Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 2 Kings 23:29
In his days Pharaoh Necho king of Egypt went up against the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates: and king Josiah went against him; and he slew him at Megiddo, when he had seen him.
29. Pharaoh-nechoh ] R.V. necoh. He is stated to have been the 5th or 6th king of the Sate 26th dynasty. His expedition against the king of Assyria was b.c. 610. He probably came from Egypt by sea and landed on the coast of Palestine. Otherwise Josiah would have chosen some place further south than Megiddo to meet him. From his conduct we may conclude that Josiah at this time was in alliance with, or perhaps tributary to, Assyria. The destination of the Egyptian expedition (according to the Chronicler) was Carchemish on the Euphrates, and he relates the very considerate message which the Egyptian king sent to Josiah, ‘What have I to do with thee, thou king of Judah? I come not against thee this day but against the house wherewith I have war. For God commanded me to make haste: forbear thee from meddling with God, who is with me, that He destroy thee not.’
and king Josiah went against him ] In Chronicles we read that Josiah ‘disguised himself, that he might fight with the king of Egypt, and hearkened not unto the words of Nechoh from the mouth of God.’ The claim to be divinely directed in the expedition is singular in the mouth of an Egyptian king. The language is not, however, of the same kind as that which Rab-shakeh used, when he asserted that the Lord (Jehovah) had sent him (2Ki 18:25). There may have been such a faith in a single Divine Being among the Egyptians that Nechoh could employ the word God (Elohim) in speaking thereof. Whatever the king’s belief, and in spite of the overthrow of Josiah, the Egyptian expedition against Assyria was unsuccessful in the end.
at Megiddo ] On this city, and its position and military importance, see notes on 2Ki 9:28. In 2 Chronicles it is said, ‘the archers shot at king Josiah, and the king said to his servants, Have me away, for I am sore wounded’.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Pharaoh-Nechoh – This king is well known to us both from profane historians, and from the Egyptian monuments. He succeeded his father Psammetichus (Psamatik) in the year 610 B.C., and was king of Egypt for 16 years. He was an enlightened and enterprising monarch. The great expedition here mentioned was an attempt to detach from the newly-formed Babylonian empire the important tract of country extending from Egypt to the Euphrates at Carchemish. Calculating probably on the friendship or neutrality of most of the native powers, the Egyptian monarch, having made preparations for the space of two years, set out on his march, probably following the (usual) coast route through Philistia and Sharon, from thence intending to cross by Megiddo into the Jezreel (Esdraelon) plain.
The king of Assyria – This expression does not imply that Nineveh had not yet fallen. The Jews, accustomed to Assyrian monarchs, who held their courts alternately at Nineveh and Babylon 2Ki 19:36; 2Ch 33:11, at first regarded the change as merely dynastic, and transferred to the new king, Nabopolassar, the title which they had been accustomed to give to their former suzerains. When, later on, Nebuchadnezzar invaded their country they found that he did not call himself King of Assyria, but King of Babylon, and thenceforth that title came into use; but the annalist who wrote the life of Josiah inmediately upon his death, and whom the author of Kings copied, used, not unnaturally, the more familiar, though less correct, designation.
Josiah went against him – Josiah probably regarded himself as in duty bound to oppose the march of a hostile force through his territory to attack his suzerain. For further details see the account in Chronicles (marginal reference). On Megiddo, see Jos 12:21 note.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 29. In his days Pharaoh-nechoh] See the note on the death of Josiah, 2Kg 22:20.
Nechoh is supposed to have been the son of Psammitichus, king of Egypt; and the Assyrian king, whom he was now going to attack, was the famous Nabopolassar. What the cause of this quarrel was, is not known. Some say it was on account of Carchemish, a city on the Euphrates, belonging to the Egyptians, which Nabopolassar had seized. See Isa 10:9.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Pharaoh-nechoh, called Necos by Herodotus, who makes mention of this fight; wherein, as he saith, Necos conquered the Syrians in Magdalo. The king of Assyria, i.e. the king of Babylon, who having formerly rebelled against the Assyrian his lord, had now conquered him; as appears by the course of the sacred, and the concurrence of profane history; and therefore is here and elsewhere called the Assyrian, and the king of Assyria, because now he was the head of that empire. To the river Euphrates, i.e. against Carchemish by Euphrates, as it is expressed, 2Ch 35:20, which the Assyrian had taken from the Syrians, Isa 10:9, Pharaohs confederates, who therefore sendeth forces against the Assyrian, that he might both help them, and secure himself.
