2 Kings 23:5

_AND HE PUT DOWN THE IDOLATROUS PRIESTS, WHOM THE KINGS OF JUDAH HAD ORDAINED TO BURN INCENSE IN THE HIGH PLACES IN THE CITIES OF JUDAH, AND IN THE PLACES ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM; THEM ALSO THAT BURNED INCENSE UNTO BAAL, TO THE SUN, AND TO THE MOON, AND TO THE PLANETS, AND TO ALL THE HOST OF HEAVEN._ Put down the idolatrous priests, х_ HAKªMAARIYM_ (H3649) (singular, komer), blackness, gloominess), the 'scorched' - i:e., Guebres or fire-worshippers, distinguished by a girdle (Ezekiel 23:14) or belt of wool and camel's hair, twisted round the body twice, and tied with four knots, which had a symbolic meaning, and made it a defense against evil. The Septuagint has: katekause tous Choomarim, he burned the idol-priests.] THEM ALSO THAT BURNED INCENSE UNTO BAAL ... THE SUN ... - or Baal-shemesh, because Baal was som

4-14 What abundance of wickedness in Judah and Jerusalem! One would not have believed it possible, that in Judah, where God was known, in Israel, where his name was great, in Salem, in Zion, where his dwelling-place was, such abominations should be found. Josiah had reigned eighteen years, and had himself set the people a good example, and kept up religion according to the Divine law; yet, when he came to search for idolatry, the depth and extent were very great. Both common history, and the records of God's word, teach, that all the real godliness or goodness ever found on earth, is derived from the new-creating Spirit of Jesus Christ....

Verse 2 Kings 23:5. _THE IDOLATROUS PRIESTS_] הכמרים _hakkemarim_. Who these were is not well known. The _Chaldee, Syriac_, and _Arabic_, call them the _priests_ simply, _which the kings of Judah had ordained_. Probably they were an _order_ made by the idolatrous kings of Judah, and called _kemarim_, from כמר _camar_, which signifies to be _scorched, shrivelled together, made dark_, or _black_, because their business was constantly to attend _sacrificial fires_, and probably they were _black garments_; hence the Jews in derision call Christian ministers _kemarim_, because of their _black clothes_ and _garments_. Why we should _imitate_, in our _sacerdotal dress_, those priests of Baal, is strange to think and hard to tell. _UNTO BAAL, TO THE SUN_] Though _Baal_ was cert

A parenthesis giving the earlier reforms of Josiah. 2 Kings 23:4 THE PRIESTS OF THE SECOND ORDER - This is a new expression; and probably refers to the ordinary priests, called here “priests of the second order,” in contrast with the high priest, whose dignity was reviving (2 Kings 12:2 note). THE VESSELS - This would include the whole apparatus of worship, altars, images, dresses, utensils, etc., for Baal, etc. (2 Kings 21:3 notes). The ashes of the idolatrous objects burned in the first instance in the “fields of Kidron” (i. e., in the part of the valley which lies nort

EXPOSITION 2 KINGS 23:1 JOSIAH'S RENEWAL OF THE COVENANT. HIS REFORMS AND DEATH. REIGN OF JEHOAHAZ. ACCESSION OF JEHOIAKIM. 2 KINGS 23:1 _Josiah_'_s renewal of the covenant_._ _The first care of Josiah, on receiving Huldah's message, which stamped the book found as the true "book of the covenant," was to call together a great assembly of the nation, which should be sufficiently representative of it, and renew the covenant between God and his people made originally a

AND HE PUT DOWN THE IDOLATROUS PRIESTS,.... The Cemarim, so called, because they wore black clothes, as Kimchi and others, whereas the priests of the Lord were clothed in white linen, Zephaniah 1:4. WHOM THE KINGS OF JUDAH HAD ORDAINED TO BURN INCENSE IN THE HIGH PLACES, IN THE CITIES OF JUDAH, AND IN THE PLACES ROUND ABOUT JERUSALEM; for though those high places were destroyed by Hezekiah, they were rebuilt by Manasseh his son, and priests put in them to officiate there, whom Josiah now deposed, 2 Kings 21:3, THEM ALSO THAT BURNT INCENSE UNTO BAAL; in the same high places; these were the priests, and the others in the preceding clause are thought to be ministers unto them: TO THE SUN, AND TO THE MOON, AND TO THE PLANETS; the five plane

2. THE RESULTS OF THE REVIVAL AND THE DEATH OF JOSIAH CHAPTER 23:1-30 _ 1. The People hear the law (2 Kings 23:1; 2 Chronicles 34)_ 2. Josiah makes a covenant (2 Kings 23:3) 3. The great reformations (2 Kings 23:4) 4. The Passover celebrated (2 Kings 23:21; 2 Chronicles 35) 5. Further statements concerning Josiah (2 Kings 23:24

2 KINGS 23:3. BY THE PILLAR. COVENANT: for the word pillar see 2 Kings 11:14 and 1 Kings 7:21. In the latter passage it is used for the two great brazen pillars set up by Solomon before the porch of the Temple. In making the covenant the king takes the lead. The ceremony was accompanied by a sacrifice; hence the phrase in Heb. is to _cut_ a covenant (Genesis 15:17 *, Jeremiah 34:18) or divide the victims. The newly discovered volume is called (2 Kings 23:2) the

IDOLATROUS PRIESTS. black-robed; not _kohen,_ as appointed by God, but _kemarlm,_ as appointed by man. Compare Hosea 10:5; Zephaniah 1:4. PLANETS. stations: i.e. the twelve signs of the Zodiac. Hebrew. _mazzaloth._ Spelled _Mazzaroth_ in Job 38:32. _stations._ The Babylonian name for the _divisions_ of the zodiac. Called in the Assyrian inscriptions "Mauzalti". (See _Western Asiatic Inscriptions.)_...

THE IDOLATROUS PRIESTS— In the Hebrew כמרים _kemarim._ It is plain from this place, that their particular business was to _burn incense._ Hence the faithful Jews seem to call them כמרים in contempt, as being continually _scorched_ by their fumigating fires. Bishop Patrick thinks, that they were so called from being _clothed in black;_ for the Egyptians, as well as many other pagan nations, made use of black garments when they sacrificed to the infernal deities: in opposition to which, the Jewish priests were clothed in white at their sacrifices....