Commentaria in II Paralipomenon
Chapter 29
Synopsis of the chapter.
Ezechias restores the worship of God taken away by his father Achaz, together with the priests, Levites, and singers, and honours God with very many victims.
1. Ezechias began to reign when he was twenty-five years old, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem: the name of his mother was Abia, the daughter of Zacharias.
2. And he did that which was pleasing in the sight of the Lord, according to all that David his father had done.
3. In the first year and month of his reign he opened the doors of the house of the Lord, and repaired them:
4. and he brought the priests and the Levites, and gathered them together in the east street:
5. And he said to them: Hear me, ye Levites, and be sanctified: cleanse the house of the Lord the God of your fathers, and take away all uncleanness out of the sanctuary.
6. Our fathers have sinned, and have done evil in the sight of the Lord our God, forsaking him: they have turned away their faces from the tabernacle of the Lord, and have turned their back.
7. They have shut up the doors that were in the porch, and have put out the lamps, and have not burnt incense, nor offered holocausts in the sanctuary to the God of Israel.
8. And the wrath of the Lord was stirred up against Juda and Jerusalem, and he hath delivered them up to trouble, and to destruction, and to a hissing, as you see with your eyes.
9. Lo, our fathers have fallen by the sword; our sons, and our daughters, and our wives are led away captives for this wickedness.
10. Now therefore I have a mind that we make a covenant with the Lord the God of Israel: and he will turn away from us the wrath of his indignation.
11. My sons, do not now be negligent: the Lord hath chosen you to stand before him, and that you may minister to him, and worship him, and burn incense to him.
12. Then the Levites arose: Mahath the son of Amasai, and Joel the son of Azarias, of the sons of Caath; and of the sons of Merari, Cis the son of Abdi, and Azarias the son of Jalaleel. And of the sons of Gerson, Joah the son of Zemma, and Eden the son of Joah.
13. And of the sons of Elisaphan, Samri and Jahiel. Of the sons also of Asaph, Zacharias and Mathanias:
14. and of the sons of Heman, Jahiel and Semei; and of the sons of Idithun, Semeias and Oziel.
15. And they gathered together their brethren, and were sanctified; and went in according to the commandment of the king and the order of the Lord, to purify the house of God.
16. The priests also going into the temple of the Lord to sanctify it, brought out all the uncleanness that they found within in the porch of the house of the Lord, which the Levites took, and carried out to the torrent Cedron without.
17. And they began to cleanse on the first day of the first month, and on the eighth day of the same month they entered into the porch of the temple of the Lord, and cleansed the temple for eight days, and on the sixteenth day of the same month they finished what they had begun.
18. And they went in to king Ezechias, and said to him: We have sanctified all the house of the Lord, and the altar of holocaust, and the vessels thereof, and the table of proposition with all its vessels.
19. And all the furniture of the temple, which king Achaz had defiled in his reign, after he had transgressed: and behold they are all set forth before the altar of the Lord.
20. And king Ezechias rising early, gathered together all the rulers of the city, and went up to the house of the Lord:
21. and they offered together seven bullocks, and seven rams, seven lambs, and seven he-goats for sin, for the kingdom, for the sanctuary, for Juda, and he said to the priests the sons of Aaron to offer them upon the altar of the Lord.
22. So they killed the bullocks, and the priests received the blood and poured it upon the altar; they killed also the rams, and poured their blood upon the altar, and they killed the lambs, and poured out the blood upon the altar.
23. They brought the he-goats for sin before the king and all the multitude, and laid their hands upon them;
24. and the priests killed them, and sprinkled their blood before the altar for an expiation of all Israel: for the king had commanded that the holocaust and the sin offering should be for all Israel.
25. He appointed also the Levites in the house of the Lord, with cymbals, and psalteries, and harps, according to the ordinance of David the king, and of Gad the seer, and of Nathan the prophet: for it was the commandment of the Lord by the hand of his prophets.
