Bible Commentaries

2 Kings 18:13-16 — At that time did Hezekiah cut off the gold from the doors of the temple of Jehovah, and from the pillars which Hezekiah king of Judah had overlaid, and gave it to the king of Assyria." Practically every word of the balance of this chapter and through 2 Kings 19 are given in the parallel account in Isaiah 36-37, where we have already written some sixteen pages of comments on these events. (See Vol. I of my major prophets series (Isaiah), pp. 329-345.) Montgomery referred to the two separate accounts

2 Kings 18:29-35 — of Rabshakeh. We shall summarize these arguments. (1)    It is foolish to rely on Egypt for help. The prophets of God had frequently warned God's people of such a foolish course, and so this must be understood simply as a fact. (2)    This argument was a theological one. Hezekiah had indeed taken away the high places and the altars mentioned; and Rabshakeh's false argument was that such must have displeased Jehovah. This, of course, was an outright lie. God

Psalms 28:4-5 — the operation of his hands, He will break them down and not build them up." This is a fourfold plea that God will deal with the wicked as they deserve. The plea is that God will execute justice upon the wicked enemies: (1) according to their work; (2) according to their wickedness; (3) after the operation of their hands; and (4) according to what they deserve. Such could be nothing less than absolute justice. Addis' notion that this was David's prayer, "for vengeance,"W. E. Addis, p. 377. misses

Ezekiel 14:7-9 — by myself" This meant that God would answer, not through the words of any true prophet, but by the summary execution of terrible penalties upon the idolater. "I will set my face against that man" Here is spelled out the penalty: (1) spiritual death, (2) being cut off from God's people, and (3) the experiencing of some terrible earthly calamity, of the type that would get public attention and make the victim an astonishment and a proverb. Two examples of this in the New Testament are the sudden death

Numbers 10:1-10 — the beginnings of your months, ye shall blow the trumpets over your burnt-offerings, and over the sacrifices of your peace-offerings; and they shall be to you for a memorial before your God: I am Jehovah your God." "Make thee two trumpets" (Numbers 10:2). It may not be supposed that God waited until the day before Israel was to march and then instructed Moses to make these silver trumpets. "It does not follow necessarily that the command was given at this time."Thomas Whitelaw, The Pulpit Commentary,

Numbers 16 overview — scholars agree on which passages belong either to "JE," or to "P"; and Marsh even split "J" into subordinate parts, that maneuver springing from the very obvious truth that the alleged "JE" is in no sense unified.John Marsh, Interpreter's Bible, Vol. 2, Numbers (New York: Abingdon Press, 1955), p. 225. Furthermore, both the Samaritan and Septuagint (LXX) versions support the narrative as it occurs here.Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Whole Bible, Vol. 1 (London: T. Mason and G. Lane, 1837), p. 667. How

Micah 2:11 — willing audience for anyone who panders to the vices of the age under the guise of proclaiming God's truth."David J. Clark, The New Layman's Bible Commentary (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1979), p. 991. The verses of this sub-section (Micah 2:6-11) have the utility of authenticating the prophecies of captivity for God's people, following invasion and destruction of their capitals. It is simply amazing that some of the critical commentators miss this; in fact, all of them miss it. They freely

Zechariah 2:12 — prophets. It is the holy land because Jesus' church began there, the first of the martyrs bled there, and because the earthly Jerusalem is typical of a heavenly reality, "the Jerusalem which is above, which is free, which is our mother" (Galatians 4:26). It is the holy land in the sense that Jesus rose from the dead in that city; there he appeared to his foreordained witnesses; there many of his most wonderful deeds were done; and there was fulfilled to the letter his sentence of death upon Jerusalem,

Deuteronomy 20:5-9 — have made an end of speaking unto the people, that they shall appoint captains of hosts at the head of the people." There are four grounds of exemption given here: (1)    for a house-builder who has not yet dedicated his house; (2)    for the planter of a vineyard who has not yet brought the vineyard into common production; (3)    for the betrothed husband who has not yet taken his wife; and (4)    for all cowards. We

John 1:45 — Philip findeth Nathaniel, and saith unto him, We have found him, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. All that Philip here said of Jesus is true: (1) that Moses and the prophets wrote of him, (2) that he was of Nazareth, and (3) that he was the son of Joseph, although the latter was true legally, not actually. Thus, any effort to force a "conflict" between John and the synoptics is nothing but a device of unbelief. Being the legal