Josiah went against him; either to defend his own country from Pharaohs incursions; or to assist the king of Babylon, with whom he seems to have been in league, as was noted before. He slew him, i.e. gave him his deaths wound there, though he died not till he came to Jerusalem, 2Ch 35:23,24. When he had seen him, i.e. when he fought with him, or in the first onset. Thus fighting is called a looking in the face, 2Ki 14:8.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
29. In his days Pharaoh-nechoh(See2Ch 35:20-27).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
In his days Pharaohnechoh king of Egypt,…. Who is called in the Targum Pharaoh the lame, because he was lame in his feet, perhaps gouty; Herodotus x also calls him Necos the son of Psammiticus; now it was in the last days of Josiah this king reigned in Egypt, or however that the following event was:
[that] he went up against the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates; to Carchemish, a city situated upon it; see 2Ch 35:26, the king he went against was the king of Babylon, who had conquered the Assyrian monarchy, and therefore called king of it; some take him to be Nabopolassar; according to Marsham y, he was Chyniladanus;
and King Josiah went against him; to stop him, that he might not pass through his country, and attack the king of Babylon, whose ally, perhaps, Josiah was; or, however, thought himself obliged to him by the privileges, power, and authority he allowed him to exercise in the land of Israel:
and he slew him at Megiddo, when he had seen him; as soon as they came face to face, and engaged in battle, see 2Ki 14:8 that is Pharaoh slew Josiah at the first onset. Megiddo was a city in the tribe of Manasseh, Jos 17:11. Herodotus z calls it Magdolus, which seems to be a city on the borders of Egypt, the same with Migdol, Jer 44:1 where he says Pharoahnechoh conquered the Syrians; in Josephus a it is called Mendes very wrongly. Josiah seems to have engaged in this action without consulting the Lord and his prophets.
x Euterpe, sive, l. 2. c. 158. y Chronic. Secul. 18. p. 568. z Ibid. c. 159. a Antiqu. l. 10. c. 5. sect. 1.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
(29) Pharaoh-nechoh.Necho II., the successor of Psammetichus, and the sixth king of the 26th or Saite dynasty, called by Herodotus (ii. 158, 159; 4:42); he reigned circ. 611-605 B.C. , but is not mentioned in the Assyrian records, so far as they are at present known to us.
The king of Assyria.It is sometimes assumed that Nechos expedition was directed against the then ruler of what had been the Assyrian empire (Thenius and others), and that the king in question was Nabopalassar, the conqueror of Nineveh, who became king of Babylon in 626-625 B.C. If the fall of Nineveh preceded or coincided with this last event, then Nabopalassar must be intended by the historian here. But if, as the chronology of Eusebius and Jerome represents, Cyaraxes the Mede took Nineveh in 609-608 B.C. , or, according to the Armenian chronicle, apud Eusebius, in 608-607 B.C. , then Nechos expedition (circ. 609 B.C. ) was really directed against a king of Assyria in the strict sense. After the death of Assurbanipal (626 B.C. ) it appears that two or three kings reigned at Nineveh, namely, Assur-idil-ilani-ukinni, Bel-sum-iskun and Esar-haddon II. (the Saracus of Abydenus and Syncellus). Nineveh must have fallen before 606 B.C. , as Assyria does not occur in the list of countries mentioned by Jeremiah (Jer. 25:19-26) in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, i.e., 606 B.C. The probable date of its fall is 607 B.C. A year or so later Necho made a second expedition, this time against the king of Babylon, but was utterly defeated at Carchemish. (See Schrader, K. A. T., pp. 357-361.) Josephus says that Necho went to wage war with the Medes and Babylonians, who had just put an end to the Assyrian empire, and that his object was to win the dominion of Asia.
King Josiah went against him.Probably as a vassal of Assyria, and as resenting Nechos trespass on territory which he regarded as his own. The Syriac adds: to fight against him: and Pharaoh said to him, Not against thee have I come; return from me. And he hearkened not to Pharaoh, and Pharaoh smote him. This may once have formed part of the Hebrew text, but is more likely a gloss from Chronicles.
