. That they sent a remonstrance of this grievance to the king their master, setting forth, it is likely, the loss their infant colony had sustained by the lions and the continual fear they were in of them, and stating that they looked upon it to be a judgment upon them for not worshipping the God of the land, which they could not, because they knew not how, v. 26. The God of Israel was the God of the whole world, but they ignorantly call him the God of the land, apprehending themselves therefore within his reach, and concerned to be upon good terms with him. Herein they shamed the Israelites, who were not so ready to hear the voice of God’s judgments as they were, and who had not served the God of that land, though he was the God of their fathers and their great benefactor, and though they were well instructed in the manner of his worship. Assyrians begged to be taught that which Israelites hated to be taught. 4. That the king of Assyria took care to have them taught the manner of the God of the land (2Ki 17:27; 2Ki 17:28), not out of any affection to that God, but to save his subjects from the lions. On this errand he sent back one of the priests whom he had carried away captive. A prophet would have done them more good, for this was but one of the priests of the calves, and therefore chose to dwell at Bethel for old acquaintance’ sake, and, though he might teach them to do better than they did, he was not likely to teach them to do well, unless he had taught his own people better. However, he came and dwelt among them, to teach them how they should fear the Lord. Whether he taught them out of the book of the law, or only by word of mouth, is uncertain. 5. That, being thus taught, they made a mongrel religion of it, worshipped the God of Israel for fear and their own idols for love (v. 33): They feared the Lord, but they served their own gods. They all agreed to worship the God of the land according to the manner, to serve the Jewish festivals and rites of sacrificing, but every nation made gods of their own besides, not only for their private use in their own families, but to be put in the houses of their high places, v. 9. The idols of each country are here named, 2Ki 17:30; 2Ki 17:31. The learned are at a loss for the signification of several of these names, and cannot agree by what representations these gods were worshipped. If we may credit the traditions of the Jewish doctors, they tell us that Succoth-Benoth was worshipped in a hen and chickens, Nergal in a cock, Ashima in a smooth goat, Nibhaz in a dog, Tartak in an ass, Adrammelech in a peacock, Anammelech in a pheasant. Our own tell us, more probably, that Succoth-Benoth (signifying the tents of the daughters) was Venus. Nergal, being worshipped by the Cuthites, or Persians, was the fire, Adrammelech and Anammelech were only distinctions of Moloch. See how vain idolaters were in their imaginations, and wonder at their sottishness. Our very ignorance concerning these idols teaches us the accomplishment of that word which God has spoken, that these false gods should all perish (Jer. x. 11); they are all buried in oblivion, while the name of the true God shall continue for ever. 6. This medley superstition is here said to continue unto this day (v. 41), till the time when this book was written and long after, above 300 years in all, till the time of Alexander the Great, when Manasse, brother to Jaddus the high priest of the Jews, having married the daughter of Sanballat, governor of the Samaritans, went over to them, got leave of Alexander to build a temple in Mount Gerizim, drew over many of the Jews to him, and prevailed with the Samaritans to cast away all their idols and to worship the God of Israel only; yet their worship was mixed with so much superstition that our Saviour told them they knew not what they worshipped, John iv. 22.

      II. Concerning the Israelites that were carried into the land of Assyria. This historian has occasion to speak of them (v. 22), showing that their successors in the land did as they had done (after the manner of the nations whom they carried away), they worshipped both the God of Israel and those other gods; but what did the captives do in the land of their affliction? Were they reformed, and brought to repentance, by their troubles? No, they did after the former manner, v. 34. When the two tribes were afterwards carried into Babylon, they were cured by it of their idolatry, and therefore, after seventy years, they were brought back with joy; but the ten tribes were hardened in the furnace, and therefore were justly lost in it and left to perish. This obstinacy of theirs is here aggravated by the consideration, 1. Of the honour God had put upon them, as the seed of Jacob, whom he named Israel, and from him they were so named, but were a reproach to that worthy name by which they were called. 2. Of the covenant he made with them, and the charge he gave them upon that covenant, which is here very fully recited, that they should fear and serve the Lord Jehovah only, who had brought them up out of Egypt (v. 36), that, having received his statutes and ordinances in writing, they should observe to do them for evermore (v. 37), and never forget that covenant which God had made with them, the promises and conditions of that covenant, especially that great article of it which is here thrice repeated, because it had been so often inculcated and so much insisted on, that they should not fear other gods. He had told them that, if they kept close to him, he would deliver them out of the hand of all their enemies (v. 39); yet when they were in the hand of their enemies, and stood in need of deliverance, they were so stupid, and had so little sense of their own interest, that they did after the former manner (v. 40), they served both the true God and false gods, as if they knew no difference. Ephraim is joined to idols, let him alone. So they did, and so did the nations that succeeded them. Well might the apostle ask, What then, Are we better than they? No, in no wise, for both Jews and Gentiles are all under sin, Rom. iii. 9.

Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary

Land Resettlement – Verses 24-41

The other side of the Assyrian policy of resettlement of conquered lands brought strange people into the former ten tribes of the north. These were people from Babylon, in lower Mesopotamia; Cuthah, a short distance east of Babylon; Ava, on the Orontes River, inland from the northeast coast of the Mediterranean Sea; Hamath, same general area; and Sepharvaim, of indefinite location, probably also in the area of Ava and Hamath.

The statement that these people `feared not the Lord” means they were unacquainted with His worship and had no reverence for Him. With the depopulation of the land the lions had come into these newly desolate lands and posed a formidable danger to the new inhabitants. They perceived that their trouble arose from their ignorance of the God of the land, on which basis they appealed to the Assyrian king to send them someone who could teach them how to worship. the God of the land, so they could do things which would please Him and escape from the lions. The remedy prescribed was to send one of the priests of the calf worship, who had been brought out with the captives, back to the land to teach them what to do. This was of course a good example of what Jesus v ould later refer to as the blind leading the blind (Mat 15:14).

The repatriated priest set up at the old calf-temple of Bethel and proceeded to teach the people the worship of “Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin.” There was a major difference this time; the new people were not Israel and had not subjected themselves to the law, so that God’s chastisements did not fall on them for disobedience to the covenant. so the newcomers learned the religion of the calves, which purportedly was the worship of the Lord, but which was actually an abomination to Him.

The new people did not forsake their own gods, but merely added the calves to their idols. They came to be called the Samaritans, and would be a constant source of trouble to the Jews who returned from the captivity in the times of Jerubbabel, Ezra, and Nehemiah. They and their impure religion would persist to the time of Christ. Orthodox Jews would refer to them contemptuously as “lion proselytes” because they “converted” out of fear of the lions, and would have no dealings with them (Joh 4:9).

Many different gods found place among the Samaritans, as they utilized the old high places of Israel which had been longtime an object of divine wrath in Israel’s later history. They included the Babylonian diety, Succothbenoth, or “supreme-arbiter”; Nergal, god of pestilence and war, of the Cutha; Ashima, of the Hamathites; the Avite Nibhaz, borrowed from the Elamites, and Tartak; Adrammelech and Anammelech, deities of the Sepharvaim, to whom children were sacrificed. In this conglomerate mess the Samaritans “feared the Lord,” meaning they gave Him reverence, and served their own gods as well, just as they had done before being brought to Palestine.

Because of this attempted mixture of paganism and true worship the Jews rejected them, and rightly so. Their attempt would fall under the condemnation of Jesus, when He said, “Ye cannot serve God and mammon” (Mat 6:24). They followed the former practice of the Israelitish kings in making men of the lowest sort priests of the system. Verse 34 characterizes their worship for what it really was, “they fear not the Lord,” in that they did not follow His statutes and ordinances, nor keep His commandments and law as He gave them to the children of Israel.

So the Samaritans did not worship the Lord. His charge was that no other god was to be served or reverenced. The God who brought Israel out of Egypt by His great power should be the only One they worshipped and to whom sacrifice should have been. made. They should have kept their statutes, ordinances, law, and commandments perpetually, as He had Moses to record it and deliver it to their priests. Had they done this they would have been delivered from their enemies and would have remained in their land. Neither could these Samaritans expect the blessing of the Lord unless they were faithful to them. But their system of multiple worship of graven images continued through the succeeding generations. They were never His people.

