He was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Abi the daughter of Zechariah.
This verse gives three plain facts about Hezekiah: his age, the length of his reign, and his mother's name. Each one carries weight. His age raises a famous puzzle about his father. The years of his reign date the illness that nearly killed him. His mother's name points to the person who shaped him.
The mother the record names
Her name appears in Scripture in two forms:
Morrish Bible DictionaryAbijah. Daughter of Zechariah and mother of Hezekiah, 2 Chronicles 29:1: shortened to ABI in 2 Kings 18:2.
Who her father Zechariah was is not certain, and commentators only offer possibilities. What her son became, however, invites a conclusion about her:
C. Knapp"His mother's name was Abi the daughter of Zechariah." Her father was perhaps one of the two faithful witnesses of Isaiah 8:2. Or she may have been a descendant of the Zechariah who guided Uzziah during the earlier part of his reign; or even of the martyr Zechariah, killed by order of king Joash. Either way, she must have been a true "mother in Israel" to have raised so godly a son, with such a wicked father's example in front of him. Mothers, what a responsibility is yours, and what a privilege too! It is as if God says to you, "Take this child, and nurse it for Me, and I will give you your wages." Abi certainly had her "wages" when she saw her son renew and reform the ruined kingdom of his father David. Often, in truth, the hand that rocks the cradle rules the empire, whether for good or for harm.
Upbringing is not the whole explanation
A godly upbringing can be traced in Hezekiah, but one writer warns against turning that into a rule, since Judah's history supplies the counter-examples:
H. L. RossierHezekiah's mother was probably from the priestly or Levite family. No doubt, as we have often noticed, the Lord used her in bringing up her son. His father Ahaz, on the other hand, could only have had a bad influence on him. But whatever these good or bad influences may have been, grace alone explains the characters of Hezekiah and of Josiah. The last kings of Judah prove it: they were ungodly despite their Jewish mothers and their godly father.
No one is bound by his father
Hezekiah came to the throne at twenty-five, straight from the reign of one of Judah's worst kings, and he broke the pattern:
Leslie M. GrantHis father set an unusually bad example, yet Hezekiah did not follow it. Every person should realise that he does not have to walk in his father's ungodly footsteps. Hezekiah's grandfather Uzziah had been a faithful man by comparison. But we are not told that Hezekiah did according to all that Uzziah had done — he did according to all that his father David had done. So David was his example, the first king of God's choice in Israel.
The puzzle of "twenty-five years old"
The age creates one of the best-known arithmetic problems in Scripture, because Ahaz was twenty when he began to reign and reigned sixteen years:
C. KnappThis seems to teach that Ahaz was only eleven years old when his son Hezekiah was born, which is highly unlikely, if not impossible… Fausset says "twenty" in 2 Kings 16:2 is "a copyist's error" for "twenty-five"… But one writer aptly replies: "We may observe that it is never advisable to find fault with the text except where there is no other tolerable solution, which is not the case here."
Rather than correcting the text, two explanations are offered that leave the numbers standing:
C. KnappFirst, it is quite possible that a break of some years occurred in king Ahaz's reign… Second, Scripture does not say that Hezekiah began to reign immediately after his father's death. True, the usual wording is used — "Ahaz slept with his fathers … and Hezekiah his son reigned in his place"… So a number of years, Scripture allows us to believe, may have passed between the death of Ahaz (because of the unsettled state of his kingdom) and Hezekiah's accession. This would entirely remove any difficulty about Ahaz's young age at the birth of his firstborn.
Why twenty-nine years matters
The length of his reign fixes the date of the illness that nearly killed him:
C. Knapp"In those days Hezekiah became sick and was at the point of death." "Those days" must refer to the time of the Assyrian invasion, or just after Sennacherib came up. That was the fourteenth year of Hezekiah's reign, since the prophet promised him fifteen more years of life. As he reigned twenty-nine years, there is no difficulty at all in fixing the exact time of his sickness. Men make difficulties for themselves, where there really are none, by listening to uncertain monument records instead of holding to the simple and sure statements of Holy Scripture.
Summary
- Named — she is Abi here and Abijah in Chronicles, the daughter of Zechariah.
- Nurtured — she raised a godly son under a wicked father. The hand that rocks the cradle rules the empire.
- Grace — upbringing alone will not explain him. Later kings had godly mothers and still turned out badly. Grace alone accounts for Hezekiah.
- Free — his pattern was David, not Ahaz or even Uzziah. No one has to walk in a father's ungodly footsteps.
- Numbered — both numbers stand as written. The age problem has fair answers without changing the text, and the twenty-nine years date his illness to his fourteenth year.