Acts 11:20 — river, some twenty miles from the sea, where the river emerges from between the Lebanon and Taurus mountain ranges, it was a city "of great extent and remarkable beauty." F. N. Peloubet, Bible Dictionary (Chicago: The John C. Winston Company, 1925), p. 36. It was distinguished by two great colonnaded streets intersecting at the center and dividing Antioch into quadrants. "Octavian, Tiberius, Trajan … and Hadrian adorned and equipped it with temple, theater, colonnade, circus, bath

Acts 2:14-16 — be this known unto you, and give ear unto my words. For these are not drunken, as ye suppose; seeing it is but the third hour of the day; but this is that which was spoken through the prophet Joel. Peter standing up with the eleven … In Acts 1:26, Luke said that Matthias was "numbered with the eleven," meaning that Matthias was the twelfth man. In the same way, Peter's standing up "with the eleven," as here, means that Peter was the twelfth man. Thus the Twelve participated

Acts 2:32 — Gospels should be received the same way, especially in view of the truth that the "variations" in them are so minor as to be negligible. Hunter noted that the New Testament accounts of the resurrection all agree (1) that the tomb was empty and (2) that the resurrection occurred the third day. Regarding the empty tomb, he said: Paul's tradition implies it. So does the apostolic preaching in Acts. The four evangelists declare it. The silence of the Jews confirms it … In trying to fathom

Romans 5:18 — than seven words into this verse by the translators to make Paul say what they thought he meant was altogether gratuitous. They do not clarify at all, but merely confuse. Stripping the verse of the italicized portions of it (which make up more that 20 percent of it), we have the following: So then as through one trespass unto all men to condemnation; so through one act of righteousness unto all men to justification of life. This is a terse way of saying that, just as through one act of Adam all

James 2:26 — For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, even so faith apart from works is dead. See under James 2:17, above, for elaboration of the meaning of the comparison here. Ward warned against "pressing the parallelism too far"; Ronald A. Ward, op. cit., p. 1229. but it is not apparent to this student how that would be possible. Certainly all of

Judges 10:6-9 — surprise that some have expressed at this is due to their failure to recognize the fact that we have here a double introduction: (1) There is the introduction to the judgeship of Jephthah and his deliverance of Israel out of the hand of the Ammonites, and (2) this chapter also is an introduction anticipating the conflict of Samson with the Philistines. "This also explains the fact that the Samson narrative, which is the second longest in the Book of Judges, has but a single verse introducing the story."Ibid.,

Judges 2:1-5 — and wept. And they called the name of that place Bochim: and they sacrificed there unto Jehovah." "The angel of Jehovah" "This is the expression used in the O.T. to denote God Himself in His manifestation to men."The New Bible Commentary, Revised, p. 259 "The phrase is used about sixty times in the O.T. to designate the Angel of God's Presence, and in all cases where a message is delivered (as here), He does it as if God Himself were speaking."Albert Barnes, Notes on Bible Books, Judges, p. 418. Here,

1 John 1:4 — possession of Christians. J. W. Roberts has given a thorough discussion of this in his commentary. He cited many passages that indicate that, "In some sense, John sees the Christian as enjoying eternal life here and now,"J. W. Roberts, op. cit., p. 26, 27. a proposition that is obvious to any reader or student of John. He concluded that, "The eternal life which the believer has (present tense) is to be interpreted not as quantitative (everlasting) but as qualitative."Ibid. Those qualities

Revelation 13 overview — that Satan, in any sense, either created or produced these monsters, called by Moffatt, "polycephalous brutes." James Moffatt, Expositor's Greek New Testament, Vol. V (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1967), p. 429. He simply encouraged and organized the emerging tendency of a human creation in rebellion against God. The beast out of the sea symbolically represents the great earthly governments which repeatedly in human history have exalted themselves against

Revelation 4:4 — heads crowns of gold. There are almost as many explanations of this as there are commentators. Who are these elders? They have been variously identified as symbolical of: (1) the "raptured" church which allegedly had already happened; Ibid. (2) the twenty-four star gods of the Babylonian pantheon; G. B. Caird, op. cit., p. 63. (3) in the Targum the elders are interpreted as leaders of the Jewish people; (4) the twenty-four priestly orders enumerated in 1 Chronicles 24:4 ff; G. R. Beasley-Murray,