2 Chronik 16:12

12 Und Asa ward krank an seinen Füßen im neununddreißigsten Jahr seines Königreichs, und seine Krankheit nahm sehr zu; und er suchte auch in seiner Krankheit den HERRN nicht, sondern die Ärzte.

2 Chronik 16:12 Meaning and Commentary

2 Chronicles 16:12

And Asa in the thirty ninth year of his reign was diseased in
his feet
This was about two years before his death, and his disease is generally thought to be the gout in his feet, and a just retaliation for putting the prophet's feet into the stocks:

until his disease was exceeding great;
it increased upon him, and became very severe and intolerable, and the fits were frequent, as well as the pain sharper; though the sense of the Hebrew ^F13 phrase may be, that his disease got upwards, into a superior part of his body, head, or stomach, which, when the gout does, it is dangerous. A very learned physician ^F14 is of opinion, that not the gout, but what he calls an "aedematous" swelling of the feet, is meant, which insensibly gets up into the bowels, and is successively attended with greater inconveniences; a tension of the abdomen, difficulty of breathing, very troublesome to the patient, and issues in a dropsy, and death itself:

yet in his disease he sought not to the Lord;
his seeking to physicians for help in his disease, perhaps, would not have been observed to his reproach, had he also sought unto the Lord, whom he ought to have sought in the first place; and when he applied to the physicians, he should have implored the blessing of God on their prescriptions; but he so much forgot himself as to forget the Lord: this is the first time we read of physicians among the Jews, and some think these were Heathens, and a sort of enchanters: the Jews entertained a very ill opinion of physicians; the best of them, they say ^F15, deserve hell, and they advise ^F16 men not to live in a city where the chief man is a physician; but the author of the book of Ecclesiasticus gives a great encomium of them, and exhorts to honour and esteem them,

``1 Honour a physician with the honour due unto him for the uses which ye may have of him: for the Lord hath created him. 2 For of the most High cometh healing, and he shall receive honour of the king. 3 The skill of the physician shall lift up his head: and in the sight of great men he shall be in admiration. 4 The Lord hath created medicines out of the earth; and he that is wise will not abhor them. 5 Was not the water made sweet with wood, that the virtue thereof might be known? 6 And he hath given men skill, that he might be honoured in his marvellous works. 7 With such doth he heal [men], and taketh away their pains. 8 Of such doth the apothecary make a confection; and of his works there is no end; and from him is peace over all the earth,'' (Sirach 38)

Julian ^F17 the emperor greatly honoured them, and observes, that it is justly said by the philosophers, that the art of medicine fell from heaven.

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FOOTNOTES:

F13 (hleml de) "usque ad supra", Montanus; "usque ad summum", Vatablus; "usque ad sursum", Piscator.
F14 Scheuchzer. Physic. Sacr. vol. 4. p. 645.
F15 T. Bab. Kiddashin, fol. 32. 1. Gloss. in ib.
F16 T. Bab. Pesachim, fol. 113. 1.
F17 Opera, par. 2. p. 154.

2 Chronik 16:12 In-Context

10 Aber Asa ward zornig über den Seher und legte ihn ins Gefängnis; denn er grollte ihm über diesem Stück. Und Asa unterdrückte etliche des Volkes zu der Zeit. {~}

11 Die Geschichten aber Asas, beide, die ersten und die letzten, siehe, die sind geschrieben im Buch von den Königen Juda's und Israels.

12 Und Asa ward krank an seinen Füßen im neununddreißigsten Jahr seines Königreichs, und seine Krankheit nahm sehr zu; und er suchte auch in seiner Krankheit den HERRN nicht, sondern die Ärzte.

13 Also entschlief Asa mit seinen Vätern und starb im einundvierzigsten Jahr seines Königreichs.

14 Und man begrub ihn in seinem Grabe, das er hatte lassen graben in der Stadt Davids. Und sie legten ihn auf sein Lager, welches man gefüllt hatte mit gutem Räuchwerk und allerlei Spezerei, nach der Kunst des Salbenbereiters gemacht, und machten ihm einen großen Brand.