2 Chronicles 30:3

3 non enim occurrerant facere in tempore suo quia sacerdotes qui possent sufficere sanctificati non fuerant et populus necdum congregatus erat in Hierusalem

2 Chronicles 30:3 Meaning and Commentary

2 Chronicles 30:3

For they could not keep it at the time
In the month Nisan, as the Targum adds, on the fourteenth day of the month, as the law enjoined, because the cleansing of the temple was not finished until the sixteenth day, see ( 2 Chronicles 29:17 ) and, besides this, two other reasons follow:

because the priests had not sanctified themselves sufficiently;
that is, a sufficient number of them were not sanctified, to slay all the passover lambs the people that came to the feast would want:

neither had the people gathered themselves together to Jerusalem;
they had no notice of it, nor summons for it; and it was required that, at such a time, all the males in the land should appear at Jerusalem; but this custom having been long disused, it required time to acquaint them of the revival of it.

2 Chronicles 30:3 In-Context

1 misit quoque Ezechias ad omnem Israhel et Iudam scripsitque epistulas ad Ephraim et Manassem ut venirent ad domum Domini in Hierusalem et facerent phase Domino Deo Israhel

2 inito ergo consilio regis et principum et universi coetus Hierusalem decreverunt ut facerent phase mense secundo

3 non enim occurrerant facere in tempore suo quia sacerdotes qui possent sufficere sanctificati non fuerant et populus necdum congregatus erat in Hierusalem

4 placuitque sermo regi et omni multitudini

5 et decreverunt ut mitterent nuntios in universum Israhel de Bersabee usque Dan ut venirent et facerent phase Domino Deo Israhel in Hierusalem multi enim non fecerant sicut lege praescriptum est