At Megiddo.In the plain of Jezreel (1Ki. 4:12). (Comp. Zec. 12:11.) Herodotus calls it Magdolus (ii. 159). The fact that this was the place of battle shows that Necho had not marched through southern Palestine, but had taken the shortest route over sea, and landed at Accho (Acre). Otherwise, Josiah would not have had to go so far north to meet him.
When he had seen him.At the outset of the encounter; as we might say, the moment he got sight of him. According to the account in Chronicles, which is derived from a different source, Josiah was wounded by the Egyptian archers, and carried in a dying state to Jerusalem (2Ch. 35:22 seq.). Thenius thinks that Jer. 15:7-9 was spoken on occasion of Josiahs departure with his army from the north, and that the prophets metaphor, her sun went down while it was yet day, refers to the eclipse of Thales, which had recently happened, 610 B.C. (Herod, i. 74, 103).
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
29. Pharaoh-necho According to Manetho, he was the sixth king of the twenty-sixth dynasty, and the enterprising monarch who, according to Herodotus, (iv, 42,) fitted out an expedition under charge of the Phenician sailors, which accomplished the circumnavigation of Africa twenty-one centuries before Vasco de Gama doubled the Cape of Good Hope. He appears to have been a most active and energetic king.
Went up against the king of Assyria According to Josephus, this expedition of Necho was “to fight with the Medes and Babylonians, who had overthrown the dominions of the Assyrians.” In that case the king of Assyria here would mean the Babylonian conqueror, Nabopolassar, who had so recently become ruler of Assyria, and stood in the same relation to Judah, so that the Hebrew historian considered it unnecessary to be more particular.
Some think that as the exact date of the fall of Nineveh is not yet settled, it may be that the Assyrian empire was just now in its last stage of weakness, and this weakness tempted Necho to improve the opportunity to conquer Carchemish, (2Ch 35:20,) and attach to his own dominion the Asiatic country west of the river Euphrates. But it is fatal to this supposition, that Necho held Carchemish only three years, when it was wrested from him by Nebuchadnezzar, who had then just attained the royal power. Jer 25:1; compare with Jer 46:2. But Nebuchadnezzar’s father reigned twenty years, and his reign could not have commenced long before the fall of Nineveh. Hence Necho’s conquests on the Euphrates must have occurred after the fall of Assyria.
Josiah went against him He probably supposed that if this Egyptian expedition against the king of Assyria was successful, Necho would not spare Judea on his return. Although the king of Egypt pretended to assure him that he had no hostile intentions against Judea, Josiah was too far-sighted a ruler to fail to see that if Egypt extended her dominions beyond him on the east, and so surrounded him, he would soon be required to surrender his independency, and become a mere vassal of Pharaoh.
Slew him at Megiddo In the great plain of Esdraelon at the northern base of the Carmel range of mountains, at the site of the modern village el-Lejjun. See at Jos 12:21. It appears from the parallel passage in Chronicles that the surrounding plain was sometimes called “the valley of Megiddo.” Near by was Hadadrimmon, and the excessive lamentation of the Jews over the fall of the beloved Josiah became proverbial, and is spoken of by Zechariah (Zec 12:11) as “the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon.” Herodotus seems to refer to this battle between Necho and Josiah when he says (ii, 159) that this king of Egypt “made war by land upon the Syrians and defeated them in a pitched battle at Magdolus,” the latter name being probably a confused form of Megiddo.
