2 Kings 17:40

Howbeit they did not hearken, but they did after their former manner.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(40) They—i.e., the Ephraimites.

Did.—Continued doing.

After their former manner—i.e., they clung to the old-established cultus of the calves.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

17:24-41 The terror of the Almighty will sometimes produce a forced or feigned submission in unconverted men; like those brought from different countries to inhabit Israel. But such will form unworthy thoughts of God, will expect to please him by outward forms, and will vainly try to reconcile his service with the love of the world and the indulgence of their lusts. May that fear of the Lord, which is the beginning of wisdom, possess our hearts, and influence our conduct, that we may be ready for every change. Wordly settlements are uncertain; we know not whither we may be driven before we die, and we must soon leave the world; but the righteous hath chosen that good part which shall not be taken from him.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Which he wrote for you - It is worth observing here, first, that the author regards the whole Law as given to the Israelites in a written form; and secondly, that he looks on the real writer as God.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

34. Unto this day—the time of the Babylonian exile, when this book was composed. Their religion was a strange medley or compound of the service of God and the service of idols. Such was the first settlement of the people, afterwards called Samaritans, who were sent from Assyria to colonize the land, when the kingdom of Israel, after having continued three hundred fifty-six years, was overthrown.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Howbeit, they did not hearken, but did after their former manner. They did not repent of their idolatries, but persisted in them, and even when they were in captivity in Assyria, or such of them as were left in the land.

Geneva Study Bible

Howbeit they did not hearken, but they did after their former manner.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

40. Howbeit they did not hearken] From the recital of God’s covenant and testimony unto Israel, the writer now turns to the new colonists of Samaria. They had heard, from the priest sent to them, an account of the Lord the God of Israel, and of what He had done for His people. For though the priest was probably one of the ministers before the calves, he would point, through them, to the God who brought Israel out of Egypt. This the writer appears to think should have moved the newcomers to regard Jehovah as far above any local deity.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 40. - Howbeit they did not hearken. The mixed race, with their mixed religion, though professing to be worshippers of Jehovah, paid no attention to the warnings and threatenings of the Law (ver. 34), which were to them a dead letter. But they did after their former manner; i.e. they continued to maintain the syncretism described in vers. 28-33. 2 Kings 17:40

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

They did not hearken, however (the subject is, of course, the ten tribes), but they (the descendants of the Israelites who remained in the land) do after their former manner. הראשׁון משׁפּטם is their manner of worshipping God, which was a mixture of idolatry and of the image-worship of Jehovah, as in 2 Kings 17:34. - In 2 Kings 17:41 this is repeated once more, and the whole of these reflections are brought to a close with the additional statement, that their children and grandchildren do the same to this day. - In the period following the Babylonian captivity the Samaritans relinquished actual idolatry, and by the adoption of the Mosaic book of the law were converted to monotheism. For the later history of the Samaritans, of whom a small handful have been preserved to the present day in the ancient Sichem, the present Nablus, see Theod. Guil. Joh. Juynboll, commentarii in historiam gentis Samaritanae, Lugd. Bat. 1846, 4, and H. Petermann, Samaria and the Samaritans, in Herzog's Cycl.