Lessons for this section: 1) Judgment eventually comes to all who reject the Lord; 2) some people insist on their own way knowing that the Lord will bring them into judgment for it; 3) when His people leave His way God will no longer go with them; 4) the average person seeks to please the Lord, if he does so at all, out of fear rather than reverent love; 5) there is a vast difference between fear of God and worship of God, for “perfect love casts out fear” (1Jn 4:18).

Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary

CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES.

2Ki. 17:24. King of Assyria brought men from Babylon, &c.Had the land been depopulated there would have seemed promise of the exiles return; but under the royal direction Assyrian subjects came in and possessed the sacred soil, making it the home of foreigners. This king, called here is regarded by many expositors as Esarhaddon; but a doubt naturally springs from the fact that Esarhaddon did not come to the throne for some twenty-six years after Shalmanezer, who carried Israel into captivity. From Ezr. 4:2 we gain information that Esarhaddon brought these colonists into Samaria.

2Ki. 17:27. Carry thither one of the priests The country was too thinly populated to subdue the growth of those beasts of prey by which the land had been infested prior to its occupancy by Israel (Jdg. 14:5; 1Sa. 17:34, &c.); now they again multiplied and ravaged the country. Interpreting this as a judgment from God for the neglect of His worship, an exiled priest was sent back to the people to teach them Jehovahs will. And from this event arose that mingled religion which became distinctive of the Samaritans; also the Samaritan version of the Pentateuch, which acquired such historic importance.

2Ki. 17:30. The men of Babylon made Succoth-benothBooths of the daughters, i.e., tents of voluptuousness, where lust was sanctioned as a religious observance. NergalIdentified in the British Museum inscriptions as Mars, the god of war. Ashimaa goat idol. Nibhaza dog. Tartakan ass, or planet of ill omen. AdrammelechEither Moloch the Assyrian sun-god; or, as others think, a mule or a peacock. AnammelechAn idol in form of a hare. Thus the Samaritans became a people of varied religious forms and vagaries, the true worship and knowledge of God being perverted by the rival heathenish fallacies and rites which the immigrants of Babylon had brought into the land. So even though Jehovah was in some way feared (2Ki. 17:32), idolatry was fostered, and they served their graven images through generations following (2Ki. 17:41).W. H. J.

HOMILETICS OF 2Ki. 17:24-41

RELIGIOUS COMPROMISE

I. That religious compromise is the offspring of human fear (2Ki. 17:24-28). The incursion and ravages of the lions and wild beasts that multiplied so rapidly in the Jordan Valley and the forests of Samaria filled the now scattered inhabitants with dread. Regarding their sufferings as an indication of the anger of some local deity, they were anxious to be instructed in the manner of the god of the land. Thus it came to pass that Jehovah was worshipped as one of many other deities. Fearfear of consequences, fear of offending, fear of sufferingleads to the most calamitous compromises. In morals, says a certain writer, what begins in fear usually ends in wickedness; in religion, what begins in fear usually ends in fanaticism. Fear, either as a principle or a motive, is the beginning of all evil.

II. That religious compromise is ever productive of error and confusion (2Ki. 17:29-34). What a curious and pitiable jumble of creeds and deities we have here! It is an illustration of what must happen when man is left to himself. The key-note of the paragraph is 2Ki. 17:33They feared the Lord and served their own gods. They sought to accomplish the impossibleto blend what can never be united, as there are certain metals that can never weld together, and certain fluids that can never coalesce. One part of the day the worshipper enters the temple of Jehovah, and at another part the temple of Succoth-Benoth. So confused and mixed a cultus could not but produce serious misconceptions of religion in the minds of both old and young. The haphazard mixture of glaring colours in the pattern offends the eye and vitiates the taste.

III. That religions compromise creates a class of inferior and incompetent teachers. They made unto themselves of the lowest of them priests (2Ki. 17:32). There is in the sinful human heart that which responds too readily to what is broad and vague in religious thought. Eccentricity of religious opinion has many imitators. It is an easy matter to procure teachersand sometimes men gifted with no mean intellectual abilitywho are willing to teach what is agreeable to believe and pleasant to practise. A false system of religion never lacks advocates, such as they are.

The sweet words

Of Christian promise, words that even yet
Might stem destruction, were they wisely preached,
Are muttered oer by men, whose tones proclaim
How flat and wearisome they feel their trade:
Bank scoffers some, but most too indolent
To redeem their falsehoods, or to know their truth.

Coleridge.

IV. That the claims of true religion admit of no compromise (2Ki. 17:35-41). In these verses the writer rehearses the terms of the covenant between Jehovah and His people, and shows that nothing short of full submission and obedience could be acceptable to God. Religion is a necessity of the soul. The ivy cannot grow alone; it must twine around some support or other; if not the goodly oak, then the ragged thorn; round any dead stick whatever, rather than have no stay or support at all. It is even so with the heart and affections of man; if they do not twine around God, they must twine around some meaner thing. True religion demands the absolute surrender of the whole man to God. When he begins to hesitate, to palter, to compromise, he begins to drift away from God. The Divine claims become an irksome bondage. He seeks to snap one fetter of obligation after another; but when he has snapped the last fetter, as he thinksa belief in a personal Godhe has still himself left. Which is preferablethe golden fetters of a righteous and impartial Ruler, or the tyranny of a Frankenstein monster, generated from the dreary swamps of a perverted self? It is dangerous to trifle with the absolute claims of true religion.

LESSONS:

1. Compromise may be useful in settling external difficulties, but is inadmissible when it touches vital principles.

2. The man who compromises religious principle, loses caste with those to whom he yields, and loses strength in himself.

3. The claims of Jehovah should be reverently recognised and faithfully observed.

GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES

2Ki. 17:24-28. The religion of fear.

1. To be carefully distinguished from a spirit of reverential awe.

2. Is based on a natural dread of suffering and calamity (2Ki. 17:25).

3. Will pay court to any deity who promises protection and safety (2Ki. 17:26).

4. Readily listens to any teacher who professes to know anything about the deity who is dreaded (2Ki. 17:27-28).

2Ki. 17:25. Not the veriest Pagan can be excused for his ignorance of God. Even the most depraved nature might teach us to tremble at a Deity. The brute creatures are sent to revenge the quarrel of their Maker. Still hath God left himself champions in Israel. Lions tear the Assyrians in pieces, and put them in mind that, had it not been for wickedness, the land needed not to have changed masters. The great Lord of the world cannot want means to plague offenders. There is no security but in being at peace with God.Bp. Hall.

2Ki. 17:26. These blind heathens that think every land hath a several god, yet hold that god worthy of worship; yet hold that worship must be grounded upon knowledge, the want of that knowledge punishable, the punishment of that want just and divine. How much worse than Assyrians are they who are ready to ascribe all calamities to nature, to chance!who, acknowledging but one God, are yet careless to know and serve Him!Ibid.

2Ki. 17:29-33. Polytheism.

1. Bewilders the worshipper by the multiplicity of gods (2Ki. 17:29-31).

2. Is not scrupulous as to the character of its priests (2Ki. 17:32).

3. Makes no distinction between the only true God and false deities (2Ki. 17:33).

4. Can never meet the deepest needs of mans nature.

A country cannot fall lower than it does when each man makes unto himself his own god. We are indeed beyond the danger of making to ourselves idols of wood and stone, silver and gold; but we are none the less disposed to form idols for ourselves out of our own imaginatons, and not to fear and worship the one true God as He has revealed Himself to us. That is the cultivated heathenism of the present day. Some make to themselves a god who dwells above the stars, and does not care much for the omissions or commissions of men upon earth. Others, one who can do anything but chastise and punish, or one in whose sight men forgive themselves their own sins; who does not recompense each according to his works; but forgives all without discrimination, and who opens heaven to all alike, no matter how they have lived upon earth.Lange.

What a prodigious mixture was here of religionstrue with false, Jewish with Pagan, divine with devilish! Every division of these transplanted Assyrians had their several deities, high places, sacrifices. No beggars coat is more pieced than the religion of these inhabitants of Israel. I know not how their bodies sped for the lions; I am sure their souls fared the worse for this medley. Above all things God hates a mongrel devotion. If we be not all Israel, it were better to be all Ashur. It cannot so much displease God to be unknown or neglected, as to be consorted with idols.Bp. Hall.