When he had seen him When the two armies came in conflict on the field of battle, and looked each other in the face. See at 2Ki 14:8. It does not appear that Necho slew Josiah with his own hand, but, according to Chronicles, he was shot at and wounded by the archers, and was carried in a chariot to Jerusalem; but where he died is not exactly stated. See on next verse.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
2Ki 23:29. In his days Pharaoh-nechoh, king of Egypt, went up, &c. We have heretofore observed, that Pharaoh in the Egyptian language signifies king: but Nechoh, according to Herodotus, was the proper name of this monarch; though some will have it to be an appellative signifying lame, because this Pharaoh, as they suppose, had a lameness, proceeding from some wound which he had received in war. The same historian tells us, that he was the son and successor of Psammeticus, king of Egypt, and a man of a bold enterprising spirit; that he made an attempt to join the Nile and the Red Sea by drawing a canal from one to the other; that, though he failed in this design, yet by sending a fleet from the Red Sea through the straits of Babelmandel, he discovered the coast of Africa; and in this his expedition to the Euphrates resolved, by destroying the united force of the Babylonians and Medes, to bid fair for the whole monarchy of Asia. Megiddo was a city in the half tribe of Manasseh, not far from the Mediterranean sea. Houbigant renders the last clause of this verse, and king Josiah, &c.who slew king Josiah coming against him, as soon as he had him for an adversary; and instead of dead in the next verse, he reads dying, as it appears from 2Ch 35:24 that he died at Jerusalem. See Prideaux and Calmet.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
2Ki 23:29 In his days Pharaohnechoh king of Egypt went up against the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates: and king Josiah went against him; and he slew him at Megiddo, when he had seen him.
Ver. 29. In his days Pharaohnechoh, ] i.e., Claudus Pharaoh, the club-foot, so called for distinction. Tamerlane was likewise lame of one foot.
Went up against the king of Assyria.
To the river Euphrates,
And king Josiah went against him.
And he slew him.
“Upon this place the great Gustavus died,
Whilst Victory lay bleeding by his side.”
When he had seen him,
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Pharaoh-nechoh: i.e. Nechoh II, the sixth king of the twentysixth dynasty. His father was a tributary to Assyria, but had secured independence for Egypt.
the king of Assyria: i.e. the king of Babylon, who had just conquered Nineveh, the rival capital.
went against him. His motive not known.
he = the king of Egypt.
him = Josiah.
Megiddo. Southern margin of the plain of Esdraelon, celebrated for Syria’s defeat by Barak (Jdg 5:19).
seen. Figure of speech Tapeinosis, to emphasize the fact that he did much more than “see” him. Compare 2Ki 14:8 and 2Ch 35:21, 2Ch 35:22.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
am 3394, bc 610
Pharaohnechoh: Pharaoh-nechoh, called , Necos, the son of Psammiticus, by Herodotus, was now was now marching “to make war upon the Medes and Babylonians, who had dissolved the Assyrian empire,” the king of the latter being the famous Nabopollasar, who had also become king of Assyria. 2Ki 23:33-35; 2Ch 35:20-24; Jer 46:2
Euphrates: 2Ki 24:7; 2Ch 35:20; Jer 46:2
Josiah went: 2Ch 35:20-23
slew him: 2Ki 22:20; Ecc 8:14, Ecc 9:1-2; Isa 57:1-2; Rom 11:33
Megiddo: Megiddo, called , Magdolum, by Herodotus, was situated in the tribe of Manasseh, west of Jordan, in the valley of Jezreel, and not far fron Hadad-Rimmon, or Maximianopolis. This shews that Josiah reigned over the country formerly possessed by the ten tribes; and it is also probable, that Nechoh had landed his troops at or near Cesarea of Palestine. 2Ki 9:27, Jos 17:11, Jdg 1:27, Jdg 5:19, 1Ki 4:12, Zec 12:11, Megiddon, Rev 16:16, Armageddon
he had seen him: 2Ki 14:8, 2Ki 14:11
Reciprocal: Gen 25:18 – toward Jos 12:21 – Megiddo 1Ki 9:15 – Megiddo 1Ch 7:29 – Megiddo 1Ch 10:2 – Jonathan Ezr 6:22 – the king Neh 9:32 – on our kings Eze 19:1 – the princes Eze 19:12 – strong Zec 9:8 – because of him that passeth by
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
