Page:03.BCOT.KD.HistoricalBooks.B.vol.3.LaterProphets.djvu/516

 were present, to the number of 30,000 (head), and 3000 bullocks from the possession of the king (cf. 2Ch 31:3; 2Ch 32:29). כּל־הנּמצא is all the people who were present, who had come to the feast from Jerusalem and the rest of Judah without having brought lambs for sacrifice.

Verses 8-9
And his princes (the king's princes, i.e., the princes of the kingdom) presented for a free-will offering to the people, the priests, and the Levites. לנדבה is not to be taken adverbially, as Berth. thinks: according to goodwill, but corresponds to the לפּסחים, i.e., for free-will offerings, Lev 7:16. The number of these gifts is not stated. From the princes of the king we must distinguish the prefects of the house of God and the princes of the Levites, who are mentioned by name in 2Ch 35:8, 2Ch 35:9. Of these the first presented sheep and cattle for passover-sacrifices to the priests, the latter to the Levites. Of the three נגידים of the house of God named in 2Ch 35:8, Hilkiah is the high priest (2Ch 34:9), Zechariah perhaps the next to him (משׁנה כּהן, 2Ki 25:18; Jer 52:24), and Jehiel is probably, as Berth. conjectures, the chief of the line of Ithamar, which continued to exist even after the exile (Ezr 8:2). Of the Levite princes (2Ch 35:9) six names are mentioned, three of which, Conaniah, Shemaiah, and Jozabad, are met with under Hezekiah in 2Ch 31:12-15, since in the priestly and Levitic families the same names recur in different generations. The Conaniah in Hezekiah's time was chief overseer of the temple revenues; the two others were under overseers. Besides the פּסהים for which the king and the princes of the priests and of the Levites gave צאן, i.e., lambs and young goats, בּקר, oxen, in considerable numbers, are mentioned as presents; 3000 from the king, 300 from the princes of the priests, and 500 from the princes of the Levites. Nothing is said as to the purpose of these, but from 2Ch 35:13 we learn that the flesh of them was cooked in pots and caldrons, and consequently that they were intended for the sacrificial meals during the seven days of the Mazzoth-feast; see on 2Ch 35:12 and 2Ch 35:13.

Verses 10-15
The preparation of the paschal sacrifice and the paschal meals. - 2Ch 35:10 leads on to the carrying out of the arrangements. “So the service was prepared;” the preparation for the festival mentioned in 2Ch 35:3-9 was carried out. The priests stood at their posts (cf. 2Ch 30:16), and the Levites according to their courses, according to the command of the king (in 2Ch 35:4 and 2Ch 35:5).

Verse 11
And they (the Levites, cf. 2Ch 35:6)