1 Kings 20:31

_AND THERE CAME A MAN OF GOD, AND SPAKE UNTO THE KING OF ISRAEL, AND SAID, THUS SAITH THE LORD, BECAUSE THE SYRIANS HAVE SAID, THE LORD IS GOD OF THE HILLS, BUT HE IS NOT GOD OF THE VALLEYS, THEREFORE WILL I DELIVER ALL THIS GREAT MULTITUDE INTO THINE HAND, AND YE SHALL KNOW THAT I AM THE LORD._ No JFB commentary on these verses....

31-43 This encouragement sinners have to repent and humble themselves before God; Have we not heard, that the God of Israel is a merciful God? Have we not found him so? That is gospel repentance, which flows from an apprehension of the mercy of God, in Christ; there is forgiveness with him. What a change is here! The most haughty in prosperity often are most abject in adversity; an evil spirit will thus affect a man in both these conditions. There are those on whom, like Ahab, success is ill bestowed; they know not how to serve either God or their generation, or even their own true interests with their prosperity: Let favour be showed to the wicked, yet will he not learn righteousness. The prophet designed to reprove Ahab by a parable. If a good prophet were punished for sparing his friend and God's when God said, Smite, of much sorer punishment should a wicked king be thought worthy, w...

Verse 31. _PUT SACKCLOTH ON OUR LOINS, AND ROPES UPON OUR HEADS_] Let us show ourselves humbled in the deepest manner, and let us put ropes about our necks, and go submitting to his mercy, and deprecating his wrath. The citizens of Calais are reported to have acted nearly in the same way when they surrendered their city to Edward III., king of England, in 1346. See at the end. 1 Kings 20:43....

AND ROPES UPON OUR HEADS - “Ropes about our necks” is probably meant. They, as it were, put their lives at Ahab’s disposal, who, if he pleased, might hang them at once....

EXPOSITION THE INVASIONS OF ISRAEL BY THE SYRIANS AND THEIR RESULTS.—The insertion of this chapter, which contains an account of two invasions of Israel by the hosts of Syria, and of the utter defeat of the latter, and which therefore constitutes a break in the history of Elijah, which has occupied the historian up to the end of 1 Kings 19:1; and which is resumed with 1 Kings 21:1.—the insertion of this twentieth chapter in this place is apparently due to the compiler of these records, who seems to have adopted this arrangement as the more chronological. It is not absolutely certain, however, that we owe this disposition

AND HIS SERVANTS SAID UNTO HIM,.... Being reduced to the utmost extremity; for if he attempted to go out of the city, he would fall into the hands of the Israelites, and there was no safety in it, the wall of it being fallen down; and it could not be thought he could be concealed long in the chamber where he was, wherefore his servants advised as follows: BEHOLD, NOW, WE HAVE HEARD THAT THE KINGS OF THE ISRAEL ARE MERCIFUL KINGS; not only the best of them as David and Solomon, but even the worst of them, in comparison of Heathen princes, were kind and humane to those that fell into their hands, and became their captives: LET US, I PRAY THEE; so said one in the name of the rest: PUT SACK CLOTH ON OUR LOINS, AND ROPES UPON OUR HEADS; and so coming in such a mean and humble manner, and not with their armour on, they might the rather hope to have admittance; so, the Syracusans sent ambass...

4. KING AHAB: HIS WICKED REIGN AND END CHAPTER 20 Ahab's War with the Syrians and His Victory _ 1. The siege and relief of Samaria (1 Kings 20:1)_ 2. The victory at Aphek (1 Kings 20:22) 3. A prophet's symbolical action and his message (1 Kings 20:35) Two expeditions of Ben-hadad (son of the Sun) against Israel are recorded in this chapter. When Ben-hadad forced the war and insulted the King of Israel, Ahab prepared for the battle. Then a prophet came to Ahab, most likely one of those who had been hidden by Obadiah. He brought a message from the Lord. “Thus saith Jehovah, Hast thou seen all this great multitude? behold I will deliver it into thine hand this day; and thou sha

AHAB'S VICTORY OVER BEN-HADAD. Chs. 20 and 22 come from another source. Elijah does not appear, the religious interest is less prominent, and Ahab is presented in a far less hostile light. He acts as a brave and chivalrous king, bold in the battle and merciful in victory. In the Book of Kings the kings of Israel are seldom represented in a hostile spirit when confronted by the common enemy, Syria (_cf._ 2 Kings 7). Syria, we learn, had become a formidable power. Ben-hadad's father had taken some of Omri's cities, and had compelled him to allow his merchants to have streets, _i.e._ bazaars, in Samaria (1 Kings 20:34). The power of Syria was such that the king could treat the Israelite sovereign as his despised vassal. When the Syrian army filled the valley, the Israelite forces appeared like two small flocks of goats ...

_let us, I_[R.V. WE] _pray thee_ The change is made because the sentence is in other parts in the plural. The Hebrew נא is a mere particle employed to give emphasis to forms of entreaty, and has nothing that indicates whether one or more persons are speakers. _sackcloth on our loins_ The garment of humiliation and mourning. Cp. Genesis 37:34; 2 Samuel 3:31; 2 Kings 6:30; Isaiah 37:1-2. _ropes upon our heads_ Probably meaning with ropes around the neck. No token of submission could be more expressive than this to indicate that Ahab might hang them if he pleased. peradventure he will save thy lif

LET US—PUT SACKCLOTH ON OUR LOINS, AND ROPES, &C.— The approaching persons, _with a sword hanging to the neck,_ is, in the East, thought to be a very humble and submissive manner of coming before them. So William of Tyre, describing the great solemnity and humiliation with which the governor of Egypt under the caliph of that country appeared before his master, tells us, that he prostrated himself on the ground thrice, with his sword hanging to his neck, which, at the third prostration, he took off and laid down. Thevenot has mentioned this circumstance in the account he has given of the taking of Bagdat by the Turks in 1638, extracted from the letter of a person of distinction in the Turkish army, to one of the Sangiacks of Egypt; for upon the besieged begging quarter we are told, that the lieutenant, and principal officer of the governor of Bagdat, went to the grand vizier with a _scarf...