2Ki. 17:34-41. The sin of disobedience.

1. All the more grievous when it is the violation of solemn covenant.
2. When committed against a Being who has wrought out great deliverances and bestowed signal blessing.
3. When it is a breach of the plainest and oft-repeated commandments.
4. When it is perpetuated generation after generation.
5. Is an occasion of sorrowful regret to every lover of the Divine law.

2Ki. 17:34. Rightly they fear him not, because neither truly nor totally. Their religion was galimfrey, a mixture of true and false, which is as good as none; for God will not part stakes with the devil at any hand. Such a religion is a mere irreligion, because

1. Contrary to Gods law which rejects heathen rites (2Ki. 17:34; 2Ki. 17:36-38; 2Ki. 17:40).

2. Contrary to Gods covenant, which heathens have nothing to do with (2Ki. 17:33; 2Ki. 17:38).Trapp.

Decay in religious matters, lack of unity of conviction in the highest and noblest affairs, prevents a nation from ever becoming great and strong. It is a sign of the most radical corruption Similarity of faith and community of worship form a strong uniting force, and are the conditions of true national unity. The existence of different creeds and professions by the side of one another is a source of national weakness. It is an error to try to produce this unity by force: it is a blessing only when it proceeds from a free conviction.Lange.

2Ki. 17:41. Mongrel religion. This base union of fearing God and serving other gods is by no means obsolete. From generation to generation there have been mongrel religionists who have tried to please both God and the devil, and have been on both sides, or on either side, as their interest led them. Some of these wretched blunderers are always hovering around every congregation.

I. The nature of this mongrel religion.

1. These people were not infidels. Far from it. They feared the Lord. They did not deny the existence, or the power, or the rights of the great God of Israel, whose name is Jehovah. They had faith, though only enough to produce fear. It was better to dread God than to despise Him; better slavishly to fear than stupidly to forget.

2. They were willing to be taught. The man sent to teach them was a Bethelite, one who worshipped God under the symbol of an ox, which the Scripture calls a calf. He was a very slight improvement upon a heathen; but we must be glad even of small mercies.

3. They were willing to learn, yet they stuck to their old gods. Thus this mingle-mangle religion left the people practically where they were: whatever their fear might be, their customs and practices remained the same. Have you never met with persons of the same mongrel kind? They take delight in divine services, and yet are much at home with the God of this world. Some worship a deity as horrible as Moloch, whose name in the olden time was Bacchusthe god of the wine cup and the beer barrel. There are others who adore the goddess Venus, the queen of lust and uncleanness. Too often the god is Mammon, who is as degraded a deity as any of them.

II. The manner of the growth of this mongrel religion.

1. These people came to live where the people of God had lived. If the Sepharvites had stopped at Sepharvaim they would never have thought of fearing Jehovah; if the men of Babylon had continued to live in Babylon they would have been perfectly satisfied with Bel, or Succoth-Benoth. But when they were brought into Canaan they came under a different order of things. God would not allow them to go the whole length of idolatry in His land. It sometimes happens to utter worldlings that they are dropped into the midst of Christian people. A kind of fashion is set by the professors among whom they dwell, and they fall into it.

2. The Lord sent lions among them. Affliction is a wild beast by which God teaches men who act like wild beasts. This is the growth of mongrelists. First, they are among godly people, and they must, therefore, go a little that way; and next, they are afflicted, and they must now go further still. They argue that if the ills they feel do not reform them, they may expect worse. If God begins with lions, what will come next?

3. Notice that the root of this religion is fear. Their hearts go after their idols, but to Jehovah they yield nothing but dread. If sin were not followed with inconvenient consequences they would live in it as their element, as fishes swim in the sea. They are only kept under by the hangmans whip or the jailers keys. They dread God, and this is but a gentler form of hating him.

4. They had a trimming teacher. The king of Assyria sent them a priest: he could not have sent them a prophet, but that was what they really wanted. He sent them a Bethelite, not a genuine servant of Jehovah, but one who worships, God by means of symbols; and this the Lord had expressly forbidden. I know of no surer way of a peoples perishing than by being led by one who does not speak out straight, and honestly denounce evil. If the preacher trims and twists to please all parties, can you expect his people to be honest? Those who are afraid to rebuke sin, or to probe the conscience, will have much to answer for.

III. The value of this mongrel religion.

1. It must evidently be feeble on both sides, because the man who serves Succoth-Benoth cannot do it thoroughly if all the while he fears Jehovah; and he who fears Jehovah cannot be sincere if he is worshipping Moloch. The one sucks out the life of the other. The man is lame on both feet, impotent in both directions. He is like the salt which has lost its savour, neither fit for the land, nor yet for the dunghill.

2. It looked like an improvement. It had a look in the right direction. They feared the Lord only in a certain sense, but inasmuch as they also served other gods, it came to this, when summed up, that they did not fear God at all. The man who is religious and also immoral, to put it short, is irreligious. The value of this mixture is less than nothing. It is sin with a little varnish upon it. It is enmity to God with a brilliant colouring of formality.

3. These Samaritans in after years became the bitterest foes of Gods people. Read the Book of Nehemiah, and you will see that the most bitter opponents of that godly man were these mongrels. Their fear of God was such that they wanted to join with the Jews in building the Temple, and when they found that the Jews would not have them, they became their fiercest foes. No people do so much hurt as those who are like Jack-o-both-sides. The mischief does not begin with the people of God, but with those who are with them, but not of them. As the clinging ivy will eat out the life of a tree around which it climbs, so will these impostors devour the church if they be left to their own devices.

4. How provoking this adulterated religion must be to God. It is even provoking to Gods ministers to be pestered with men whose hypocrisies weaken the force of his testimony. How provoking must it be to God Himself! True religion suffers for their falsehood.

IV. The continuance of this evil. As did their fathers, so do they, unto this day. I am almost obliged to believe in the final perseverance of hypocrites; for, really, when a man once screws himself up to play the double, and both to fear God and serve other gods, he is very apt to stick there. On the anvil of a false profession, Satan hammers out the most hardened of hard hearts.

V. The cure of this dreadful evil of mongrelism. He who in any way tries to serve God and His enemies, is a traitor to God. Suppose God were to treat us after the same double fashion; suppose he smiled to-day and cursed to-morrow. You want one course of conduct from Godmercy, tenderness, gentleness, forgiveness; but if you play fast and loose with Him, what is this but mocking Him? O thou great Father of our spirits, if we poor prodigals return to thee, shall we come driving all the swine in front of us, and bringing all the harlots and citizens of the far country at our heels, and introduce ourselves to thee by saying, Father, we have sinned, and have come home to be forgiven, and to go on sinning? It were infernal; I can say no less. Lastly, what shall I say of the Holy Spirit? If He does not dwell in our hearts we are lost; there is no hope for us unless He rules within us. None can hang between spiritual death and spiritual life, so as to be partly in one and partly in the other. Be one thing or the other.C. H. Spurgeon.

In time the idolatrous dross got purged out, and eventually the Samaritan system of belief and practice became as pure as that of the Jews, though less exact in some of its observances. In some respects it may have been purer, as the Samaritans would have nothing to do with the mass of oral traditions with which, before the birth of Christ, the Jewish system became disfigured and overladen.Kitto.

Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell

B. THE REPOPULATION OF SAMARIA 17:2441

TRANSLATION

(24) And the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Cuthah, Ava, Hamath and from Sepharvaim, and made them dwell in the cities of Samaria in place of the children of Israel; and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in her cities. (25) And it came to pass at the beginning of their dwelling there, they did not fear the LORD. And the LORD sent against them lions which slew some of them. (26) And they said to the king of Assyria, saying, The nations which you carried away and caused to dwell in the cities of Samaria do not know the manner of the God of the land, and He has sent among them lions; and behold they are killing them because they do not know the manner of the God of the land. (27) And the king of Assyria commanded, saying, Cause one of the priests which you carried away from there to go there, and let them go and dwell there that he may teach them the manner of the God of the land. (28) And one of the priests who had been carried away from Samaria came, and dwelled in Bethel, and taught them how they might fear the LORD. (29) But each nationality made its own gods; and they put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made, each nationality in the cities where they were dwelling. (30) And the men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, and the men of Cuth made Nergal, and the men of Hamath made Ashima. (31) And the Avites made Nibhaz and Tartak; and the Sepharvites continued to bum their children in fire to Adremmelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim. (32) So they feared the LORD, while they made for themselves from the lowest of them priests of the high places who made offerings for them in the houses of the high places. (33) They feared the LORD, while they served their own gods according to the manner of the nations from which they were carried away. (34) Unto this day they are doing according to the former manner; they do not fear the LORD, neither do they do after their statutes and their judgments, or the instruction and commandments which the LORD commanded the children of Jacob whom He named Israel. (35) And the LORD made a covenant with them and commanded them, saying, Do not fear other gods, and do not bow down to them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice to them, (36) But the LORD who brought you up from the land of Egypt with great strength and outstretched arm, Him you shall fear, and to Him bow down, and to Him make sacrifice. (37) And the statutes and the judgments and the instruction and the commandment which He wrote for you, you shall observe to do forever; and you shall not fear other gods. (38) And the covenant which I made with you, do not forget, and do not fear other gods. (39) But fear the LORD your God, and He will deliver you from the hand of all your enemies. (40) Yet they did not hearken, but did according to their former manner. (41) So these nations feared the LORD, and served their graven images; also their sons and the sons of their sons; as their fathers did, so do they unto this day.

COMMENTS

In keeping with imperial policy, the Assyrian king replaced those Israelites taken into captivity with subjects from other parts of his empire. It would seem that this resettlement started not long after the fall of Samaria in 722 B.C.[597] Five areas are named as having furnished the foreign settlers of Samaria. Babylon and its near neighbor Cuthah were conquered by Sargon in 709 B.C. Hamath on the Orontes river fell to Sargon in 720 B.C. and its inhabitants were carried off. The location of Ava and Sepharvaim is disputed, some scholars feeling they were Mesopotamian towns, and others, that they were located in Syria.[598] The Assyrian policy of national transplantation which had been introduced by Tiglath-pileser was practiced on an even larger scale by Sargon. By separating people from their native lands and from their leadership, the Assyrians hoped to be able to prevent rebellions from subject peoples (2Ki. 17:24).

[597] In his annals Sargon mentions deporting people from Mesopotamia to the Hatti land (Syria-Palestine) in his first year of reign (721 B.C.). A similar repopulation of Samaria took place in his seventh year (715 B.C.). In the days of Esarhaddon (681669 B.C.) the resettlement of Samaria was still taking place (Ezr. 4:2).

[598] In 2Ki. 18:34 Ivvah is probably the same as Ava here. It is there mentioned with various Syrian locations. That Sepharvaim is a Syrian town is suggested by 2Ki. 18:34; 2Ki. 19:13.

The foreign colonists were ignorant of Yahweh and therefore neglected to pay Him the proper respect. To teach these idolaters a much-needed lesson, the Lord sent against them lions. These beasts are no longer found in Palestine, but apparently in antiquity they were quite numerous in this region. The rural areas of the Northern Kingdom had become so depopulated by war and deportation that conditions were favorable for the rapid increase of the lion population. Several of the colonists lost their lives (2Ki. 17:25) and the situation became a matter of grave concern. Word came to the Assyrian king along with the suggestion that the colonists needed to learn the proper ritual to perform in order to please the God of Israel and thus bring about the end of the lion plague (2Ki. 17:26). The king then ordered that one of the priests of Yahweh be sent back to instruct the colonists in the ways of the Lord. Since the priests were such prominent personages in ancient society, they had all been carried away to other parts of the Assyrian empire. While there was a remnant of Israel left in the land (2Ch. 34:9), they would not have been familiar with the details of the religious ritual practiced in the temples. This priest, along with his entourage (note the plural them in 2Ki. 17:27), returned to dwell in Bethel. He taught the new settlers to fear the Lord (2Ki. 17:28) by which is most certainly meant the perverted parody of the true worship practiced in Jerusalem. No positive evidence exists, however, that this priest set up a new calf image to replace the one which had been carried off to Assyria (Hos. 10:5).

Those who had settled in the region of Samaria were polytheists and, in spite of the teaching of the priest of Yahweh, they continued to worship their native deities. They set up their idols in the high places which had been constructed by the Samaritans (i.e., the inhabitants of the Northern Kingdom) throughout their cities (2Ki. 17:29). The Babylonians worshiped Succoth-benoth which is generally regarded as a corruption of the name of the goddess who was the wife of Marduk, viz., Sarpanitu.[599] The men of Cuth (Cuthah of 2Ki. 17:24) continued to honor Nergal the god of war which was the titular deity of their native city. The colonists from Hamath worshiped Ashima, a deliberate misvocalization of Asherah, the name of the Canaanite mother goddess (2Ki. 17:30).

[599] This goddess was popularly titled Zir-banitu (seed-creating).

The names of the gods of the Avites are unfamiliar, but this is to be expected in view of the fact that nothing is known of the religion of that particular city. Nibhaz and Tartak may have been purely local gods, or they may have been local names for gods worshiped elsewhere under other appellations. The Sepharvites worshiped Adram-melech (the glorious king), which may have been a special title of Shamash the sun god. Anammelech (the arranging king) may be an intentional Hebrew corruption of the name of the goddess Anunit who was the consort of Shamash.[600] In honor of these particular gods, the Sepharvites committed the most abominable rite of antiquity, the sacrifice of their children (2Ki. 17:31).

[600] Gray (OTL, p. 655) thinks Anammelek means Anu (the Mesopotamian sky-god) is king.

It is in the very nature of polytheism to be syncretistic. Thus it is not strange to find that the foreign colonists in the territory of Samaria feared the Lord and served their own gods. To the author of Kings this mixed religion was so inexplicable and repugnant that he dwells upon it. While they feared, i.e., worshiped, the Lord, the Samaritans followed the apostate practice of recruiting priests from all ranks of society, even the lowest (cf. 1Ki. 12:31). These priests were willing to officiate in the illegitimate high places which were maintained contrary to the Law of Moses (2Ki. 17:32). The Samaritans continued to mix with this apostate Yahwism the worship to which they were accustomed prior to being transplanted by the Assyrian authorities to Samaria (2Ki. 17:33). At the time Kings was written, this syncretistic religion was still being practiced in the North.

While in an external sense the Samaritans feared the Lord (2Ki. 17:32-33; 2Ki. 17:41), in reality they did not, for genuine fear of the Lord demand the elimination of all who would rival His deity. Had these people really wanted to serve Yahweh they would have attended to their statutes and ordinances, i.e., the divine commandments which are binding upon all who would pretend to worship the Lord (2Ki. 17:34). With the children of Jacob (Israel), God had made a covenant in which He had stipulated that they should not worship any other god (2Ki. 17:35). All religious devotion belonged exclusively to Yahweh who had brought these people out of the land of their bondage (2Ki. 17:36). To all of His commandments they must forever give heed and never must they fear, i.e., serve, other gods (2Ki. 17:37). Never were they to forget that Sinai covenant (Exo. 19:5-8) which had been so solemnly ratified by the sprinkling of blood and by a covenant feast (Exo. 24:3-11). For the sake of emphasis again, the author reiterates that Gods people were not to fear other gods (2Ki. 17:38). Gods promise of deliverance and protection for His people was conditioned upon their faithfulness to Him (2Ki. 17:39). The colonists in Samaria refused to hearken to the warnings of the Law, but continued to maintain the syncretism described in 2Ki. 17:28-33.

The final verse of chapter 17 sums up the spiritual condition of the foreign colonists who were brought by the Assyrians to Samaria. They feared the Lord (externally) and at the same time continued to serve their graven images. In Mesopotamia the images of the gods generally assumed human form. The syncretistic worship of the Samaritans continued right down to the time of the author (2Ki. 17:41). But by the time of Christ, the Samaritans had become devoted followers of Yahweh and followers of the Law of Moses in most respects. To this day a small colony of these Samaritans still can be found in Nabulus Israel.

Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series

(24-33) RE-PEOPLING OF THE LAND WITH ALIENS; THEIR WORSHIP DESCRIBED.