2Ki 23:29. In his days Pharaoh-nechoh, king of Egypt, went up, &c. According to Herodotus, Nechoh was the proper name of this monarch, Pharaoh being the general name of all their kings, as has been before observed in these notes. He tells us he was the son and successor of Psammeticus, king of Egypt, and a man of a bold and enterprising spirit; that he made an attempt to join the Nile and the Red sea, by drawing a canal from the one to the other; that, though he failed in this design, yet, by sending a fleet from the Red sea, through the straits of Babelmandel, he discovered the coast of Africa, and in this expedition to the Euphrates, intended to destroy the united force of the Babylonians and Medes, and thereby to obtain the whole monarchy of Asia. See Prideauxs Connect., and Calmets Dict. Went up against the king of Assyria The king of Babylon, who, having formerly rebelled against the Assyrian, had now conquered him, as appears by the course of the sacred, and the concurrence of profane history; and therefore is here and elsewhere called the Assyrian, and the king of Assyria, because now he was the head of that empire. To the river Euphrates Against Carchemish by Euphrates, as it is expressed 2Ch 35:20, which the Assyrian had taken from Pharaohs confederates, who therefore sends forces against the Assyrian, that he might both help them and secure himself. Josiah went against him Either to defend his own country from Pharaohs incursions, or to assist the king of Babylon, with whom he seems to have been in league. And he slew him at Megiddo Gave him his death-wound there, though he died not till he came to Jerusalem. When he had seen him When he fought with him, or in the first onset. Megiddo was a city in the half-tribe of Manasseh, not far from the Mediterranean sea. It does not appear that Josiah had any clear call to engage in this war; possibly he received his death-wound as a punishment of his rashness. Mr. Locke, however, observes, that from the time of the carrying away of Manasseh, the kings of Judah were under the protection of the Babylonians; and that Josiah, being most piously observant of his faith, would not grant a passage to this enemy of the king of Babylon, and therefore went against him.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
23:29 In his days Pharaohnechoh king of Egypt went up against the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates: and king Josiah {s} went against him; and he slew him at Megiddo, when he had seen him.
(s) Because Pharaoh passed through his country, he was afraid Pharaoh would have done him harm and would have stopped him, yet he did not consult the Lord, and therefore was slain.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
THE DEATH OF JOSIAH
B.C. 608.
2Ki 23:29-30
“Howl, O fir tree; for the cedar is fallen.”
– Zec 11:2
JOSIAH survived by thirteen years the reformation and covenant which are the chief events of his reign. He lived in prosperity and peace. He did justice and judgment; the poor and needy flourished under his royal protection; and it was well with him. It seemed as if the Deuteronontic blessings on faithfulness to its law were about to be abundantly fulfilled, when “the azure calm of heaven” was suddenly shattered, and “down came the thunderbolt.” The great and victorious Assurbanipal of Assyria had died, and left his power to weaker successors. Meanwhile, Egypt was growing in power and splendor under Pharaoh Necho II (B.C. 612-596), the sixth king of the twenty-fifth or Saitic dynasty. He nearly anticipated M. de Lesseps in making the Suez Canal, and perhaps actually anticipated Vasco da Gama in rounding the Cabo Tormentoso, or Cape of Good Hope, in a three years voyage. He was fixed by the ambitious dream of succeeding the Assyrians as the chief power in the world, or at any rate of seizing part of the dominions which they had conquered. Accordingly, in B. C. 608, he went up against the King of Assyria to the river Euphrates. The Chronicler says that his destination was Carchemish, on the Euphrates, and some have conjectured that the vague phrase “against the King of Assyria” is incorrect, and that, as Josephus states, he was really marching against the Medes and Babylonians after the fall of Nineveh.
With this expedition Josiah was not greatly concerned. He may have begun his reign as the vassal of Assurbanipal; but if so, it is probable that he had long since ceased to pay tribute to a power which was tottering to its fall under the attacks of Scythians and Babylonians. He had availed himself of the disorganization of the Assyrian power to re-establish some, at least, of the old authority of the House of David over the Northern Kingdom, and perhaps he only undertook the desperate expedient of withstanding the northward march of the Egyptian host under the notion that either on the march or on his return the Pharaoh intended to subjugate Palestine to Egypt.
Pharaoh Necho II, among his other achievements, had created a powerful fleet, and it is nearly certain that he did not advance along the coast of Palestine, but made his way by sea to Acco or Dor. Here he received the news that Josiah meant to block his path at Megiddo, on the plain of Jezreel. That plain has been the great and only possible battle-field of Palestine, from the revolt in which Barak destroyed the host of Jabin, to that in which Tryphon met Jonathan the Maccabee, and Kleber in 1799 defeated twenty-five thousand Turks with three thousand French.
