2 Kings 17:9

And the children of Israel did secretly those things that were not right against the LORD their God, and they built them high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(9) Did secretly.—The literal sense is covered. In this connection it is natural to remember that Heb. verbs of covering and hiding are often used in the sense of dealing perfidiously or deceitfully. (Comp. mā’al, l Chron. 10:13, with me’îl, “mantle;” and bāgad, “to deal treacherously,” Hosea 5:7, with bèged, “garment.”) The form in the text (the pihel of ‘hāphā) is only found here.

They built them high places.—First, the institution of unlawful places of worship.

From the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city.—The towers are such as are mentioned in 2Chronicles 26:10. Here, and in 2Kings 18:8, these solitary buildings, tenanted by a few herdsmen, are contrasted with the embattled cities which protected multitudes. Wherever men were, whether in small or large numbers, these high places were established.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

17:7-23 Though the destruction of the kingdom of the ten tribes was but briefly related, it is in these verses largely commented upon, and the reasons of it given. It was destruction from the Almighty: the Assyrian was but the rod of his anger, Isa 10:5. Those that bring sin into a country or family, bring a plague into it, and will have to answer for all the mischief that follows. And vast as the outward wickedness of the world is, the secret sins, evil thoughts, desires, and purposes of mankind are much greater. There are outward sins which are marked by infamy; but ingratitude, neglect, and enmity to God, and the idolatry and impiety which proceed therefrom, are far more malignant. Without turning from every evil way, and keeping God's statutes, there can be no true godliness; but this must spring from belief of his testimony, as to wrath against all ungodliness and unrighteousness, and his mercy in Christ Jesus.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Literally, the words run thus - "And the children of Israel concealed (or 'dissembled') words which were not so concerning the Lord their God;" the true meaning of which probably is, the Israelites cloaked or covered their idolatry with the pretence that it was a worship of Yahweh: they glossed it over and dissembled toward God, instead of openly acknowledging their apostasy.

From the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city - This phrase was probably a proverbial expression for universality, meaning strictly; "alike in the most populous and in the most desolate regions." "Towers of watchmen" were built for the protection of the flocks and herds which were pastured in waste and desert places 2 Chronicles 26:10; 2 Chronicles 27:4.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

2Ki 17:7-41. Samaria Taken, and Israel for Their Sins Carried Captive.

7. For so it was, that the children of Israel had sinned—There is here given a very full and impressive vindication of the divine procedure in punishing His highly privileged, but rebellious and apostate, people. No wonder that amid so gross a perversion of the worship of the true God, and the national propensity to do reverence to idols, the divine patience was exhausted; and that the God whom they had forsaken permitted them to go into captivity, that they might learn the difference between His service and that of their despotic conquerors.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Things that were not right against the Lord: this belongs, either,

1. To their gross idolatries, and other abominable practices, which they were ashamed to own before others: compare Ezekiel 8:12. Or,

2. To the worship of calves; and so the words are otherwise rendered, and that agreeably to the Hebrew text, they cloaked, or disguised, or covered things that were not right against, or before, or towards the Lord, i.e. they covered their idolatrous worship of the calves with fair pretences of necessity, the two kingdoms being now divided, and at enmity; and of their honest intention of serving the true God, and retaining the substance of the Jewish religion, from which they alleged that they differed only in circumstances of worship.

From the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city; in all parts and places, both in cities and in the country; yea, in the most uninhabited and neglected parts, where few or none dwell beside the watchmen, who are left there in towers, to preserve the cattle and fruits of the earth, or to give notice of the approach of enemies.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And the children of Israel did secretly those things that were not right against the Lord their God,.... As being partly conscious to themselves that they were not right, and ashamed to commit them openly; and partly as foolishly imagining, that, being done privately, they were not seen and observed of God, having imbibed some atheistical notions of him, that he was not omniscient, or saw not, and had forsaken the earth; or they "covered" (g) these actions of theirs under reigned and plausible pretences, that what they did they were obliged to by their kings, and with political views, and that they worshipped the true God in the calves; but these were coverings too thin not to be seen through:

and they built them high places in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city; not content with those built in former times, they built new ones; and these not in their metropolis only, but in all the cities of the kingdom; and not in large cities only, but in every town and village between one fortified city and another; even wherever there was a watch tower erected, either for shepherds to watch their flocks, or for keepers of gardens, orchards, and vineyards, to watch the fruits of them, that they were not taken away.