(24) The king of Assyria.Sargon (Sargna), who actually records that in his first year (721 B.C. ) he settled a body of conquered Babylonians in the land of Hatti or Syria. In another passage he speaks of locating certain Arab tribes, including those of Thamd and Ephah, in the land of Beth-Omri; and in a third passage of his annals he says that he removed the rest of these Arab tribes, and caused them to dwell in the city of Samerina (Samaria). This notice be. longs to Sargons seventh year (715 B.C. ). Kuthah and Sepharvaim were also towns in Babylonia. The former is called Kutie in the cuneiform inscriptions. It had a temple of Nergal and Laz, the ruins of which have been discovered at Tell-Ibrhm, north-east of Babylon. Sepharvaim, in the cuneiform Sipar and Sippar, means the two Sipars; in allusion, probably, to the fact that the town was divided between the two deities Samas (the sun), and Anunitum, and bore the names of Sippar sa Samas (Sippara of the Sun), and Sippar sa Anunitum (Sippara of Anunit). Rassam discovered ruins of parra, the great sun-temple, at Abu Habba, south-west of Bagdad, on the east bank of the Euphrates.

Ava (Heb., (Avv) may be the same as Ivah (Heb. Iwwah) (2Ki. 18:34; 2Ki. 19:13).

Hamath.Sargon has recorded his reduction, in 720 B.C. , of Itu-bi-di (or Yau-bi-di) king of Hamath, and also his settling of colonists in Hainathite territory. It is, therefore, quite likely that he had, as usual, deported the conquered Hamathites, and, in fact, settled some of them in Samaria, as this verse relates.

Placed them.Heb., made them dwell, the very phrase used by Sargon himself in describing these arrangements (usesib). At a later period Esarhaddon reinforced these colonists (Ezr. 4:2).

Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)

ORIGIN OF THE SAMARITANS, 2Ki 17:24-41.

24. The king of Assyria brought This king was Sargon, who tells us in his inscription that he “took and occupied the city of Samaria, and changed the former government of the country, and placed over it lieutenants of his own.” See the note on 2Ki 17:6. It appears from Ezr 4:2, that subsequently Esar-haddon also transported colonists to the cities of Samaria.

From Babylon Either from the city or province, for the whole of Babylonia belonged at this time to the Assyrian empire.

Cuthah Called, in 2Ki 17:30, Cuth. Its site has been the subject of dispute and uncertainty, but G. Rawlinson is confident that it was a city near Babylon whose ruins are now called Ibrahim. He says, ( Herodotus, vol. i, p. 515,) “The city was called Digona by Ptolemy, Digba by Pliny, Digubis in the Peutingerian map. The ruins of Cuthah, distant about twelve miles from Babylon, were first discovered by Sir H. Rawlinson in 1846, and have since been repeatedly visited by travellers.” In the Chaldee and the Talmud the Samaritans are called Cuthites, and hence some have thought that the main portion of these colonists came from Cuthah. Compare also Josephus, 2Ki 9:14 ; 2Ki 9:3. “With almost equal confidence,” adds Rawlinson, ( Historical Evidences, p. 341,) “may we pronounce on the position of Ava, of which Winer says, that it is most probably a Mesopotamian town, ‘of which no trace remains in ancient authors, or in modern Oriental topography.’ Ava, or Ivah, (2Ki 18:34,) is a city dedicated to the god Hea, (Neptune,) which was on the Euphrates, at the extreme northern limit of Babylonia. It is called by the Talmudical writers Ihi, or with an epithet, Ihi-dakira, by Herodotus Is, by the Egyptians Ist, by the Turks and Arabs of the present day Hit. The first corruption of the name may be traced in the Ahava of Ezra, (Ezr 8:15; Ezr 8:21,) where the Jews encamped on their way from Babylon to Jerusalem.”

Hamath On the Orontes. See on Jos 13:5; 1Ki 8:65. This city had probably been subjected to Assyria during the reign of Tiglath-pileser.

Sepharvaim Doubtless identical with the Sippara of Ptolemy, which was situated on the Euphrates above Babylon, near the modern Mosaib. The dual form of the name is explained from the fact, noted in the inscriptions, that the city was built on each side of the river. Berosus calls it a city of the sun, and, according to Rawlinson, the inscriptions give it the same name. Hence a reason why “the Sepharvites burnt their children in fire.” 2Ki 17:31.

They possessed Samaria And hence their descendants are called, even to this day, Samaritans.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

The Aftermath Of The Final Israelite Exile ( 2Ki 17:24-41 ).

We have become used to talking about The Exile, meaning the exile resulting from the last days of Jerusalem, but in fact Israel suffered many exiles. Quite apart from the number taken into exile over the centuries as a result of invasions by foreign nations which sometimes consisted of whole communities (consider e.g. the servant girl of Naaman), there was a major exile when Assyria invaded northern Israel and annexed a large section of it to form part of an Assyrian province (2Ki 15:20). Large numbers of Israelites were taken away captive and colonies of Israelites were then formed in different parts of the Assyrian Empire. For them that was ‘the exile’. It was then followed by this final Israelite exile when Samaria was taken and the cream of the country sheltering in it were exiled to Assyria and Media. And to this we must add those who went into voluntary exile, fleeing as refugees to places like Egypt, and even overseas. Indeed Isaiah tells us that by his day there were exiles in Assyria, Egypt, Pathros, Cush, Elam,Babylon, Hamath, and the islands of the sea (Isa 11:11; see also Isa 43:6; Isa 49:22-23; Isa 51:14), and this long before what we know of as ‘the Babylonian exile’.

But the question naturally arose as to ‘what happened to the land of Israel after that?’ And that is the question that the prophetic author now seeks to answer. It must be pointed out that it is a mistake to see these people who are being described as the forbears of the ‘Samaritans’ of New Testament times. Those being described were a polytheistic people, and they remained so. The New Testament ‘Samaritans’ on the other hand were a people who had clung to their own version of the Book of the Law (the Pentateuch), were firmly monotheistic, and were localised in a specific area. They did not arise from the miscellany described below (except possibly as a small group of believing Israelites who settled together apart from the others around Shechem, determined to maintain a pure form of Yahwism, and forming their own community. But that is simply hypothesis. There is no early evidence for it).

We must first recognise that the land was not totally denuded of Israelites. Many would have fled to the mountains when the final Assyrian invasion began, and would have remained in hiding until they had gone, (they had done it often before), and the Assyrian possibly was never to remove everyone, but only the cream of the people, the rulers, the aristocrats the elders, the craftsmen, the scribes, and so on. The common people were left behind. And to these would now be added a new aristocracy transferred from other nations. And the consequence was a mixed people who were neither one thing or the other, but remained essentially polytheistic, even though it did become intermingled with a smattering of Yahwism. They were no better than those who had formed a part of the cult of Jeroboam. Indeed it is stressed that (unlike the later ‘Samaritans’) they did not observe the Law of YHWH.

They were still there with their mixed ideas in the days of the original source. Those who remained of them may well have been forcibly converted to Judaism in the days the Hasmoneans (the late inter-testamental period), when such forced conversions regularly took place (consider the Edomites and the Galileans), thus becoming ‘Jews’. But if so we have no record of the fact. And by then it might well be that many exiled Israelites had returned to their homeland. Thus the ‘Jews’ of Jesus’ days were a hotch potch of different nationalities and far from being a pure people descended from Abraham, were a multinational people. (Indeed a hitch potch of nations was what Israel had always been, as Exo 12:38 makes clear. Consider also the servants of Abraham, e.g. Eliezer the Damascene and Hagar the Egyptian, who formed a good part of those who went to Egypt, and those who like Uriah the Hittite had become Israelites by proselytisation – Exo 12:48).

