Commentaria in II Paralipomenon
Chapter 30
Ezechias sends messengers throughout Juda and the ten Tribes to invite all to the solemn Phase, and this was kept with the greatest celebration for 14 days.
1. Ezechias also sent to all Israel and Juda: and he wrote letters to Ephraim and Manasses, that they should come to the house of the Lord in Jerusalem, and keep the Phase to the Lord the God of Israel. 2. So the king, and the princes, and all the assembly of Jerusalem, taking counsel, decreed to keep the Phase in the second month. 3. For they could not keep it at its time, because the priests who could suffice were not sanctified, and the people were not yet gathered together in Jerusalem. 4. And the proposal pleased the king and all the multitude. 5. And they decreed to send messengers to all Israel, from Bersabee to Dan, to come and keep the Phase to the Lord the God of Israel in Jerusalem: for many had not kept it as it is prescribed by the law. 6. And the couriers went with the letters by the king’s command, and of his princes, to all Israel and Juda, according as the king had commanded, proclaiming: Ye children of Israel, return to the Lord the God of Abraham, and Isaac, and Israel: and he will return to the remnant that have escaped the hand of the king of the Assyrians. 7. Be not like your fathers and brethren, who departed from the Lord the God of their fathers, and he gave them up to destruction, as you see. 8. Do not harden your necks as your fathers did: give your hands to the Lord, and come to his sanctuary, which he hath sanctified for ever: serve the Lord the God of your fathers, and the wrath of his indignation shall be turned away from you. 9. For if you return to the Lord, your brethren and children shall find mercy before their lords that led them captive, and shall return into this land; for the Lord your God is gracious and merciful, and will not turn away his face from you, if you return to him. 10. So the couriers went speedily from city to city, through the land of Ephraim and Manasses as far as Zabulon, they laughing them to scorn, and mocking them. 11. Nevertheless some men of Aser, and Manasses, and Zabulon, consenting to the counsel, came to Jerusalem. 12. And in Juda the hand of the Lord was, to give them one heart, to do according to the commandment of the king and of the princes, the word of the Lord. 13. And much people were gathered together at Jerusalem to keep the feast of unleavened bread in the second month: 14. and rising up they destroyed the altars that were in Jerusalem, and all in which incense was burnt to idols, overthrowing them, they cast into the torrent Cedron. 15. And they killed the Phase on the fourteenth day of the second month. The priests also and the Levites, at length being sanctified, offered holocausts in the house of the Lord: 16. and they stood in their order, according to the ordinance and law of Moses the man of God: and the priests received the blood to be poured out from the hands of the Levites, 17. because a great multitude was not sanctified: and therefore the Levites killed the Phase for them who came not to be sanctified to the Lord. 18. A great part also of the people of Ephraim, and Manasses, and Issachar, and Zabulon, who were not sanctified, ate the Phase, not as it is written: and Ezechias prayed for them, saying: The Lord who is good will show mercy 19. to all that with their whole heart seek the Lord the God of their fathers; and will not impute it to them that they were less sanctified. 20. And the Lord heard him, and was appeased towards the people. 21. And the children of Israel that were found at Jerusalem kept the solemnity of the unleavened bread seven days with great joy, praising the Lord every day: the Levites also and the priests, with instruments that were suited to their office. 22. And Ezechias spoke to the heart of all the Levites who had good understanding concerning the Lord, and they ate seven days of the solemnity, offering victims of peace offerings, and praising the Lord the God of their fathers. 23. And it pleased the whole multitude to celebrate other seven days: which they did with great joy. 24. For Ezechias king of Juda had given to the multitude a thousand bullocks, and seven thousand sheep: and the princes had given to the people a thousand bullocks, and ten thousand sheep: and a great multitude of priests were sanctified. 25. And all the multitude of Juda was filled with joy, as well of the priests and Levites, as of all the concourse that was come out of Israel; the strangers also of the land of Israel, and of those that dwelt in Juda. 26. And there was great joy in Jerusalem, such as had not been in that city from the days of Solomon the son of David king of Israel. 27. And the priests and the Levites rose up, blessing the people: and their voice was heard: and their prayer came to the holy dwelling place of heaven.
Verse 2. In the second month.—For this is commanded in Numbers IX, 10, that those who in the first month, on account of uncleanness or some other impediment, could not celebrate the Phase, should celebrate it in the second month.
Verse 3. The priests who could suffice were not sanctified (that is, consecrated);—for to be priests and be able to sacrifice, they ought first to be consecrated priests with the rite which is prescribed in Leviticus VIII.
