2nd Chronicles Chapter 12 verse 2 Holy Bible

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 2. - Shishak; Hebrew, שִׁישַׁק; Septuagint, Σουσάκιμ; Shishak, Sheshonk, Sesonchis, the Sheshenk I. or Shashank I. of the monuments, son of an Assyrian king called Nimrod or Nemaruth, became King of Egypt as first of six kings who lasted in all a hundred and seventy years, of the twenty-second dynasty of Manetho, reigning in Bubastis. To him Jeroboam had fled for refuge from Solomon (1 Kings 11:40). He reigned An. Sac. 3830 ( B.C. 980) to 3851 or 3863. This makes Solomon's reign A.S. 3799 ( B.C. 1011) to 3839 ( B.C. 971). Shishak's invasion, therefore, in aid of Jeroboam, was A.S. 3844 ( B.C. 966). A representation of it exists in relief sculptured on the south external wall of the temple of Amen, at Karnak, Thebes; and, together with this, an elaborate list of countries, cities, tribes, conquered by Sheshenk or tributary to him, a hundred and thirty-three in number. Among these are some of the very fifteen fenced cities (see our ver. 4) which Rehoboam built or fortified, viz. the three, Shoco, Adoraim, and Aijalon, while the erasure of fourteen names just where these are found accounts, no doubt, for the non-appearance of others of them. There are also the names of Levitical and Canaanite cities, situated in the kingdoms of the ten tribes, but belonging to the Levites who had been compelled to migrate into Judah. The dates given above are those accepted by Conder, in his 'Handbook to the Bible' (see pp. 28-34), and do not quite agree with those adopted in Smith's 'Bible Dictionary,' 3:1287-1294. Both of these most interesting articles will well repay perusal, as well as the article "Thebes" in the latter work, 3:1471-1475. (The name and word Shishak has no relation whatever with the Sheshach of Jeremiah 25:26; It. 41, שֵׁשַׁך, a word which, possibly spelling Babel or even Ur, marks the name of a place, and is evidently used by Jeremiah for Babylon or Babylonia.)

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(2) And it came to pass.--See 1Kings 14:25, with which this verse literally coincides, except that the last clause, "because they had transgressed," is added by the chronicler.In the fifth year of king Rehoboam.--The order of events is thus given: For three years Rehoboam and his people continued faithful to the Lord (2Chronicles 11:17); in the fourth year they fell away; and in the fifth their apostacy was punished.Shishak.--The Sesonchis of Manetho, and the sh-sh-nk of the hieroglyphs, was the first king of the 22nd dynasty. "His name," says Ebers, "and those of his successors, Osorkon (Zerah) and Takelot, are Semitic, a fact which explains the Biblical notice that Solomon took a princess of this dynasty for his consort, and stood in close commercial relations with Egypt, as well as, on the other hand, that Hadad the Edomite received the sister of Tahpenes the queen to wife (1Kings 11:19). In the year 949 B.C. Shishak, at the instigation of Jeroboam, took the field against Rehoboam, besieged Jerusalem, captured it, and carried off a rich booty to Thebes. On a southern wall of the Temple of Karnak, all Palestinian towns which the Egyptians took in this expedition are enumerated" (Riehm's Handwort. Bibl. Alterth., p. 333).Because they had transgressed.--For they had been faithless to Jehovah. This is the chronicler's own parenthetic explanation of the event, and expresses in one word his whole philosophy of Israelite history. Of course it is not meant that Shishak had any consciousness of the providential ground of his invasion of Judah.