Analysis.

a And the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Avva, and from Hamath and Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel; and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in its cities (2Ki 17:24).

b And so it was, at the beginning of their dwelling there, that they did not fear YHWH, therefore YHWH sent lions among them, which killed some of them (2Ki 17:25).

c For which reason they spoke to the king of Assyria, saying, “The nations which you have carried away, and placed in the cities of Samaria, do not know the law of the god of the land, therefore he has sent lions among them, and, behold, they kill them, because they do not know the law of the god of the land” (2Ki 17:26).

d Then the king of Assyria commanded, saying, “Carry there one of the priests whom you brought from there, and let them go and dwell there, and let him teach them the law of the god of the land (2Ki 17:27).

e So one of the priests whom they had carried away from Samaria came and dwelt in Beth-el, and taught them how they should fear YHWH (2Ki 17:28).

f However every nation made gods of their own, and put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made, every nation in their cities wherein they dwelt (2Ki 17:29).

g And the men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, and the men of Cuth made Nergal, and the men of Hamath made Ashima, and the Avvites made Nibhaz and Tartak, and the Sepharvites burnt their children in the fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim (2Ki 17:30-31).

f So they feared YHWH, and made for themselves from among themselves priests of the high places, who sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places. They feared YHWH, and served their own gods, after the manner of the nations from among whom they had been carried away (2Ki 17:32-33).

e To this day they do after the former manner. They do not fear YHWH, neither do they after their statutes, or after their ordinances, or after the law or after the commandment which YHWH commanded the children of Jacob, whom he named Israel (2Ki 17:34).

d With whom YHWH had made a covenant, and charged them, saying, “You shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice to them, but YHWH, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt with great power and with an outstretched arm, him shall you fear, and to him shall you bow yourselves, and to him shall you sacrifice” (2Ki 17:35-36).

c “And the statutes and the ordinances, and the law and the commandment, which he wrote for you, you shall observe to do for ever more, and you shall not fear other gods, and the covenant that I have made with you, you shall not forget, nor shall you fear other gods, but YHWH your God you shall fear, and he will deliver you out of the hand of all your enemies” (2Ki 17:37-39).

b However, they did not listen, but they did after their former manner (2Ki 17:40).

a So these nations feared YHWH, and served their graven images, their children likewise, and their children’s children, as did their fathers, so do they to this day (2Ki 17:41).

Note that in ‘a’ the people were brought to Israel from many different nations, and in the parallel these nations feared YHWH and served their graven images. In ‘b’ at the beginning they did not fear YHWH, and in the parallel Israel had similarly not listened to YHWH. In ‘c’ their troubles were put down to the fact that they did not know the law of God, and in the parallel Israel were called on to obey the law of God. In ‘d’ the nations were to be taught the law of God, and in the parallel that law is summarised as it relates to their situation. In ‘e’ the priest taught them that they should fear YHWH, and in the parallel in spite of it they did not fear YHWH. In ‘f’ the peoples set up their own gods, and in the parallel they feared YHWH and worshipped their own gods. centrally in ‘g’ we learn the details of the gods who were set up as gods of the land.

2Ki 17:24

‘And the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Avva, and from Hamath and Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel, and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in its cities.’

Just as the cream of the Israelites had been transported to other lands, so the cream of the people of other lands were transported to Israel. (In the words of Sargon, ‘I settled people of the many lands I had conquered into Hatti-land’). This would not, however, take place immediately but as and when these peoples rebelled against Assyria and were thus treated in this way. The aim was to divide and rule. Some came from some distance, from Babylon and Cuthah. Others came from nearer at hand, from Avva, Hamath and Sepharvaim. Meanwhile the Israelites who were left were scraping a living from parts of the deserted land, while much of the rest of the land lay waste and was an open invitation to the many wild beasts who roamed the area to take possession of it.

A rebellion in Southern Mesopotamia in Sargon’s first year (c 721 BC) resulted in peoples being deported from there to ‘Hatti land’ (which was a general description that could include Syria and Palestine) while in his second year one took place at Hamath under Ilubi’di, probably with the same result. In his seventh year (c 714 BC) Sargon records the suppression of an Arabian revolt and the settlement of captives in Samaria. Thus the new population of Samaria began to settle in and develop.

Along with a good number from Babylonia itself, people were introduced from Cuthah, a centre for the cult of Nergal, which is generally located at Tell Ibrahim north east of Babylon (in around 709 BC). They were prominent enough for their name (Kuthim) later to be used as a term of abuse for the population of Samaria. Avva is mentioned as ‘Iwwa in 2Ki 18:34 along with Sepharvaim, possibly as loosely connected with Hamath, and various suggestions have been made as to its identity (e.g. Ammia near Byblos, ‘Imm east of Antioch, ‘Ama in Elam, or Tell Kefr ‘Aya on the upper Orontes). Hamath, which was north of Aram (Syria), originally submitted to Assyria, but led a coalition against Sargon which resulted in its capital city being burned, its king Ilubi’di being killed, and presumably the cream of its population transported. Sepharvaim is usually connected with Sibraim, which was between Damascus and Hamath (Eze 47:16). It was called Sabara’in in the Babylonian Chronicle. Others see it as the Babylonian Sippar.

2Ki 17:25

‘And so it was, at the beginning of their dwelling there, that they did not fear YHWH, therefore YHWH sent lions among them, which killed some of them.’

The length of time that it took for the land to be settled and restored to cultivation resulted in a good number of lions and other wild beasts establishing themselves in the area. This was always a danger when land was left unsettled (compare Lev 26:22; and see 1Sa 17:34; 1Sa 17:46). Thus the new settlers found themselves being troubled by lions, which were a feature of Palestine for many centuries. This was put down by them to the fact that they were not giving due obeisance to the God of the land. ‘YHWH sent lions among them’ is describing what happened as seen from the author’s viewpoint. To him everything that happened was caused by YHWH. He would have agreed with Amo 3:6 which says, ‘shall there be evil in a city, and YHWH has not done it?’.

2Ki 17:26

‘For which reason they spoke to the king of Assyria, saying, “The nations which you have carried away, and placed in the cities of Samaria, do not know the law of the god of the land, therefore he has sent lions among them, and, behold, they kill them, because they do not know the law of the god of the land.” ’

The problem was severe enough for the new inhabitants to appeal to Sargon pointing out that because ‘they did not know the law of the land’ the god of the land had sent lions among them to kill them. It should be noted that while on the one hand the Assyrian kings could be cruel in their tyranny, they were also on the other hand concerned for their subjects once they had colonised them. They wanted them to be semi-independent while looking to their ‘father’ the king of Assyria. After all satisfied people contributed to the wealth of Assyria. Thus he took notice of their complaint.

2Ki 17:27

‘Then the king of Assyria commanded, saying, “Carry there one of the priests whom you brought from there, and let them go and dwell there, and let him teach them the law of the god of the land.’

Their problem was taken seriously, for Sargon gave command that one of the priests who had been brought from Samaria should be sent back in order to teach them the law of the god of the land. (He was not to know that such a priest would be a priest frowned on by YHWH as not being of the house of Aaron). Note the change from ‘him’ to ‘them’. He would not be expected to go alone, but to take with him some support.

2Ki 17:28

‘So one of the priests whom they had carried away from Samaria came and dwelt in Beth-el, and taught them how they should fear YHWH.’

Thus a leading priest was forced to return to Samaria (no doubt with assistants) and take up his abode in Bethel, in order to teach the people ‘the fear of YHWH’. He would be seen as the ‘high priest’ of YHWH. Bethel was thus once again a centre of a form of Yahwism. But this was one of Jeroboam’s false priests, and his idea of Yahwism would not have gone down well in Jerusalem. He would probably have no law book, and would rather be teaching them what he himself had learned within the cult of Jeroboam. It was not a very promising way for these peoples to discover the real truth about YHWH.

2Ki 17:29

‘However every nation made gods of their own, and put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made, every nation in their cities wherein they dwelt.’

Meanwhile each nation made gods of their own and set them up in the ‘high places’ which had been left behind by the transported ‘Samaritans’. Israel thus became the home of a multiplicity of gods.

This is the first mention of the term ‘Samaritans’ in the Bible, but we must not mix these up with the Samaritans of New Testament times who were ardent monotheists based around Shechem, who had their own copy of the Law which they sought to live by. It will be noted in fact that the Samaritans mentioned in this verse have actually been transported to other countries. The term was thus NOT referring to the new people in the land.

2Ki 17:30-31

‘And the men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, and the men of Cuth made Nergal, and the men of Hamath made Ashima, and the Avvites made Nibhaz and Tartak, and the Sepharvites burnt their children in the fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim.’