The Chronicler here adds a very remarkable incident. {2Ch 35:20-22} Necbo, like Joash of Israel in former days, did not care to fight with the poor little King of Judah-or at any rate did not wish to do so at present, when he was on his way to the greater encounter. He therefore sent an embassy to Josiah, saying, “What have I to do with thee, King of Judah? I come not against thee this day, but against the house wherewith I have war. For God [Elohim] commanded me [in a dream] to make haste. Forebear, then, from meddling with God, who is with me, that He destroy thee not.”
The conjecture “in a dream” is not unlikely, nor is it in disaccord with other events in the annals of the Pharaohs and the Sargonidae of Assyria. We may indeed be surprised that an Egyptian Pharaoh should profess to deliver to a Jewish king the messages of Elohim though we have seen something like this in the case of the Rabshakeh. {2Ki 18:25} The variation in #/RAPC 1Es 1:26-28 is curious and interesting. We are there told that the message was sent to Josiah, not only by Pharaoh Necho, who had sent to say “The Lord is with me hastening me forward: depart from me, and be not against the Lord,” but also by “the prophet Jeremy.” Josephus frankly ascribes the error of Josiah to destiny, as though he had been infatuated by the dementation which the Greeks attributed to Ate.
This, however, is not likely; for it is clear that Jeremiah, though not mentioned in the Book of Kings, must have had a strong influence over the mind of Josiah, whom he loved, whose views he shared, in whose religious revolution he had taken part. Further, we do not read of any warning recorded by the prophet himself; and had he uttered one, it would certainly have been mentioned, when he committed his prophecies to writing twenty-three years after their commencement. A warning of which the neglect had led to fatal issues would have been so decisive a confirmation of Jeremiahs prophetic insight that it could not have been passed over in silence.
Indeed, Jeremiah may have shared the conviction which, founded on imperfect generalization, perhaps dazzled the unfortunate king to his ruin. Josiah had accepted the Book of Deuteronomy with the whole strength of his belief, and the Book of Deuteronomy had proclaimed to Israel as the reward of faithfulness this promise: “And it shall come to pass that Jehovah, thy God, shall set thee on high above all the nations of the earth.. Jehovah shall cause thine enemies which rise up against thee to be smitten before thy face: they shall come out against thee one way, and flee before thee seven ways.” {Deu 28:1-8} In the strength of that promise, Josiah was perhaps saying to himself, in the language of the Psalms, that Jehovah could not fail to save His anointed, and dash His enemies to pieces under His feet; {Psa 20:6; Psa 18:29-50} in the language, perhaps, of later days, that the sound of a shaken leaf should chase them, and they should flee when none pursued. {Lev 26:36}
Alas! such passages do not apply invariably to our worldly fortunes! Gods promises are general. The individual must be considered apart from the universal in the region of spiritual and eternal blessings. In the affairs of earth the wicked often seem to be in prosperity, while the righteous are overwhelmed by all Gods waves and storms. Further, Josiah evidently received a warning-a warning which professed to come, and really came, from God-whether uttered by Pharaoh or by Jeremiah. And in this instance Josiah had sought war: he had not been forced into it. It was not for him to go out of his way to champion the cause either of cruel Assyria or vaunting Babylon.
The result was entire disenchantment. No more disheartening and disastrous calamity could have happened to the kingdom, which had just begun to struggle out of the slough of idolatry and humiliation.
Heedless of the message he had received, strong in mistaken hopes, Josiah opposed his poor, weak forces to the powerful host of renovated Egypt. The result was instantaneous ruin. Judah was defeated and scattered without a blow, -Necho came, saw, conquered. Josiah, according to the present record of the Chronicles, like Ahab, “disguised himself” and went into the battle; and as he drove from rank to rank an Egyptian archer drew a bow at a venture, and smote him while he was putting his forces in array. The arrow-point brought conviction too late. Josiah saw his error; he knew that his own death involved the rout of his army. He sounded a retreat, and said to his servants, “Bear me away to my traveling chariot, for I am sore wounded.” He died at Megiddo, where his ancestor Ahaziah had died before him from the arrow-wounds of Jehus pursuers. His servants carried him in a Chariot dead from Megiddo. The famous plain of Esdraelon had already witnessed two great victories-that of Barak over Sisera, and that of Gideon over the Midianites; and one deplorable defeat – that of Saul by the Philistines It was now darkened by a catastrophe even more sad.
