Ahaz was twenty years old when he began to reign; and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem. And he did not what was right in the sight of Jehovah, like David his father,
Ahaz comes to the throne of Judah at twenty, and the summary God gives of him is a negative one: he did not match David. That one measurement shapes the whole chapter. It also raises a question: who sets the standard for a life?
The same record is written of one king after another in Judah. One writer notes that with Ahaz evil moved fast, and prophecies of ruin began.
But even in Judah, one king arises after another of whom there is the emphatic record — "he did not do what was right in the eyes of the LORD his God, as his father David had done." These are the exact words used of Ahaz. In his reign evil moved so fast that we begin to find predictions of utter desolation against Jerusalem, the land, and its people. They appear in prophecies written during his reign and in those that followed.
Why David? A writer explains it while commenting on Amaziah, an earlier king who also fell short of that mark.
To govern his conduct, Amaziah should have gone back to the origin of the kingship and to the conduct of David, king according to God's heart. Certainly David had failed badly in his life, and he had to undergo severe discipline for it. But David's heart had always been upright when it came to the Lord's service and the throne of God among His people.
Ahaz chose a different pattern — the kings of the ten northern tribes, who had broken away from David's house. One writer notes that the word "evil" here is always measured by one relationship, not by public reputation.
Notice that this description "evil" is always given to us in reference to the Lord. It does happen that forsaking God hands the guilty person over to all sorts of moral evil, to crime and impurity. But it is not always so. Jeroboam I, Joash of Israel, and Jeroboam II were remarkable monarchs in the eyes of men. Two of them were "saviours" of their nation, helping to establish its reputation and to win back its territory. But for God the question is a different one. It is a matter of determining the relationship that these kings, like Ahaz king of Judah here, had with Him.
The age is not incidental. Ahaz had every advantage of a godly line, and one commentator draws attention to how early and how deliberately he turned from it.
Ahaz stands in painful contrast to his father. Jotham had not been able to turn Judah away from worship in the high places. It seems his influence over his own son was also ineffective. From the start of his reign, at the age of twenty, Ahaz had set himself on a course of evil.
The verse sits directly after the record of Jotham, who did right. That contrast has always troubled readers, and one writer points to the silence about Ahaz's mother as a possible clue.
It seems strange that the best of men often have the worst of sons. Ahaz's mother is not mentioned, and it is possible that his father was unfortunate in his choice of a wife. A king carries the heavy responsibilities of government all the time. He can have little time to give to training his children, so that duty must fall largely on the mother.
The chapter that opens with this verse does not record a slow drift but a hardening under repeated appeals from God.
Jotham did better, as we read in 2 Chronicles 27, but Ahaz walked in the ways of Israel's kings, and despite calls of grace (2 Chronicles 28), he sank lower and lower. His son Hezekiah was simple and strong in faith.
Remarkably, it was to this king that one of the greatest promises in the Bible was given.
The house of David was ripening for judgement: 120,000 men fell in one day, and 200,000 women and children were taken to Samaria. A prophet named Oded secured their release. God's mercy lingered over Judah, and He gave Ahaz the sign that "the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel." Everything was failing in Judah as well as in Israel. Yet God had One in prospect through whom He would finally secure blessing.
- Standard. God measured Judah's kings against David, whose heart was upright toward the Lord's service. Ahaz never reached that mark.
- Substitute. He copied the kings of Israel instead. God weighs "evil" by a man's relationship to Him, not by public success.
- Start. At twenty he was already set on that course, so a good father's influence proved no guarantee.
- Slide. Calls of grace came, and he sank lower instead of turning back.
- Son. Yet God gave this king the promise of Immanuel, and his own son Hezekiah was strong in faith — mercy outlasting the man who despised it.
but walked in the ways of the kings of Israel, and even made molten images for the Baals;
Ahaz inherits David's throne in Jerusalem. At once he takes his model from the northern kingdom, which had already left the Lord. The verse names the model he chose and the images he made. Where does a borrowed pattern of worship end?
Walking "in the ways of the kings of Israel" was not vague drift. One writer names the reign Ahaz was reviving, and then shows what the word "evil" measures.
Instead of serving the Lord, he walked in the ways of the kings of Israel. He went back to the evil days of ungodly Ahab. In Judah he set up the worship of Baal and of Moloch, to whom he sacrificed his sons. … Notice that this word "evil" is always given to us in reference to the Lord. No doubt forsaking God can hand the guilty one over to all sorts of moral evil, to crime and impurity. But it is not always so. Jeroboam I, Joash of Israel, and Jeroboam II were remarkable monarchs in the eyes of men. Two of them were "saviours" of their nation. … But for God the question is a different one. It is a matter of determining the relationship these kings, like Ahaz king of Judah here, had with Him. … People today especially forget that the moral stature of a man is found in how he acts toward God.