Verse 15. At length sanctified.—The Hebrew has, they were suffused with shame; because in so great alacrity of the people they had been slow in their own sanctification and purification, whence they straightway sanctified and cleansed themselves.
Verse 16. And the priests received the blood to be poured out from the hands of the Levites,—for all the blood of the victim had to be poured out on the ground to God by a priest, to signify that he is the lord of the death and life of all. “From the hands of the Levites,” who then sacrificed by dispensation, because the consecrated priests who were clean were too few to be able to sacrifice so many victims: the Levites therefore helped them, and killed the victims, and gave the flowing blood to the priests, that they might pour it out beside the altar.
Verse 17. Because the great multitude (of priests) had not been sanctified (from irregularity and legal uncleanness, purged by the lustration prescribed by law in Numbers XIX): and therefore the Levites killed the Phase for them who came not to be sanctified to the Lord.—The Septuagint has, who could not be purified for the Lord; that is, who, being occupied with other things, came late to be sanctified, that is, to be cleansed from legal uncleanness. Note: “Phase” signifies first, the Paschal lamb, which was sacrificed to God at the Passover; second, the Paschal victims, which were offered to God during the seven days of the Passover: which offering belonged to the priests alone. But the killing of the Paschal lamb belonged to every father of a family, who in this respect retained the primitive priestly right, originally annexed to primogeniture, and to any father of a family in his own family, provided he was clean; but if he was unclean and polluted, then the Levites killed the lamb in his place, as is here said, and likewise 1 Esdras VI, 10. The unclean also could not eat of the Paschal lamb and other victims; but because this was a public solemnity, and the restoration of a lapsed religion, and the number of the unclean was great, hence it was dispensed with them equally that they might eat of them, Ezechias praying to God for them, as follows. See what I said on Exodus XII, 6. On account of the necessity therefore which the fewness of the priests who were clean produced, and on account of the multitude and devotion of the people flocking from all Israel, and on account of the abundance of the victims to be killed, it seems that a dispensation was granted to the Levites, so that they sacrificed not only the Paschal Lamb, but also the other victims: for this is what is expressly said in verse 15: “The priests also and the Levites, at length being sanctified, offered holocausts in the house of the Lord.” Yet I should believe that the priests alone killed the victims, that is, slew them in honour of God, cut their throats, and poured out the blood, in which properly consisted the nature of sacrifice, and which was easy and of small labour; then handed the victims slain by themselves to the Levites, that they themselves might strip off the skin, wash them, cut them in pieces, and duly arrange the pieces on the altar, and burn them with fire put under. For to all this the priest offering was not sufficient, wherefore he was compelled to use the help and work of the Levites, as I said on Leviticus I, 9. Whence for “they offered holocausts,” the Hebrew is tabiu, that is, they brought in, as the Septuagint, Vatablus, and Pagninus render it, holocausts into the house of the Lord, and so it was done in the solemn Phase, which Josias celebrated some years after, chapter XXXV, verse 11, where it is said: “And the Phase was killed, and the priests sprinkled the blood with their hand (on the altar as the custom was), and the Levites stripped the skins of the holocausts.” Finally, fathers of families who were unclean yielded to the Levites the killing of the Paschal lamb; they themselves, however, ate of it also on account of the most joyful solemnity. For greater cleanness was required in the killing of the lamb than in eating it; as now greater purity is required in the priest celebrating than in a layman communicating; especially because these unclean could not be purified so quickly, and approached the sacred banquet of the lamb with great inward devotion, which God requires and regards more than external lustration.
A great part of the people who were not sanctified (that is, cleansed and purified from legal uncleanness) ate the Phase.—The Hebrews, according to St. Jerome, relate that many of those who being unclean had eaten the Phase were slain by a plague sent from heaven by God; but Ezechias praying and pleading the ignorance of the people and their pious intention, God spared the rest, and therefore verse 20 declares that God heard him, and was appeased toward the people.
And the Lord heard him—by some sensible sign, as by sending fire from heaven to burn the victims of Ezechias, as he did to Abel, Genesis chapter IV; to Aaron, Leviticus chapters VIII and IX; and to Solomon, 3 Kings chapter VIII; for unless there had been here a sensible sign, the unclean would have eaten of the Phase neither securely nor with so great joy. So Cajetan.
Verse 22. And Ezechias spoke to the heart of all the Levites (flattering them and praising them, because they had) good understanding concerning the Lord,— that is, because they were skilled in their office, namely intelligent and accurate in singing psalms to God. Otherwise Cajetan: He spoke, he says, to them words to the heart, that they might undertake and continue the care of instructing the people.