23 And the servants of the king of Syria said to him, Their gods are gods of the mountains; therefore they were stronger than we; but if we fight against them on the plateau, shall we not be stronger than they?
And they also built for themselves high places, and columns, and Asherahs on every high hill and under every green tree;
Woe unto us! who shall deliver us out of the hand of these mighty gods? these are the gods that smote the Egyptians with every plague in the wilderness.
And the man of God drew near, and spoke to the king of Israel and said, Thus saith Jehovah: Because the Syrians have said, Jehovah is a god of the mountains, but he is not a god of the valleys, I will give all this great multitude into thy hand, and ye shall know that I am Jehovah.
Have the gods of the nations which my fathers have destroyed delivered them: Gozan, and Haran, and Rezeph, and the children of Eden that were in Thelassar?
Do ye not know what I and my fathers have done to all the peoples of the countries? Were the gods of the nations of the countries in any wise able to deliver their country out of my hand? Who is there among all the gods of those nations that my fathers have utterly destroyed, that was able to deliver his people out of my hand, that your God should be able to deliver you out of my hand? And now, let not Hezekiah deceive you, nor persuade you in this manner, neither yet believe him; for no +god of any nation or kingdom was able to deliver his people out of my hand, nor out of the hand of my fathers: how much less shall your God deliver you out of my hand? And his servants spoke yet more against Jehovah, the [true] God, and against his servant Hezekiah. And he wrote a letter to rail at Jehovah the God of Israel, and to speak against him saying, As the gods of the nations of the countries have not delivered their people out of my hand, so shall not the God of Hezekiah deliver his people out of my hand. And they cried with a loud voice in the Jewish [language] to the people of Jerusalem that were on the wall, to frighten them and to trouble them; that they might take the city. And they spoke of the God of Jerusalem as of the gods of the peoples of the earth, the work of man's hand.
These [things] hast thou done, and I kept silence; thou thoughtest that I was altogether as thyself: [but] I will reprove thee, and set [them] in order before thine eyes. Now consider this, ye that forget +God, lest I tear in pieces, and there be no deliverer.
{A Song of degrees.} I lift up mine eyes unto the mountains: whence shall my help come? My help [cometh] from Jehovah, who made the heavens and the earth.
I am Jehovah, that is my name; and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images.
Because, knowing God, they glorified [him] not as God, neither were thankful; but fell into folly in their thoughts, and their heart without understanding was darkened: professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into [the] likeness of an image of corruptible man and of birds and quadrupeds and reptiles.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on 1 Kings 20
Commentary on 1 Kings 20 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 20
This chapter is the history of a war between Ben-hadad king of Syria and Ahab king of Israel, in which Ahab was, once and again, victorious. We read nothing of Elijah or Elishain all this story; Jezebel's rage, it is probable, had abated, and the persecution of the prophets began to cool, which gleam of peace Elijah improved. He appeared not at court, but, being told how many thousands of good people there were in Israel more than he thought of, employed himself, as we may suppose, in founding religious houses, schools, or colleges of prophets, in several parts of the country, to be nurseries of religion, that they might help to reform the nation when the throne and court would not be reformed. While he was thus busied, God favoured the nation with the successes we here read of, which were the more remarkable because obtained against Ben-hadad king of Syria, whose successor, Hazael, was ordained to be a scourge to Israel. They must shortly suffer by the Syrians, and yet now triumphed over them, that, if possible, they might be led to repentance by the goodness of God. Here is,
1Ki 20:1-11
Here is,
1Ki 20:12-21
The treaty between the besiegers and the besieged being broken off abruptly, we have here an account of the battle that ensued immediately.
1Ki 20:22-30
We have here an account of another successful campaign which Ahab, by divine aid, made against the Syrians, in which he gave them a greater defeat than in the former. Strange! Ahab idolatrous and yet victorious, a persecutor and yet a conqueror! God has wise and holy ends in suffering wicked men to prosper, and glorifies his own name thereby.
1Ki 20:31-43
Here is an account of what followed upon the victory which Israel obtained over the Syrians.