Ahaz had better examples close at hand. He passed over them.
Ahaz stands in painful contrast to his father. Jotham had not been able to turn Judah away from worshipping in high places. His influence over his own son seems to have failed too. From the start of his reign, at the age of twenty, Ahaz set himself on a course of evil. Ignoring the faithfulness of his father David and that of other kings of Judah, he chose to follow the wicked example of the kings of Israel.
The name Ahaz cast in metal is plural: "the Baals" (older translations read "Baalim"). Its meaning explains the appeal.
The word "Baals" means "lords," just as today there are many who will talk about "the Lord" while not at all meaning the Lord Jesus. … People commonly prefer a substitute that will not try their consciences.
A dictionary entry names this "lord" and describes his worship in the land Israel entered.
The name means "master, possessor". … The chief male god of the Phoenicians and the Canaanites. When the Israelites came into the land, they no doubt found temples, groves, altars and high places set apart to Baal. There people offered incense, burned offerings, and sacrificed children to him.
Ahaz did not create the appetite he fed. One writer looks back at Jotham: the king did right, but the people were corrupt.
If the people acting corruptly shows a lack of energy in the king, how much greater was the corruption in his son Ahaz? He soon went further, and led the people in their corruption. Jotham could not put down the idolatry of his own family, or hold back the leanings of the heir to his throne. Much less could he hold back the same leanings in the nation. Two things mark his reign. The king himself was righteous, but he had no zeal. Meanwhile the people acted corruptly, and so made themselves ready to follow Ahaz in all his abominations.
The images of verse 2 were the opening move of a reign that hardened under every blow.
The reign of Ahaz forms a turning point. He forsakes the Lord completely and gives himself up wholly to idolatry. The more God strikes him, the more he sins against Him. … All this distress leads Ahaz to seek help from the king of Assyria, who only brought him into still greater trouble.
One writer sets a king like Ahaz inside a larger story: man's failure shown again and again.
In the lives of many people, God first showed their failure and then made them objects of grace. History shows that His dealings with man as a whole follow the same order. … Thirty-nine books of the Old Testament testify to the failure of man: in paradise; after the fall, when he was given a conscience; in the time of government, as with Noah; in the time of promise, as with Abraham; and in the time of the law, as with Moses. In every case, man failed. Even the priesthood God gave failed. The kings failed. And when God sent prophets to call for repentance, men failed to listen.
- Pattern — Ahaz took his model from the kings of Israel, reviving the Baal and Moloch worship of Ahab's days.
- Measure — God measures him by David, not by public success. A king can be "remarkable in the eyes of men" and evil in reference to the Lord.
- Substitute — "Baal" means lord or master; people still prefer a lord who will not trouble the conscience.
- Soil — A father who was right himself but had no zeal left both family and nation ready to follow Ahaz.
- Slide — The cast images were only the start. The more God struck him, the more he sinned, and the help he bought brought worse trouble. Man fails at every stage, and grace comes after.
and he burned incense in the valley of the son of Hinnom, and burned his sons in the fire, according to the abominations of the nations that Jehovah had dispossessed from before the children of Israel.
Ahaz, a king in David's line, burned his own sons in a ravine outside Jerusalem, copying the nations God had driven out. Two questions follow: how could a king sink this low, and what does God do with a nation that acts like the people it replaced?
Ahaz did not invent his religion. He copied the kings of Israel. One writer weighs what that says about the guilt of Judah's kings.
Another effect of that link with Ahab is that Ahaz walked in the ways of the kings of Israel. This expression seems to mark the greatest guilt of the kings of Judah, and it is used after a link with Ahab. Ahaz burned his children in the fire. Manasseh dealt with a medium and with mediums. Could the chosen nation sink lower?
One writer describes what these sacrifices involved. He also notes that men like Ahaz thought of themselves as religious.
He made idol images and burned incense in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, and there he sacrificed his own children to the fire (v. 3). They did this by placing the young child in the arms of a metal idol. Then they lit a fire under the child and beat drums to drown out the child's cries. Such is the callous wickedness of idolatry. Yet men like Ahaz think they are very religious when they practise it.
Some readers take the phrase "pass through the fire" as a harmless dedication ceremony. One writer rejects that, and sets what the idol demanded beside what God asked for:
Some have used the words "passing through the fire," here and elsewhere, to deny that they burned their children. But this seems a kind attempt to soften how wicked it really was. It was the fullest, though not the only, profanation of the name of Israel's God. The Lord accepted a sheep or an ox, or even a much smaller sacrifice; Satan under these names demanded their sons.
Ahaz copied "the abominations of the nations whom the LORD drove out." God had warned Israel: the land would cast them out for the same sins.
