2 Chronicles 29:23

And they brought forth the he goats for the sin offering before the king and the congregation; and they laid their hands upon them:

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(23) Brought forth.—Rather, brought near—viz., to the altar.

He goats.—Se ‘îrîm (“hairy ones”). A different term—çëphîrê ‘izzîm, “spring-bucks of goats”—was used in 2Chronicles 29:21. This latter is properly an Aramean word, and only found in late Heb., se ’îrîm being the classical term.

Laid their hands upon them.—Comp. Leviticus 1:4; Leviticus 3:2; Leviticus 4:4, from which it appears that the person offering laid his hand upon the head of the victim, whether he were making a burnt offering or a thank-offering or a sin-offering.

The natural fitness of the ceremony in the case of expiatory sacrifices is obvious. “The king and the congregation” performed it, in the present instance, on behalf of the entire nation.

Benson Commentary

2 Chronicles 29:23. They laid their hands upon them — The king and the elders of the people, in the name of the whole congregation: thereby owning themselves guilty before God, and expressing their desire that the guilt of their sin might be transferred upon the sacrifice. By faith we lay our hands on the Lord Jesus, and so receive the atonement, Romans 5:11. Burnt- offerings were offered with the sin-offerings, the intention of which was to give glory to the God of Israel, whom they owned as the only true God, and their God, which it was proper to do, at the same time that they were, by the sin-offering, making atonement for their offences.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

29:20-36 As soon as Hezekiah heard that the temple was ready, he lost no time. Atonement must be made for the sins of the last reign. It was not enough to lament and forsake those sins; they brought a sin-offering. Our repentance and reformation will not obtain pardon but in and through Christ, who was made sin, that is, a sin-offering for us. While the offerings were on the altar, the Levites sang. Sorrow for sin must not prevent us from praising God. The king and the congregation gave their consent to all that was done. It is not enough for us to be where God is worshipped, if we do not ourselves worship with the heart. And we should offer up our spiritual sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving, and devote ourselves and all we have, as sacrifices, acceptable to the Father only through the Redeemer.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The he goats for the sin offering - Rather, "the he goats of the sin offering" - that portion of the Sin offering which had been reserved to the last.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

20-30. Then Hezekiah the king rose early, and gathered the rulers of the city—His anxiety to enter upon the expiatory service with all possible despatch, now that the temple had been properly prepared for it, prevented his summoning all the representatives of Israel. The requisite number of victims having been provided, and the officers of the temple having sanctified themselves according to the directions of the law, the priests were appointed to offer sacrifices of atonement successively, for "the kingdom," that is, for the sins of the king and his predecessors; for "the sanctuary," that is, for the sins of the priests themselves and for the desecration of the temple; "and for Judah," that is, for the people who, by their voluntary consent, were involved in the guilt of the national apostasy. Animals of the kinds used in sacrifice were offered by sevens, that number indicating completeness. The Levites were ordered to praise God with musical instruments, which, although not originally used in the tabernacle, had been enlisted in the service of divine worship by David on the advice of the prophets Gad and Nathan, as well calculated to animate the devotions of the people. At the close of the special services of the occasion, namely, the offering of atonement sacrifices, the king and all civic rulers who were present joined in the worship. A grand anthem was sung (2Ch 29:30) by the choir, consisting of some of the psalms of David and Asaph, and a great number of thank offerings, praise offerings, and freewill burnt offerings were presented at the invitation of the king.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

i.e. The king and the elders of the congregation in the name of the whole congregation.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And they brought forth the he goats for the sin offering before the king and the congregation,.... Which were to make atonement for the sins of both:

and they laid their hands on them; signifying thereby that they were vicarious sacrifices to be offered up in their own room and stead, and that they deserved to die, as these creatures would: transferring as it were hereby their sins unto them, for which they were to be sacrificed, and to make atonement, as an emblem of the imputation of the sins of the Lord's people to Christ, sacrificed in their stead.

Geneva Study Bible

And they brought forth the he goats for the sin offering before the king and the congregation; {k} and they laid their hands upon them:

(k) That is, the king and the elders, as in Le 4:15 for they who offered a sin offering must lay their hands on it, to signify that they had deserved that death, and also that they consecrated it to God to be sanctified by it, Ex 29:10.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

23. brought forth] R.V. brought near, i.e. to the king and the people.

and they laid their hands] “they” = the representatives of the people; cp. Leviticus 4:15.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 23. - The he-goats for the sin offering. No preposition "for" is found in the Hebrew text, and the previous noun is in the construct state, שְׂעַירֵי. Laid their hands. This signified the supposed laying of sins - the sins of the people - on the head of the animal (Leviticus 1:4; Leviticus 4:4, etc.). 2 Chronicles 29:23

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The re-dedication of the temple by offering sacrifices. - 2 Chronicles 29:20. Probably on the very next morning Hezekiah went with the princes (heads) of the city into the house of the Lord, and brought seven bullocks, seven rams, and seven lambs for a burnt-offering, and seven he-goats for a sin-offering, "for the kingdom, for the sanctuary, and for Judah," i.e., as expiation for and consecration of the kingdom, sanctuary, and people. These sacrifices were offered by the priests according to the prescription of the law of Moses, 2 Chronicles 29:22-24. The burnt-offerings are first named, as in the sacrificial Torah in Leviticus 1-6, although the offering of the sin-offering preceded that of the burnt-offering. The laying on of hands, too, is mentioned only with the sin-offering, 2 Chronicles 29:23, although according to Leviticus 1:4 the same ceremony was gone through with the burnt-offerings; but that is not because a confession of sin was probably made during the laying on of hands, as Bertheau conjectures, adducing Leviticus 16:21, for from that passage no such conclusion can be drawn. The ceremony is mentioned only in the one case to emphasize the fact that the king and the assembly (the latter, of course, by their representatives) laid their hands upon the sacrificial beasts, because the atonement was, according to the king's words, to be for all Israel. "All Israel" are probably not only all the inhabitants of the kingdom of Judah, but Israelites in general (the twelve tribes), for whom the temple in Jerusalem was the only lawful sanctuary. דּם את חטּא signifies to bring the blood to the altar for an atonement, in the manner prescribed in Leviticus 4:30, Leviticus 4:34.