2 Chronicles 12:2-4 And it came to pass, that in the fifth year of king Rehoboam Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem… I. THE INVADER. Shishak King of Egypt, the Sesonchis of Manetho, the Shashanq I. of the monuments (s.c. 966). Originally the son of an Assyrian king named Nimrod, "who had met his death in Egypt and been buried at Abydos," Shashanq I. of the twenty-second dynasty established his seat of royalty at Bubastis, in Lower Egypt (Brugsch, 'Egypt under the Pharaohs,' 2:215, 216; Ebers, in Riehm's 'Handworterbuch,' art. "Sisak;" 'Records of the Past,' 12:93). His mother's name was Tentespeh, his wife's Tahpenes (1 Kings 11:19). One of his wife's sisters married Hadad the Edomite; another became the wife of Jeroboam (Stanley, 'Jewish Church,' 2:275; Ewald, 'History of Israel,' 3:217; 4:32). II. THE ARMY. 1. Chariots. In ancient times a common instrument of war (Exodus 14:9; 2 Samuel 15:1; 1 Kings 20:1). Shishak had twelve hundred, or twice the number of Pharaoh's chosen chariots in the time of Moses (Exodus 14:7). The Philistines once collected against Israel thirty thousand (1 Samuel 13:5). Solomon had fourteen hundred (1 Kings 10:26), Rehoboam likely not so many in consequence of the disruption of the kingdom. 2. Horsemen. Sixty thousand; five times as many as had belonged to Solomon (1 Kings 4:26), and twelve times as many as the Philistines had brought against Israel (1 Samuel 13:5). Forty thousand mounted warriors once fell before David's troops (2 Samuel 10:18). 3. Infantry. Without number, composed of native forces and mercenaries or foreign troops - Lubims, Sukkims, and Ethiopians. (1) The Lubims, or Libyans (2 Chronicles 16:8; Daniel 11:43), the Lehabim of Genesis 10:13, the Temhu, or Tehennu, or more accurately the eastern portion of this people, the Lubu of the monuments (Ebers, 'Egypt and the Books of Moses,' p. 104), were the inhabitants of the districts of Marcotis and Libya west of the Canopic arm of the Nile (Knobel), or in the larger sense the Liby-AEgyptii of the ancients (Keil), the people dwelling between Lower Egypt and the Roman province of Africa (Kautzsch in Riehm, art. "Libyer"). (2) The Sukkim were aborigines of Africa, "cavemen," troglodytes (LXX., Vulgate), "probably the Ethiopian troglodytes upon the mountains on the west coast of the Arabian Gulf" (Bertheau), whom Strabo and Pliny mention, the latter speaking of a troglodyte city Suche, which has been identified with Suakim (Kautzsch). (3) The Ethiopians, or Cushites, introduced among the forces of Shishak (cf. Nab. 3:9) were drawn from the African territory south of Egypt. III. THE REASON. 1. Shishak's. Perhaps to assist Jeroboam in his measures of hostility against Rehoboam, and eventually to secure the supremacy of Judah, possibly also of Israel as well. 2. Jehovah's. To punish Rehoboam and Judah for their apostasy. Though second causes need not be overlooked, they must not be permitted to obscure, far less to deny, the first. Had Rehoboam remained faithful to Jehovah, all the intrigues of Jeroboam would have failed to start Shishak on the extradition here reported. IV. THE PROGRESS. Shishak captured all the fenced cities of Judah in which Rehoboam trusted (2 Chronicles 11:5-9), and encamped his army before the walls of Jerusalem. Vain, after all, had been Rehoboam's confidence. His garrisons and soldiers had yielded the first assault, The props on which men lean often prove broken reeds. The shelters to which sinners run in the day of calamity mostly turn out refuges of lies (Isaiah 28:17). Lessons. 1. The certainty of sin being sooner or later overtaken by retribution (Numbers 32:23). 2. The weakness of all defences, whether for nations or for individuals, when God is not within them (Psalm 127:1). 3. When God has a sinner to chastise he can easily find an instrument wherewith to do it (Isaiah 10:5). - W. Parallel Verses KJV: And it came to pass, that in the fifth year of king Rehoboam Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem, because they had transgressed against the LORD, |
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