Kings II 21:1

1 And there was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David sought the face of the Lord. And the Lord said, guilt upon Saul and his house because of his bloody murder, whereby he slew the Gabaonites.

Kings II 21:1 Meaning and Commentary

2 Kings 21:1

Manasseh was twelve years old when he began to reign
So that he was born three years after Hezekiah's recovery from his sickness, and in the seventeenth year of his reign:

and reigned fifty five years in Jerusalem:
among which must be reckoned the time of his captivity in Babylon; his reign was the longest of any of the kings of Judah: and his mother's name was Hephzibah; the name the church goes by, and signifies, "my delight or pleasure is in her", ( Isaiah 62:4 ) , no doubt she was a good woman, or Hezekiah would not have made choice of her for a wife; it is a tradition of the Jews ^F1, that she was the daughter of Isaiah, whose name, they say, is not mentioned, because so wicked a king was unworthy of such a grandfather.

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FOOTNOTES:

F1 Hieron. Trad. Heb. in lib. Paralipom. fol. 86. F.

Kings II 21:1 In-Context

1 And there was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David sought the face of the Lord. And the Lord said, guilt upon Saul and his house because of his bloody murder, whereby he slew the Gabaonites.

2 And King David called the Gabaonites, and said to them; —(now the Gabaonites are not the children of Israel, but of the remnant of the Amorite, and the children of Israel had sworn to them: but Saul sought to smite them in his zeal for the children of Israel and Juda.)

3 And David said to the Gabaonites, What shall I do to you? and wherewithal shall I make atonement, that ye may bless the inheritance of the Lord?

4 And the Gabaonites said to him, We have no silver or gold with Saul and with his house; and there is no man for us to put to death in Israel.

5 And he said, What say ye? speak, and I will do it for you. And they said to the king, The man who would have made an end of us, and persecuted us, who plotted against us to destroy us, let us utterly destroy him, so that he shall have no standing in all the coasts of Israel.

Footnotes

• [a]. iniquity.
• [b]. the death of his bloods.