For these sins the land they were entering was casting out its inhabitants. And they are warned: if they practise such things, it will cast them out too. God's righteousness is the same towards all His creatures. Israel, now cast out of their land, are witnesses to it.
The valley itself matters. What happened there gave it a name the New Testament still uses.
In some part of this valley, thought to be the east end, children were passed through the fire to false gods. To stop this, Josiah defiled Topheth in this valley. The prophet Isaiah gives the key to why the New Testament links this place, under the name Gehenna, with eternal punishment. Isaiah writes: "For a burning place has long been prepared; indeed, for the king it is made ready, its pyre made deep and wide, with fire and wood in abundance; the breath of the LORD, like a stream of sulfur, kindles it."
Defeat followed defeat. One writer traces what those blows did to Ahaz.
The reign of Ahaz forms an epoch. Completely forsaking the Lord, he gives himself up wholly to idolatry; and the more he is struck by God, the more he sins against Him. He is handed over to the Syrians, and to Pekah, the king of Israel.
God still sent a promise into this reign. One writer notes who received it — not a reformer, but the man who burned his children.
The godly might have had discouraged moments when Ahaz reigned, yet what a clear and definite promise is given, and given to "that king Ahaz"! Not for his sake is it given, but to tell the nation what God will do for them, and to cheer and brighten the lives of the oppressed few.
- Copying. Ahaz's guilt starts with copying. Walking in the ways of the kings of Israel seems to mark the greatest guilt of Judah's kings.
- Burning. The rite was real burning, not a symbolic dedication; where God asked for a sheep, the idol demanded a son.
- Repeating. He did what the nations had done. God had driven them out for it, and the same standard later emptied Israel's land.
- Naming. Josiah later defiled Topheth in that valley. The New Testament calls the place Gehenna and links it with eternal punishment.
- Sparing. Blow after blow only hardened him, yet God still sent a clear promise to "that king Ahaz" — for the sake of the faithful few, not for his.
And he sacrificed and burned incense on the high places, and on the hills, and under every green tree.
Ahaz moves the worship of Judah out of the house God had chosen and spreads it across hilltops and shady trees. So what was a "high place," and why did God count that worship as evil?
Ahaz did not invent the high places. Where the ESV says he "made offerings," older translations read "burned incense." His father Jotham left them standing, and one writer traces the line from father to son, and on to worship today.
Though his father Jotham did not burn incense in the high places, he had allowed those places to remain, and Ahaz forgot the temple of God and burned incense in the high places and other outdoor areas. He was like many today who claim they need not gather with others to worship God, but can worship just as well in enjoying the scenery while they hunt or fish or play golf or hike in the mountains.
The words about hills and green trees are not just scenery. They come from Moses' warning about the religion Israel would meet in the land.
The high places were very offensive to the Lord, because they were the expression of the people's neglect and even contempt for His chosen centre. He had plainly commanded the people to destroy all the images of the Canaanites and to tear down their high places. Moses told the people before he died that they would find the land full of idols, with places of worship "on the high mountains and on the hills and under every green tree." All this came from the self-will of people who knew nothing of God, people under the blinding influence of Satan. But the people of God must not be like them. They must listen to His voice, and obey Him in all things, especially in matters of worship. He would choose His own centre, and there the tribes of Israel were to bring their sacrifices and offerings.
Scattered shrines fit a scattered idea of God. One writer sets that against the God Israel knew.
There are many demons. That is why the nations worship many gods in many places: on the high mountains, on the hills, and under every green tree! In contrast, the main thought of the Old Testament is "The LORD our God, the LORD is one." They knew Him as the Creator God, the Almighty, and as Jehovah. That is why there can be only one place of worship, only one way to render service to God. There can be no agreement with idol worship.
High places did not begin as idol shrines. One writer explains how they started, and what changed.
The high place was a sort of necessity, brought in by the failure and disordered state of the people as a whole. So high places were not necessarily connected with idolatry. In fact, at the start they were devoted to the true worship of God. To some extent they were places where He Himself in grace recognised the need and met with His people, though not according to the order He Himself had provided. Later on, however, He established His centre, placed His name at Jerusalem, and the temple of His glory was there. From then on, worship at the high places was direct disobedience to His will. So it was bound to become more and more connected with the idolatry the people were always prone to.
Ahaz is called evil. One writer asks who that word measures him against.
Notice that this description "evil" is always given to us in reference to the Lord. Forsaking God does sometimes hand the guilty man over to all sorts of moral evil, to crime and impurity. But it is not always so. Jeroboam I, Joash of Israel, and Jeroboam II were remarkable kings in the eyes of men. Two of them were "saviours" of their nation, helping to build its reputation and to win back its territory. But for God the question is a different one. It is a matter of deciding what relationship these kings, like Ahaz king of Judah here, had with Him.