26. And the Levites stood holding the instruments of David, and the priests the trumpets.
27. And Ezechias commanded that they should offer holocausts upon the altar: and when the holocausts were offered, they began to sing praises to the Lord, and to sound with trumpets, and with divers instruments which David king of Israel had prepared, to make harmony.
28. And all the multitude adored, and the singers and they that held the trumpets were in their office, till the holocaust was finished.
29. And when the oblation was ended, the king bowed down, and all that were with him, and adored.
30. And Ezechias and the princes commanded the Levites to praise the Lord with the words of David, and of Asaph the seer: and they praised him with great joy, and bowing their knee adored.
31. And Ezechias added also these words: You have filled your hands to the Lord, come near, and offer victims and praises in the house of the Lord. And all the multitude offered victims, and praises, and holocausts with a devout mind.
32. Now the number of the holocausts which the multitude offered was this: Seventy bullocks, a hundred rams, two hundred lambs.
33. And they sanctified to the Lord six hundred oxen, and three thousand sheep.
34. But the priests were few, and were not enough to strip the skins off the holocausts: wherefore the Levites their brethren helped them, till the work was finished, and the priests were sanctified: for the Levites are sanctified with a more easy rite than the priests.
35. So there were many holocausts, the fat of the peace offerings, and the libations of the holocausts: and the service of the house of the Lord was completed.
36. And Ezechias and all the people rejoiced, that the ministry of the Lord was accomplished. For this was done suddenly.
Verse 1. The name of his mother (Ezechias’) was Abia the daughter of Zacharias—who was the son of Zacharias the elder, priest and martyr, whom Joas king of Juda killed, chapter XXIV, 21. Abia therefore, the daughter of this younger Zacharias, who kept king Ozias in the worship of the true God, of whom chapter XXVI, verse 5, speaks, was the wife of Achaz and mother of Ezechias, who instructed him in all piety and fear of God, and is therefore named here, to show that Ezechias drew in his virtue and zeal with his milk from his mother. So St. Jerome in the Traditions, Salianus, and others.
Verse 4. The east street—so called because it faced the east gate of the temple.
Verse 15. To purify the house of the Lord—namely the court of the priests, which was their temple; for no one was permitted to enter the Holy Place except a priest, as into the Holy of Holies only the high priest. Whence here also only the priests are said to have “gone into the temple and sanctified it,” that is, purged it of idols and their superstition; carrying out this filth “into the porch.” The Septuagint has, into the porch, whence the Levites then carried it out, and cast it into the torrent Cedron.
Verse 17. And they began on the first day of the first month (Nisan, that is, in March) to cleanse,—as if to say: In the first eight days of the month Nisan they purged the courts and chambers of the priests and Levites which were joined to them, and then in the latter eight days they purged the temple itself, or the Holy Place.
Verse 24. And for sin,—that is, that a victim for sin might be offered, according to the rite prescribed in Leviticus, chapter IV.
Verse 30. With the words of David and Asaph the seer,—that is, the prophet: “words” he calls the Psalms, which hence appear to have been composed partly by David, partly by Asaph, as are those twelve which are entitled to Asaph.
Verse 31. You have filled (that is, consecrated) your hands to the Lord,—that is, you have consecrated yourselves priests, by filling the hand with oil and victims.
Verse 33. And they sanctified to the Lord six hundred oxen to God and the temple, six hundred oxen, and three thousand sheep, that of them some might be offered for a holocaust, others for sin, others for peace victims.
Verse 34. The priests,—for these as priests commanded the Levites. On the rite of consecrating priests, see Leviticus VIII. From this verse it is gathered that it belonged to the priests to kill the victim, flay it, divide it, lay it on the altar, and burn it. But in necessity the flaying and the rest that follows were shared with and permitted to the Levites. So Cajetan, and the first part is sufficiently clear from Leviticus, chapter I, verse 5.