2 Chronicles 28 Study Notes

28:1-4 Ahaz: Twelfth king of Judah; son of Jotham; confirmed idol worshiper; submitted voluntarily to Assyria. There was always some idolatry among the people, and there were always some people who remained true to Yahweh; but in the earlier days, the decadent kings associated with the family of Ahab encountered some resistance among the people. By the time of Joash, the people were increasingly ignoring the religion of the king. When Ahaz ascended the throne, the people and their king had become confirmed idol worshipers. Ahaz took the worship of the Baals to the point of burning his own children as an offering to Baal.

28:5-8 Pekah: Eighteenth and next-to-last king of Israel; scored a major victory over Judah, but released all of his prisoners in response to God’s command. In the usual cause-and-effect sequence that characterizes the book of 2 Chronicles, Ahaz of Judah had forsaken the Lord so he was defeated by the king of Damascus, who carried away a number of hostages. Furthermore, Pekah, king of the northern kingdom of Israel, also defeated Ahaz of Judah. Again the Chronicler’s assessment is that this happened because the people of Judah abandoned the Lord. Out of Judah’s army, one hundred twenty thousand were killed. This probably meant that Ahaz was left with less than half of his original army. Additionally, Ahaz lost his son, his chief of staff, and his prime minister. Pekah’s army also took a huge number of people as hostages and transported them to the capital city of Samaria in Israel. The Chronicler reminds us that Israel and Judah were brothers, even though they were mortal enemies at this time.

28:9-11 Once again a prophet appeared—this time a man named Oded, who lived in Samaria. He confronted the returning victorious army with some basic facts about God’s divine law. Their slaughter of their fellow Hebrews was not acceptable. Israelites were never to enslave other Israelites, but this is what Pekah was planning to do. Oded reminded the king of Israel that he too was guilty and could justly face similar punishment.

28:12-15 Some leaders of the northern kingdom realized the seriousness of the mistake they were about to make. The army of Israel abandoned the hostages, and some other people were put in charge of making sure they returned to Judah. These captives were given food and clothes, and some even received donkeys on which they could ride back as far as Jericho (the City of Palms), where they were left.

28:16-21 Ahaz of Judah found himself under increasing pressure. The nation had already been defeated by Aram and the northern kingdom; now the Edomites and the Philistines returned to do damage. But rather than turning to the Lord for help, Ahaz tried to solve his problems by asking King Tiglath-pileser of Assyria to protect him. He offered the Assyrian king all his possessions and everything that belonged to the temple. Tiglath-pileser did defeat Damascus (which he had planned to do anyway). Then he marched to Jerusalem and helped himself to more property.

28:22-23 Ahaz decided to pursue still another solution. Since the Arameans had defeated him earlier, the king concluded that the gods of Damascus must be strong, so he worshiped them (see note at 25:14-15). This was another futile move.

28:24-25 Ahaz seemed to become angry at God. His solution for dealing with these ineffective false gods was to empty the temple of the true God, shut its doors, and continue to proliferate idolatrous worship sites. These were utterly irrational actions, but we can understand them a little bit more by calling on the description of some of the events recorded in Is 7-8. Ahaz had placed himself in a state of war against God; regardless of the consequences, he was not about to let God win. The prophet Isaiah had specifically warned Ahaz against making this unreliable alliance with the Assyrians. When Ahaz rejected the admonition, Isaiah even gave him the opportunity to ask for a sign from God, to verify that God would protect him.

In a thoroughly hypocritical display of false piety, Ahaz responded to Isaiah by saying that he would never be so presumptuous as to ask for a sign from God. But Isaiah did not leave it alone. He said to Ahaz that if he were not going to ask for a sign, one would still be provided for him. He told him of the coming of a child (Is 7:14) who would grow up in a time of famine—referring to the consequences brought about soon by Ahaz’s actions, but who would also represent God’s presence with his people, thereby telescoping into the far future by predicting the coming Savior (Mt 1:23). This meant to Ahaz that God was going to actively oppose his efforts; therefore when the supposed alliance with Assyria did not work out, just as Isaiah had predicted, Ahaz blamed Isaiah’s God.

28:26-27 The Chronicler’s obituary of Ahaz is brief; the facts have spoken for themselves.