This multiplicity of gods are now described. ‘Succoth-benoth’ probably means ‘the booths of Banitu’, a Babylonian goddess also known as Ishtar/Astarte (parallel with Asherah). As the name implies (‘the booths of prostitutes/daughters’) it was probably not a very savoury religion. Yahwism was unusual in expecting an ethical response. ‘Nergal’ (‘lord of the great city’) had his cult centre in Cuthah and was noted for bringing havoc on the world through plagues, war, pestilence and floods. His consort in the under-world was Ereshkigal. Ashima, Nibhaz and Tartak would be local deities of their own people. Adram-melech (or Adar-melech – ‘the lordship of Melech’) and Ana-melech (possibly Anu-melech – ‘the king Anu’) had similar features to Melech of the Ammonites and encouraged child sacrifice. Thus the gods that Samaria had previously turned to (2Ki 17:16-17) were simply introduced in another form.

The problem with any names of deities like this Isaiah 1). that they have to be transposed from another language, and 2). that the Hebrew writers often ‘played’ with the names of gods in order to give them a derisive meaning, indicating their contempt of them. Thus Ashima may be a deliberate corruption of Asherah, the Canaanite mother goddess (compare Amo 8:14 where Ashemath Shomeron is ‘the sin of Samaria’), and Ninhaz may be a corrupt of Mizbeach indicating a deified altar. But all this is conjectural.

2Ki 17:32

‘So they feared YHWH, and made for themselves from among themselves priests of the high places, who sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places.’

So these people ‘feared YHWH’ (paid him lip service in order to get into favour with Him) and as Jeroboam had done (1Ki 12:31) chose their own high priests to serve in the high places dedicated to YHWH, and no doubt other gods as well. And these (illegitimate) high priests sacrificed on their behalf in those high places. (So far was it from the true ‘law of the God of the land’).

2Ki 17:33

‘They feared YHWH, and served their own gods, after the manner of the nations from among whom they had been carried away.’

Thus their religion was totally syncretistic, and to them YHWH was simply one of a number of gods, in His case connected with Samaria. Thus they both ‘feared YHWH’ as a local deity, and continued to serve their own gods as they had done amongst their own peoples. We can compare how in Isaiah YHWH speaks of the possibility of the fear of YHWH being simply ‘a human tradition learned by rote’ (Isa 29:13)

The Prophetic Author’s Summing Up Of The New Religion.

The prophetic author makes quite clear that there was little connection between their parody of Yahwism, and the genuine Yahwism as practised among the Jews. He emphasises that they continued in their own way and never came into any genuine connection with either YHWH or His covenant. Above all they failed to follow YHWH’s commandments and statutes which were at the centre of true Yahwism (which was not surprising as they probably knew little about them, only the garbled version brought to them by the priest). And especially they failed to recognise that YHWH was the only true God, and that they must worship Him only and not bow down to statues and images.

2Ki 17:34

‘To this day they do after the former manner. They do not fear YHWH, nor do they do after their statutes, or after their ordinances, or after the law or after the commandment which YHWH commanded the children of Jacob, whom he named Israel,’

And the author points out that is spite of their nearness to Judah they still behave in this way. They have learned nothing from Judah. They do not truly fear YHWH, nor do they follow after the statutes, ordinances, law and commandment commanded by YHWH to the children of Jacob whom He named Israel, for they do not even know what they are.

2Ki 17:35-36

‘With whom YHWH had made a covenant, and charged them, saying, “You shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice to them, but YHWH, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt with great power and with an outstretched arm, him shall you fear, and to him shall you bow yourselves, and to him shall you sacrifice,” ’

And this is especially so of the first two commandments. For in those commandments YHWH had made a covenant with His people saying, ‘You shall not fear other gods, or bow down to them, or serve them, or sacrifice to them.’ The only One Whom they must fear, and to Whom they must bow down or sacrifice is ‘YHWH Who brought them out of the land of Egypt with great power and with an outstretched arm.’ Thus these new inhabitants of Samaria are failing on all counts.

2Ki 17:37-39

“And the statutes and the ordinances, and the law and the commandment, which he wrote for you, you shall observe to do for ever more, and you shall not fear other gods, and the covenant that I have made with you, you shall not forget, nor shall you fear other gods, but YHWH your God you shall fear, and he will deliver you out of the hand of all your enemies.”

The prophetic author then applies the lesson to his readers. They too were to observe ‘for evermore’ the statutes, ordinances, law and commandment which He had made with them, and were not to fear other gods. Nor were they to forget the covenant that He had made with them. They were not to fear other gods, but were to fear YHWH alone. ‘YHWH your God you shall fear.’ And then they could be sure that He would deliver them out of the hands of their enemies. (The continual repetitions are typical of Hebrew style).

2Ki 17:40

‘However, they did not listen, but they did after their former manner.’

This could refer to Israel, but more probably refers to the newcomers simply because of the repetition of ‘their former manner’ (see 2Ki 17:33).

2Ki 17:41

‘So these nations feared YHWH, and served their graven images, their children likewise, and their children’s children, as did their fathers, so do they to this day.’

The author then sums up the position by pointing out what the actual position was. They ‘feared YHWH and served their graven images’ in complete contradiction to the commandment of YHWH. And their children and their children’s children followed suit, right up to the writer’s day. Thus they never really came to know YHWH, or came within His covenant.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

The Origin of the Samaritans

v. 24. And the king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sephar-vaim, colonists from all these cities, districts, and provinces to the north and east, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel, the great majority of whom had been taken away and never saw the land of their birth again; and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof.

v. 25. And so it was at the beginning of their dwelling there that they feared not the Lord, there was no worship of Jehovah in the land; therefore the Lord sent lions among them, which had had a chance to multiply during the time that the country lay waste, which slew some of them.

v. 26. Wherefore they spake to the king of Assyria, sending him a special message, saying, The nations which thou hast removed and placed in the cities of Samaria know not the manner of the God of the land, for they believed that each country had its own god; therefore He hath sent lions among them, and, behold, they slay them, because they know not the manner of the God of the land, had no idea of the religious customs and worship which He desired.

v. 27. Then the king of Assyria commanded, saying, Carry thither one of the priests whom ye brought from thence, one of those addicted to calf-worship, and let them go and dwell there, that is, the colonists, who were not to leave the country, and let him teach them the manner of the God of the land.

v. 28. Then one of the priests whom they had carried away from Samaria came and dwelt in Bethel, one of the former centers of calf-worship, and taught them how they should fear the Lord. It was, indeed, only a very meager and insufficient instruction, because the man himself possessed only an incomplete knowledge of Jehovah. Therefore a strange mixture of religions resulted.

v. 29. Howbeit, every nation made gods of their own, retaining their old idols, and put them in the houses of the high places which the Samaritans had made, in the old places of worship, every nation in their cities wherein they dwelt; since they lived in communities according to the countries from which they came, they retained their ancient worship beside that of Jehovah. The religion of Samaria therefore became a monstrosity, as the further description shows.

v. 30. And the men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, the goddess of victories and also of fertility, and the men of Cuth made Nergal, the god of battles, and the men of Hamath made Ashima, a very repulsive god under the picture of a goat,

v. 31. and the Avites made Nibhaz and Tartak, the former in the shape of a dog, the latter in that of a donkey, and the Sepharvites burned their children in fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim, idols like the Moloch of the southeastern nations.

v. 32. So they feared the Lord, and made unto themselves of the lowest of them, from the mass of the people, without regard to Levitical extraction, priests of the high places, which sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places.

v. 33. They feared the Lord, and served their own gods, after the manner of the nations whom they carried away from thence. It was a hybrid religion of the most abominable kind, which has left its impress on the people of that country to this day.

v. 34. Unto this day they do after their former manners; they fear not the Lord, for it is impossible for true reverence and devotion to exist under such conditions, neither do they after their statutes or after their ordinances or after the law and commandment which the Lord commanded the children of Jacob, whom He named Israel,

v. 35. with whom the Lord had made a covenant, and charged them, in the assembly at Mount Sinai and through Moses, His servant, saying, Ye shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them, nor sacrifice to them;

v. 36. but the Lord, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt with great power and a stretched-out arm, Him shall ye fear, and Him shall ye worship, and to Him shall ye do sacrifice, Deu 10:20.

v. 37. And the statutes, and the ordinances, and the Law, and the commandment which He wrote for you ye shall observe to do forevermore; and ye shall not fear other gods.

v. 38. And the covenant that I have made with you ye shall not forget, Deu 4:23; neither shall ye fear other gods.

v. 39. But the Lord, your God, ye shall fear; and He shall deliver you out of the hand of all your enemies.

v. 40. Howbeit, they did not hearken, but they did after their former manner, they continued the worship introduced by Jeroboam.

v. 41. So these nations, the inhabitants of Samaria, feared the Lord, they knew of Him and were afraid of Him as a mighty God, and served their graven images, to those they gave their faith and worship, both their children and their children’s children; as did their fathers, so do they unto this day. Although the Samaritans, after the Jewish exile, discontinued the actual gross service of idols, they remain in their blindness and darkness to this day, accepting only the five Books of Moses as the Word of God and rejecting Jesus as the Messiah. They are nearer the true religion than the heathen, but the knowledge which they possess is not the saving knowledge. There is only one way to heaven through the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior.

Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann

See, Reader! the awful desolation of Samaria! Israel would not love her one true and most gracious God, and a God in covenant with her; therefore she shall here set up a multitude of dunghill gods, as Moses described them, that newly came up, whom their fathers feared not, and had existence before them. Reader! is it possible to behold the human mind capable of such a degradation, and not be convinced of the universal ruin and fall of our nature? Deu 32:17 ; Hos 10:1-8

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

2Ki 17:24 And the king of Assyria brought [men] from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed [them] in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel: and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof.

Ver. 24. And the king of Assyria. ] First Shalmaneser, as here, and then his grandson Esarhaddon. Ezr 4:2 These colonies were afterwards called Samaritans. Mat 10:5 Luk 9:52 Joh 4:4

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

brought men. These were the substituted people forming the nucleus of the later Samaritans; but subsequently intermixed with Israelites returning with Ezra and Nehemiah (Neh 13:3, Neh 13:23-31). In N. T called “foreigners” (Luk 17:18). Compare Mat 10:5, Mat 10:6. Sargon refers to this in his inscriptions. Only one figure remains (7) of the number he gives.

Cuthah. Ten miles north-east of Babylon. In the first year of Sargon there was war between Cuthah and Babylon, and the people of Cuthah were transported to Syria and Palestine.

Ava = either the Ivah of 2Ki 18:34, or the Ahava of Ezr 8:15.

Hamath. The one in Syria.

Sepharvairn (Dual). The two Sippars in Babylonia. Sippar sa Samas (the sun-god) and Sippar sa Anuituv.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

am 3326, bc 678

the king: Ezr 4:2-10

Babylon: 2Ki 17:30, 2Ch 33:11

Ava: 2Ki 17:31, 2Ki 18:31, Isa 37:13, Ivah

Hamath: 2Ki 19:13, Isa 10:9, Isa 36:19

in the cities thereof: 2Ki 17:6, Mat 10:5

Reciprocal: Gen 10:18 – Hamathite 1Ki 16:24 – the name of the city 2Ki 17:26 – and placed 2Ki 18:34 – the gods 2Ki 19:17 – the kings Ezr 4:9 – the Dinaites Ezr 4:10 – And the rest Isa 10:13 – I have removed Isa 23:13 – the Assyrian Isa 37:18 – the kings Jer 39:5 – Hamath Jer 49:23 – Hamath Amo 6:2 – Hamath Oba 1:19 – the fields of Ephraim Mic 2:4 – he hath changed Luk 9:52 – the Samaritans Joh 4:9 – for

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

2Ki 17:24. The king of Assyria brought men from Babylon Which then was subject to the Assyrian monarch, but a few years after revolted from him, and set up another king, as appears from both sacred and profane histories. And from Cuthah, &c. Several places then in his dominion. It is probable that it was not Shalmaneser, but Esar-haddon, his son and successor, that did this, (Ezr 4:2,) because it was a work of some time; and as his father had projected, and perhaps even begun it, so he executed and finished it, whence it is ascribed to him rather than to his father. And they possessed Samaria, &c. That is, the whole country in which the ten tribes had dwelt.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

2Ki 17:24-41. The Origin of the Samaritans.This is a somewhat mixed account. 2Ki 17:24-28 describes the settlement of the land with captives from other parts of the Assyrian empire, and the sending of a priest to teach them the manner of the God of the country. Next, 2Ki 17:29-33 relates that the new settlers not only feared (i.e. worshipped) Yahweh, but also served their own gods. Finally (2Ki 17:34-41) there is a general statement regarding the sin of Israel. This has no connexion with what precedes, nor does it in any way describe the Samaritan religion. It is perhaps nothing more than a new description of the sins for which Israel and Judah were carried away captive.

2Ki 17:24. the king of Assyria: see above. In Ezr 4:2 the king who settled Northern Israel is called Esarhaddon (pp. 59f.), the son of Sennacherib (681668 B.C.). In Ezr 4:10 it is said to have been the great and noble Osnappar, probably Asshurbani-pal (p. 60), Esar-had-dons successor. The mention of Babylon as a city conquered by the Assyrians is a mark of accuracy. In later days it was, of course, the great oppressor of Judah (see on 2Ki 20:17).

2Ki 17:25. The rabbis called the Samaritans proselytes of lions. The lion has long disappeared from Palestine, but was evidently common enough in OT times. A depopulated district soon became dangerous owing to the rapid multiplication of wild beasts, and it was necessary to go armed (see Exo 23:28-30, Isa 7:24). The sending of the lions was thought to indicate the displeasure of Yahweh, the God of the country, at the rites in His honour not being duly performed.

2Ki 17:32. The high-place worship continued after the Exile, but we find no trace of it later in Samaria.

2Ki 17:41. At the time of the Return the Samaritans expressly claimed that they had the same religion as the Jews (Ezr 4:2). The first expression outside the OT of the Jews bitter hatred for the Samaritans is in Sir 50:26. Josephus and the rabbis call them Cutheans (see 2Ki 17:24). The antagonism between Jews and Samaritans in the NT is notorious (Joh 4:9).

Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible

17:24 And the king of Assyria brought [men] from Babylon, and from {n} Cuthah, and from Ava, and from Hamath, and from Sepharvaim, and placed [them] in the cities of Samaria instead of the children of Israel: and they possessed Samaria, and dwelt in the cities thereof.

(n) Of these people came the Samaritans, of which mention is so often made in the gospel, and with whom the Jews would have nothing to do, Joh 4:9.

Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes

The results of the captivity 17:24-41

The immediate result of the captivity (2Ki 17:24-33) was twofold. The Assyrians deported many Israelites to other places in the Assyrian Empire, and they imported other people from the empire into the newly formed Assyrian province that they called Samaria (2Ki 17:24). The king who did this was probably Sargon II (722-705 B.C.). Shalmaneser died either during or shortly after the siege of Samaria. These imported foreigners eventually intermarried with the Jews who remained in the land and probably were the ancestors of the Samaritans of Jesus’ day (cf. Joh 4:9). As polytheists the Assyrians did not hesitate to worship Yahweh as well as their other gods (cf. Exo 20:3). They had no priestly caste but appointed anyone as a priest (2Ki 17:32). The syncretistic worship of Yahweh and false gods prevailed (2Ki 17:32-33). The writer again emphasized the judgment of God that came on the Israelites who remained in the land for their apostasy.

The continuing result of the captivity (2Ki 17:34-41) was the same. In this section of verses the theme of Israel’s disobedience reaches a climax. In 2Ki 17:35-39 there are several loose quotations of passages from the Mosaic Law: Exo 6:6; Exo 9:15; Exo 14:15-30; Exo 20:4-5; Exo 20:23; Lev 19:32; Deu 4:23; Deu 4:34; Deu 5:6; Deu 5:15; Deu 5:32; Deu 6:12-13; and Deu 7:11; Deu 7:25.

This chapter concludes the second major section of Kings: the history of the Divided Kingdom (1 Kings 12 -2 Kings 17). The lessons of the history of this period that the writer emphasized could not be clearer.

"God’s people had become disloyal to their Suzerain who had brought them redemptively out of Egyptian servitude. They had expressed disloyalty by worshipping other gods (2Ki 17:15-17). And they did all this despite his persistent reminders to them through his spokesmen, the prophets, that what they were doing constituted high treason. The inevitable result was the judgment of God, a judgment which took the form of exile from the land of promise." [Note: Merrill, Kingdom of . . ., p. 399. See also Pauline Viviano, "2 Kings 17 : A Rhetorical and Form Critical Analysis," Catholic Biblical Quarterly 49 (October 1987):548-49.]

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)

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