Page:The Books of Chronicles (1916).djvu/296

232 dedicated, silver, and gold, and vessels. And there was no more war unto the five and thirtieth year of the reign of Asa. In the six and thirtieth year of the reign of Asa, Baasha king of Israel went up against Judah, and built Ramah, that he might not suffer any to go out or come in to Asa king of Judah. Then Asa brought out silver and gold out of the treasures of the house of the and of the king's

his spoils, but that Asa first actually presented them in the Temple. The verse is quoted verbatim from 1 Kin. xv. 15, and is most obscure, so that there is probability in the view that it is only a misplaced repetition of 1 Kin. vii. 51 b. No stress can therefore be laid on the suggestion that we may see in this statement an indirect confirmation of Abijah's victory recorded in 2 Chr. xiii.

19. there was no more war] This statement can be reconciled with 1 Kin. xv. 16, 32 only by interpreting it broadly to mean that nothing serious occurred until the war with Baasha had been going on for several years: a forced interpretation. Perhaps the Chronicler deliberately contradicts Kings "there was war between Asa and Baasha all their days," assigning to Asa's reign a time of peace which seemed appropriate to his piety.

1—6 (= 1 Kin. xv. 17—22).&emsp;

1. the six and thirtieth year] According to 1 Kin. xvi. 8 Baasha was succeeded by his son Elah in the six-and-twentieth year of Asa. The number thirty-six may therefore be wrong. It should be noticed however that the thirty-sixth year of the separate kingdom of Judah corresponds with the sixteenth year of Asa, so that possibly two different reckonings are here confused and we should read, In the six and thirtieth year, that is, in the sixteenth year of Asa. So in xv. 19 we should read, in the five and thirtieth, that is, in the fifteenth year of the reign of Asa. This scheme of Asa's reign, however, agrees badly with the dominant ideas of the Chronicler, for the religious reform and covenant in the fifteenth year (ver. 10) ought not to have been immediately followed by war in the sixteenth year, but rather by a period of peace and prosperity. Hence thirty-six may after all be the original text, and we must suppose that the Chronicler either ignored or overlooked 1 Kin. xvi. 8; or perhaps that he quoted from a midrashic source, having a different system of chronology from that in Kings.

Ramah] The modern er-Rām, situated on a commanding hill about two hours north of Jerusalem. Bädeker, Pal.$5$, p. 216.

2. silver and gold] In 1 Kin., "all the silver and the gold that were left."