2 Kings 23:5

5 He put down the idolatrous priests, whom the kings of Judah had ordained to burn incense in the high places in the cities of Judah, and in the places round about Jerusalem; those also who burned incense to Baal, to the sun, and to the moon, and to the planets, and to all the host of the sky.

2 Kings 23:5 Meaning and Commentary

2 Kings 23:5

And he put down the idolatrous priests
The Cemarim, so called, because they wore black clothes, as Kimchi and others, whereas the priests of the Lord were clothed in white linen, (See Gill on Zephaniah 1:4).

whom the kings of Judah had ordained to burn incense in the high
places, in the cities of Judah, and in the places round about
Jerusalem;
for though those high places were destroyed by Hezekiah, they were rebuilt by Manasseh his son, and priests put in them to officiate there, whom Josiah now deposed, ( 2 Kings 21:3 ) ,

them also that burnt incense unto Baal;
in the same high places; these were the priests, and the others in the preceding clause are thought to be ministers unto them:

to the sun, and to the moon, and to the planets;
the five planets besides the sun and moon, as Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, and Venus; or to the twelve celestial signs in the firmament, as some ^F20; though Theodoret takes it to be a single star, the evening star:

and to all the host of heaven;
or even to the host of heaven, all the stars thereof: this part of worship,

burning incense,
which was peculiar to the most high God, yet was frequently made by idolaters to their deities; and from the word ^F21 by which it is here and elsewhere expressed may "nectar" be derived, so much spoken of by the Heathen poets as of a sweet smell ^F23, and as delicious to their gods; and so Porphyry ^F24 represents the gods as living on smoke, vapours, and perfumes; and frankincense is said, by Diodorus Siculus ^F25, to be most grateful to them, and beloved by them; this therefore is a much better derivation of the word "nectar" than what Suidas ^F26 gives, that is, as if it was "nectar", because it makes those young that drink it; or than the account Athenaeus ^F1 gives of it, that it is a wine in Babylon so called.

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FOOTNOTES:

F20 David de Pomis Lexic. fol. 77. 3.
F21 (rjq) "suffitum fecit. Et diis acceptus--" Nidor. Ovid. Metamorph. 1. 12, fab. 4.
F23 Theocrit. Idyll. xvii. ver. 29.
F24 De Abstinentia, l. 2. c. 42. Celsus apud Origen. l. 8. p. 417.
F25 Biblioth. l. 2. p. 132.
F26 In voce (nektareou) .
F1 Deipnosophist. l. 1.

2 Kings 23:5 In-Context

3 The king stood by the pillar, and made a covenant before Yahweh, to walk after Yahweh, and to keep his commandments, and his testimonies, and his statutes, with all [his] heart, and all [his] soul, to confirm the words of this covenant that were written in this book: and all the people stood to the covenant.

4 The king commanded Hilkiah the high priest, and the priests of the second order, and the keepers of the threshold, to bring forth out of the temple of Yahweh all the vessels that were made for Baal, and for the Asherah, and for all the host of the sky, and he burned them outside of Jerusalem in the fields of the Kidron, and carried the ashes of them to Bethel

5 He put down the idolatrous priests, whom the kings of Judah had ordained to burn incense in the high places in the cities of Judah, and in the places round about Jerusalem; those also who burned incense to Baal, to the sun, and to the moon, and to the planets, and to all the host of the sky.

6 He brought out the Asherah from the house of Yahweh, outside of Jerusalem, to the brook Kidron, and burned it at the brook Kidron, and beat it to dust, and cast the dust of it on the graves of the common people.

7 He broke down the houses of the sodomites, that were in the house of Yahweh, where the women wove hangings for the Asherah.