2 Kings 22:13

Go ye, inquire of the LORD for me, and for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that is found: for great is the wrath of the LORD that is kindled against us, because our fathers have not hearkened unto the words of this book, to do according unto all that which is written concerning us.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(13) Enquire of the Lord.—Or, seek ye Jehovah. Josiah wished to know whether any hope remained for himself and his people, or whether the vengeance must fall speedily.

For the people.—Of Jerusalem.

Written concerning us.—Thenius conjectures written therein, a slight change in the Hebrew. But Josiah identifies the people and their fathers as one nation. (Comp. also Exodus 20:5.) However Chronicles has “in this book,” and the Arabic here “in it.”

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

22:11-20 The book of the law is read before the king. Those best honour their Bibles, who study them; daily feed on that bread, and walk by that light. Convictions of sin and wrath should put us upon this inquiry, What shall we do to be saved? Also, what we may expect, and must provide for. Those who are truly apprehensive of the weight of God's wrath, cannot but be very anxious how they may be saved. Huldah let Josiah know what judgments God had in store for Judah and Jerusalem. The generality of the people were hardened, and their hearts unhumbled, but Josiah's heart was tender. This is tenderness of heart, and thus he humbled himself before the Lord. Those who most fear God's wrath, are least likely to feel it. Though Josiah was mortally wounded in battle, yet he died in peace with God, and went to glory. Whatever such persons suffer or witness, they are gathered to the grave in peace, and shall enter into the rest which remaineth for the people of God.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Enquire of the Lord - As inquiry by Urim and Thummim had ceased - apparently because superseded by prophecy - this order was equivalent to an injunction to seek the presence of a prophet (compare 2 Kings 3:11; 1 Kings 22:5).

Because our fathers have not hearkened - Josiah, it will be observed, assumes that preceding generations had had full opportunity of hearing and knowing the Law. He thus regards the loss as comparatively recent (compare 2 Kings 22:8 note).

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

12-15. the king commanded … Go, inquire of the Lord for me, &c.—The agitated feelings of the king prompted him to ask immediate counsel how to avert those curses under which his kingdom lay; and forthwith a deputation of his principal officers was sent to one endowed with the prophetic spirit.

Ahikam—a friend of Jeremiah (Jer 26:24).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Inquire of the Lord; either what he intends to do with us, or what we shall do to him, to appease his wrath.

Concerning the words of this book; whether the curses here threatened must come upon us without remedy, or whether there be hope in Israel concerning the prevention of them.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Go ye, inquire of the Lord,.... Of some of his prophets, as Jeremiah, who began to prophesy in the thirteenth year of Josiah's reign, and had been a prophet five years, Jeremiah 1:1,

for me, and for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that is found; for he observed that this book threatened and foretold not only the captivity of the ten tribes, but of Judah, and of their king; and Jarchi thinks, he had a particular respect to that passage:

the Lord shall bring thee and thy king, &c. Deuteronomy 28:36 and therefore was desirous of knowing what he and his people must do to avert those judgments:

for great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us; which he concluded from the threatenings denounced:

because that our fathers have not hearkened unto the words of this book, to do according to all which is written concerning us: he clearly saw that his ancestors more remote and immediate had been very deficient in observing the laws, commands, and ordinances enjoined them in that book; and therefore feared that what was threatened would fall upon him and his people, who, he was sensible, came short of doing their duty.

Geneva Study Bible

Go ye, {f} enquire of the LORD for me, and for the people, and for all Judah, concerning the words of this book that is found: for great is the wrath of the LORD that is kindled against us, because our fathers have not hearkened unto the words of this book, to do according unto all that which is written concerning us.

(f) Meaning, to some prophet to whom God reveals the knowledge of things, as in Jer 21:8, though at other times they enquired the Lord by Urim and Thummim.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

13. our fathers have not hearkened] The two reigns of Manasseh and Amon had led the whole people away to idolatry. Of the former of these kings it is said (2 Kings 12:11) ‘He hath made Judah also to sin with his idols’. For two generations at the least the retrospect of king Josiah was a very dark one.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 13. - Go ye, inquire of the Lord for me. Inquiry of the Lord, which from the time of Moses to that of David was ordinarily "by Urim and Thummim," was after David's time always made by the consultation of a prophet (see 1 Kings 22:5-8; 2 Kings 3:11; 2 Kings 8:8; Jeremiah 21:2; Jeremiah 37:7; Ezekiel 14:7; Ezekiel 20:1, etc.). The officers, therefore, understood the king to mean that they were to seek out a prophet (see ver. 14), and so make the inquiry. And for the people, and for all Judah - the threats read in the king's ears were probably those of Deuteronomy 28:15-68 or Leviticus 26:16-39, which extended to the whole people - concerning the words of this book that is found. Not "whether they are authentic, whether they are really the words of Moses" (Duneker), for of that Josiah appears to have had no doubt; but whether they are words that are to have an immediate fulfillment, "whether," as Yon Gerlach says, "the measure of sin is already full, or whether there is yet hope of grace?" (compare Huldah's answer in vers. 16-20, which shows what she understood the king's inquiry to be). For great is the wrath of the Lord that is kindled against us. Josiah recognized that Judah had done, and was still doing, exactly those things against which the threatenings of the Law were directed - bad forsaken Jehovah and gone after other gods, and made to themselves high places, and set up images, and done after the customs of the nations whom the Lord had cast out before them. He could not, therefore, doubt but that the wrath of the Lord "was kindled;" but would it blaze forth at once? Because our fathers have not hearkened unto the words of this book, to do according unto all that which is written concerning us. Josiah assumes that their fathers have had the book, and might have known its words, either because he conceives that it had not been very long lost, or because he regards them as having possessed other copies. 2 Kings 22:13

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

From the commission, "Inquire ye of Jehovah for me and for the people and for all Judah (i.e., the whole kingdom) concerning the words of this book of the law that has been found, for great is the wrath of the Lord which has been kindled against us, because our fathers have not heard ...," we may infer that the curses of the law upon the despisers of the commandments of God in Leviticus 26; Deuteronomy 28:1, and other passages, had been read to the king. את־יי דּרשׁ means to inquire the will of the Lord, what He has determined concerning the king, his people, and the kingdom. על שׁמע signifies here to hearken to anything, to observe it, for which אל is used elsewhere. על כּתב, to prescribe for performance. עלינוּ, "prescribed for us," is quite appropriate, since the law was not only given to the fathers to obey, but also to the existing generation-a fact which Thenius has overlooked with his conjecture עליו. To render the king's alarm and his fear of severe judgments from God intelligible, there is no need for the far-fetched and extremely precarious hypothesis, that just at that time the Scythians had invaded and devastated the land.