2 Kings 21:10 - Meaning and Application

Here we read Judah and Jerusalem’s doom, and it is a heavy one. The prophets were first sent to teach them to know God, remind them of their duty, and guide them in it. If that did not work, their next task was to rebuke their sins and set those sins plainly before them, so they might repent, change, and return to their duty. If people still would not listen, the prophets then foretold God’s judgments, so the warning itself might awaken some to repentance, and the later judgment would prove that the prophets had truly been sent by God.

The prophets also served as judges for those who would not hear them as teachers. Here we have a full account of the crime. Manasseh, king of Judah, had sinned himself, even though he knew better, and he had gone beyond the wickedness of the Amorites, the pagan people whose ways he copied by outdoing them in sin. He also led God’s people into sin and forced them to sin. Besides that, he filled Jerusalem with innocent blood (2 Kings 21:16), spreading murder through the city and filling up the measure of Jerusalem’s guilt (Matthew 23:32). He did all this against the authority and honor of the King of kings, against the peace of his kingdom, and against the law that forbids such crimes.

Then comes God’s judgment: they have done evil, so I am bringing evil on them (2 Kings 21:12). It is near, and it will be terrible. Even the report of it would make ears tingle, meaning it would shock people and make their hearts tremble (2 Kings 21:12). It would become widely known and stir much discussion. The judgment would be copied from Samaria and the house of Ahab, because Jerusalem had copied their sins (2 Kings 21:13). When God measures righteousness, he will measure Jerusalem by the line used for Samaria, and when he measures judgment, he will use the plumb line of Ahab’s house. Those who imitate others in sin must expect to share their fate (Isaiah 28:17).

The destruction would be complete. God says, I will wipe Jerusalem as a person wipes a dish. This means everything would be thrown into disorder, and their whole state would be overturned. It also means the city would be emptied of its people, as a dish is emptied when it is wiped clean. They would be carried away into captivity, and the land would keep its sabbaths while they were gone. Yet this wiping away is not the same as destroying the dish itself. Jerusalem would not be broken to pieces or thrown away, but only cleaned out, first by removing the sinners and then by dealing with the sin.

God also says he will forsake the remnant of his inheritance (2 Kings 21:14). Those who forsake God are justly forsaken by him. He never leaves people until they have first left him. Once God has withdrawn his protection, they are left open and helpless before their enemies. Sin is the root of all their misery. Old guilt is brought back into account, because they had been provoking God ever since the nation began, from the time their fathers came out of Egypt (2 Kings 21:15). The people of this generation, walking in their fathers’ steps, are rightly charged with their fathers’ sins. And the guilt of blood was what filled up the measure (2 Kings 21:16). Nothing cries louder for judgment, or brings heavier punishment, than innocent blood.

This is all we are told here about Manasseh. He stands convicted and condemned, though we hope to hear of his repentance and acceptance with God in the book of Chronicles. Here, we are left with only one hint of repentance, if we take it that way, that he was buried in the garden of his own house (2 Kings 21:18). If so, he was likely buried there by his own direction, because he felt himself no longer worthy to be called a son of David, or to lie in the tombs of his fathers. True repentance brings shame, not self-importance. Still, after losing the honor of innocence, the honor of a penitent was the best he could hope for. It is better, and more honorable, for a sinner to die repenting and be buried in a garden than to die unrepentant and be buried with great honor.