When that chariot, accompanied by its wailing escort, entered the gates of Jerusalem, with the routed army of Judah behind it, the feeling of the people must have resembled that of the Athenians when the news reached them that Lysander had destroyed their whole fleet at Aegospotami, and the long wail went thrilling up through that sleepless night from the Peiraeus all along the Makra Teiche to the Parthenon and the Acropolis And there followed such a mourning as the land had never known before. It had begun at Megiddo and Hadadrimmon, leaving the sad memory of its hopeless intensity. It was renewed at Jerusalem when they buried the king in his own sepulcher. “The land mourned, every family apart; the family of the House of David apart, and their wives apart; the family of the House of Nathan apart, and their wives apart; the family of the House of Levi apart, and their wives apart; the family of Shimei apart, and their wives apart; all the families that remained, every family apart, and their wives apart.” “And all Judah and Jerusalem mourned for Josiah. And Jeremiah lamented for Josiah: and all the singing men and the singing women spake of Josiah in their lamentations unto this day, and they were made an institution in Israel: and, behold, they are written in the Lamentations.” Not even for heroic David, or royal Solomon, or pious Asa, or prosperous Jehoshaphat had there been so loud a dirge.
But, alas! there was a cause for far deeper sorrow than the loss of a prince, however able, however beloved. The dead was dead. Natural sorrow for the bereavement of the people would soon be healed by time, but behind the passing affliction lay a great fear and a great reaction.
A great fear, -for now a southern foe was added to the northern. Jeremiah and other prophets had warned Israel of the peril from the North. When the Scythian wave “rolled shoreward, struck, and was dissipated,” when the source of Assyrian terror seemed to be drying up, worldlings may have felt inclined to laugh at Jeremiah. But now it was evident that, sooner or later, the Chaldaeans would be as formidable as their predecessors, and out of the serpents egg was breaking forth a cockatrice. The uncalled-for attempt of Josiah to bar the path of the new and mighty Pharaoh had also added Egypt to the list of formidable enemies. For the present the Pharaoh had passed on to the Euphrates; but whether he returned victorious or defeated, his troops could not but be a source of danger to the little kingdom, which would henceforth be helpless between the overwhelming forces of its foes.
If such were the fears of the timid and the pessimistic, still deeper was the disheartenment of the faithful. Josiah had been the most obedient, the most religious, of all the kings of Judah from childhood upwards. Where, then, were Jehovahs old loving-kindnesses which He sware unto David in his truth? Had God forgotten to be gracious? Had He hidden away His mercy in displeasure? Where were the blessings of the newly discovered Book of the Law, if the curse fell on its most earnest votary? Where was Huldahs promise that he should be gathered to his fathers in peace, if he was carried back dead from the field of fruitless battle? There can be little doubt that the apparent blight which had fallen on unavailing righteousness hastened the reaction of the subsequent reigns. Many might be inclined to cry out with even Jeremiah in his moments of overwhelming despondency, “Ah, Lord God! surely Thou hast greatly deceived this people and Jerusalem, saying, Ye shall have peace; whereas the sword reacheth unto the soul.” {Jer 4:10} “O Lord, Thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived: Thou art stronger than I, and hast prevailed: I am a derision daily, every one mocketh me. Whenever I speak, I must shout, I must cry violence and spoil; for the word of the Lord is made a reproach unto me, and a derision, daily.” {Jer 20:7-8}
But man judges partially and judges amiss. Gods ways are not as mans ways. God sees the whole; He sees the future; He sees things as they are. Through defeat, through captivity, through multiform affliction, lay the path to the final deliverance of the nation from the grosser forms of idolatry. When they wept as they remembered Zion, when they took down their harps from the willows by the water-courses of Babylon to sing the Lords song in a strange land, they turned again-and at last with their whole heart-to God their Savior, who had done so great things for them; -until the grey secret lingering in the East was brightened by the Morning Star, and there was revealed to the world a true Israel, and a New Jerusalem, wherein the Lord should be King forevermore.