(g) "occultaverunt", Montanus, Vatablus, Grotius; "palliaverunt", Piscator.

Geneva Study Bible

And the children of Israel did secretly those things that were not right against the LORD their God, and they built them high places in all their cities, from the tower {e} of the watchmen to the fenced city.

(e) Meaning, throughout all their borders.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

9. And the children of Israel did secretly] The verb here used occurs nowhere else in the Bible, though one apparently cognate, and differing only by a single letter, is found several times. This latter is used of covering the head, and also of covering walls with gold to look more beautiful than the bare stone would do. From the first notion comes the sense ‘they did secretly’ which both A.V. and R.V. prefer. Others, with the LXX. (ἠμφιέσαντο), think that the meaning probably is ‘they decked out’ their worship, employed things alien to the simplicity of the Mosaic ordinances, viz. the high places, pillars and Asherim of which mention is made in the next clauses.

from the tower of the watchmen to the fenced city] This seems a sort of proverbial expression. It is found again 2 Kings 18:8. The towers, in which watchmen were stationed to keep guard over the flocks and crops, were always in the most lonely and deserted spots, while fenced cities implied the presence of many inhabitants. So the sense appears to be ‘in the loneliest as well as in the most populous places’.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 9. - And the children of Israel did secretly those things that were not right against the Lord their God. Most of the evil practices of the Israelites were open and flagrant, but some sought the veil of secrecy, as the use of divination and enchantments (ver. 17). It is doubtful, however, whether the Hebrew words have the signification assigned to them in the Authorized Version. They may mean no more than that the Israelites made their evil deeds a barrier between themselves and God. And they built them high places in an their cities (comp. 1 Kings 14:23). "In all their cities" is probably rhetorical; but the gist of the charge is that, instead of keeping to the one temple and one altar commanded by God for the conservation of their belief in his unity, the Israelites "erected places of worship all over the country, after the fashion of the heathen" (Bahr), and so at once depraved their own faith, and ceased to be a perpetual protest to the surrounding nations. From the tower of the watchman to the fenced city; i.e. from the smallest and most solitary place of human abode to the largest and most populous (comp. 2 Kings 18:8). The expression was no doubt proverbial, and (as used here) is a strong hyperbole. 2 Kings 17:9

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

דברים ויחפּאוּ: "they covered words which were not right concerning Jehovah their God," i.e., they sought to conceal the true nature of Jehovah their God," i.e., they sought to conceal the true nature of Jehovah by arbitrary perversions of the word of God. This is the explanation correctly given by Hengstenberg (Dissert. vol. i. p. 210, transl.); whereas the interpretation proposed by Thenius, "they trifled with things which were not right against Jehovah," is as much at variance with the usage of the language as that of Gesenius (thes. p. 5050, perfide egerunt res ... in Jehovam, since חפּא with על simply means to cover over a thing (cf. Isaiah 4:5). This covering of words over Jehovah showed itself in the fact that they built בּמות (altars on high places), and by worshipping God in ways of their own invention concealed the nature of the revealed God, and made Jehovah like the idols. "In all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen to the fortified city." נוצרים מגדּל is a tower built for the protection of the flocks in the steppes (2 Chronicles 26:10), and is mentioned here as the smallest and most solitary place of human abode in antithesis to the large and fortified city. Such bamoth were the houses of high places and altars built for the golden calves at Bethel and Dan, beside which no others are mentioned by name in the history of the kingdom of the ten tribes, which restricts itself to the principal facts, although there certainly must have been others.