- Tolerated. Jotham never burned incense in the high places, but he left them standing — and so handed his son a compromise to take up.
- Adopted. Ahaz went further than his father. He burned incense on the hills and under the trees himself — the kind of shrine God had told Israel to tear down.
- Scattered. Many gods suit many places. Because the Lord is one, there is one place of worship and one way to serve Him.
- Disobedient. High places once met God's grace. After He placed His name in Jerusalem, worship there was plain disobedience, and it slid into idolatry.
- Measured. The word over Ahaz is "evil" — and God measures a reign by its relationship to Him, not by its reputation among men.
Therefore Jehovah his God gave him into the hand of the king of Syria; and they smote him, and carried away a great multitude of them captives, and brought them to Damascus. And he was also given into the hand of the king of Israel, who smote him with a great slaughter.
Ahaz filled Judah with idols, and two armies then tore his kingdom apart: Syria, and the northern kingdom of Israel. The verse credits neither army: the LORD his God handed Ahaz over, and the rest of the chapter shows what Ahaz did with that blow.
Ahaz had burned his own children in the fire. The defeat answered that. One writer traces the slide, and says there is no middle ground between God and Satan:
As we read the Old Testament histories, it is important to remember one thing. These things happened, and Scripture records them, as a warning to us. In looking at the history of Judah during the reign of Ahaz, we see the most fearful results of turning away from God. "He burned his sons as an offering, according to the abominations of the nations." How terrible! Man cannot turn from God without turning to Satan... God delivered him into the hand of the king of Syria, and into the hand of the king of Israel. That king struck him down with heavy loss of life, "because they had forsaken the LORD, the God of their fathers."
In Kings the same campaign ends with a note that the allied kings could not conquer Ahaz. This verse says God handed him over and they struck him. One commentator fits the two records together, and shows why Jerusalem itself escaped:
These statements do not clash at all with 2 Kings 16:5, which says that these allied kings "could not conquer him." They could not get into the city, and they could not reach the king himself, though they entered the land. "God delivered him," and "they struck him," means his people and kingdom... It was the purpose of "these two smoldering stumps of firebrands" to dethrone king Ahaz, and set up in his place "the son of Tabeal"... It was doubtless Satan's plot, if not man's, to destroy the line of David; and God, for this reason, did not deliver Jerusalem into their hands.
Syria and Israel won the day, but neither had clean hands. One writer states the principle at work:
In the way God governs nations, He may use one nation as His rod to punish another. We see this again and again in the Old Testament. But woe to the nation He uses this way if it grows proud of it. God rules with justice, so He will justly humble that nation in its turn. For it is true of all alike: "Have you not sins of your own against the LORD your God?" (2 Chr. 28:10).
The defeat by Syria was the first of a series: Israel, then Edom, then the Philistines. Watch which way Ahaz turned under each blow:
The reign of Ahaz forms a turning point. He forsakes Jehovah entirely and gives himself up wholly to idolatry. The more God strikes him, the more he sins against Him. He is delivered into the hands of the Syrians, and into the hand of Pekah, the king of Israel. In the latter case, however, God steps in to rescue at least the captives. The Edomites, and afterwards the Philistines, invade Judah. All this distress leads Ahaz to seek help from the king of Assyria. That help only brought him into still greater trouble.
Syria carried the captives away to Damascus. Ahaz drew his own conclusion from the defeat, and it was the wrong one:
God's patience had no good effect on Ahaz. His determination to do evil only grew; nothing stopped it (v. 22). Syria had defeated him, and he thought Syria did so by the power of their idols. So he took up Syria's idolatry and sacrificed to their gods. But this only involved him and all Judah in deeper evil.
Everything in Judah was falling apart under Ahaz. Into that ruin came a promise that reached far beyond him:
God's mercy lingered over Judah. He gave Ahaz the sign that "the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel." Everything was failing in Judah as well as in Israel. Yet God had One in prospect, through whom He would at last secure blessing.
- Handed over. Ahaz was not just outfought. His idolatry brought this on, and the verse names God Himself as the one who gave him up.
- Hand restrained. The allied kings entered the land, but they could not take the city or the king. God guarded the line of David even while He struck the nation.
- Hand borrowed. Syria and Israel were a rod, not heroes. Verse 10 asks the winners whether they have sins of their own against the LORD.
- Hand rejected. The more God struck him, the more Ahaz sinned. The blow that should have broken him hardened him, until he worshipped the gods of the army that beat him.
- Hand outstretched. To this idol-worshipping king came the promise of Immanuel. When Judah had nothing left, God pointed to the One through whom blessing would come at last.