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Uzziah Azariah, 10th King of Judah (Cp. 2 Kings 14:21–22,15:1–7) 1–5. Time of accession, duration of reign and piety of Uzziah. 9–15. The military and civil activities of Uzziah, his army and the fortifications of Jerusalem. 17–20. Uzziah's proud appropriation of priestly rights and his leprosy. 21–23. Regency of Jotham, death and burial of Uzziah. 2 Chronicles 26:1. And all the people of Judah took Uzziah, who was sixteen years old, and made him king in the place of his father Amaziah. 2 Chronicles 26:2. He built Elath and returned it to Judah after the king died with his fathers. 2 Chronicles 26:3. Uzziah was sixteen years old when he began to reign, and he reigned fifty-two years in Jerusalem; His mother's name was Jeholiah from Jerusalem. 2 Chronicles 26:4. And he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, even as Amaziah his father had done; 2 Chronicles 26:5. and he resorted to God in the days of Zechariah, who taught the fear of God; and in those days when he ran to the Lord, God prospered him. For the double name of Uzziah-Azariah and the general nature of his reign, see the comments to (2 Kings 14:21–22) (“Explanatory Bible,” vol. II, p. 523). Of the foreign policy enterprises of Uzziah-Azariah here (v. 5), as in (2 Kings 14:22), the return to Judah and the strengthening of the port of Elath are noted first of all (about the position of Elath, see comments to (1 Kings 9:26); “Explanatory Bible”, vol. II, p. 412), under Jehoram with all Idumea, who departed from Judah ( 2 Chronicles 21:8,10; 2 Kings 8:20) and after the last one was finally lost under Ahaz (2 Kings 16:6). In addition, in (2 Chronicles 26:5) it is indicated that the source or basis of Uzziah's pious disposition (v. 4) in the first half of his reign was the influence on him of a certain prophet Zechariah, about whom nothing is known from the Bible; some have mistakenly identified him with Zechariah, the son of Jehoiada (2 Chron. 24:20) or arbitrarily considered him the son of this Zechariah (see Calmet). Blessed Theodoret most likely identifies this Zechariah with the one mentioned in the prophet Isaiah, from (Is. 8:2) Zechariah, the son of Barachiah. (Migne, Curs. Complet. Patrol. Ser. gr. t. 80, p. 845–846). In the accepted Hebrew text, v. 5 Zechariah, the leader of Uzziah is called: (gam) mebin birot hayologim, knowledgeable in the vision (or visions) of God, i.e. seer, prophet. Similar in the Vulgate: intelligentis et videntis Deum. The LXX translation has this reading only in a few copies, such as: in codices 19, 93, 108: . But in many European countries codes have a different reading. Thus, codes 1, 3, 579, 593, 683, 789 and some others in Russia do not have birot - in vision, but birat - in fear (of God). The accepted text of the LXX also has: τοῦ συνιόντος ἐν τῶ φόβω Κυρὶον; Slavic text: “one who understands the passion of the Lord”; Russian synodal translation: “who taught the fear of God.” The authority of the LXX and the significant number of Jewish codes that agree with the LXX give reason to prefer this second reading, although the thought of the first has a complete parallel in (Dan. 1:17). 2 Chronicles 26:6. And he went out and fought with the Philistines, and broke down the walls of Gath and the walls of Jabin and the walls of Ashdod; and built cities in the region of Ashdod and among the Philistines. On the situation of the Philistine cities of Azoth, Heb.: Ashdod (Onomasticon, 36) and Gath, Heb.: Gath (Onomasticon, 301), see comments to (Josh. 11:22) in the “Explanatory Bible”, vol. II, p. 74. Jabnea (Jabneel, Jamnia), slav.: “Jabnir” or “Iamnia”, LXX: Λεβνά, Ἰαβνήρ, Ἰαμνία - also a Philistine city, which formed the border of the tribe of Judah ((Josh. 15:11); Onomasticon, 533), not far from Joppa ( 1 Mac.10:69,75), 240 stadia from Jerusalem, 12 miles from Diospolis (Lydda) and 20 from Ascalon (after the destruction of Jerusalem, the Sanhedrin met here; in the Christian era there was an episcopal see here). This conquest of the Philistines by Uzziah, again freed from Jewish rule under Ahaz (2 Chron. 28:18), is an event completely unmentioned in the book. Kingdoms, according to the probable assumption of some exegetes, are meant by the prophet Isaiah (Is. 14:28–29). 2 Chronicles 26:7. And God helped him against the Philistines and against the Arabians who dwelt in Gur-Baal, and against the Meunites; 2 Chronicles 26:8. and the Ammonites gave tribute to Uzziah, and his name came to the borders of Egypt, because he was very strong. Similar success was accompanied by Uzziah’s clashes with the Arabians who lived in the area of Gur-Baal (the situation is unknown, probably not the same with Gur (2 Kings 9:27), where Ahaziah was killed, cf. Onomasticon, 356), and with the Meunites (inhabitants of Maon, according to LXX: μιναίοι, gl.: “Minea”, Vulgata: Ammonitae; cf. comments on (2 Chron. 20:1)). The Arabians in the book. Chronicles is more than once mentioned in conjunction with the Philistines (2 Chronicles 17:11,21:16,26:7). LXX: τοὺς Ἀραβας τοὺς κατοικοῦντας ἐπὶ τῆς πέτρας (Slav.: “Arabs, who lived in Kameniyh”), apparently meant the inhabitants of the rocky Arabia with the main city of Petra ((cf. 2 Kings 14:7); Cf. Blessed Theodoret, Quaestiones in II Paralipomenon, XXVI; Migne, “Patrologia Cursus Completus. Series Graeca,” t. 80, p. 846). According to the Targum, Gur-Baal is identical with Gerar. 2 Chronicles 26:9. And Uzziah built towers in Jerusalem over the corner gate, and over the valley gate, and at the corner, and fortified them. 2 Chronicles 26:10. And he built towers in the wilderness, and cut out many cisterns, because he had many cattle, both in the lowlands and in the plain, and farmers and gardeners in the mountains and in Carmel, for he loved agriculture. According to some interpreters, the numerous and grandiose buildings of King Uzziah are spoken of by the prophets who began their activities under this king: Hosea (Hosea 8:14) and Isaiah (Isaiah 2:7,15). Uzziah, the first of the kings of Judah, thoroughly strengthened Jerusalem, building fortified towers “over the coal gate (in the north-west of Jerusalem) and over the valley gate (in the west of the city, near the current Jaffa gate) and at the corner” (v. 9). The closest reason for strengthening Jerusalem on its western side could have been the destruction of part of the city wall by the Israeli king Joash during the reign of Uzziah’s father Amaziah ( 2 Kings 14:13; 2 Chronicles 25:23), and then the wise ruler was prompted to do this by the general concern of protecting the city from attacks. Then, lovingly encouraging the development of agriculture and cattle breeding (the main sources of life and well-being of the ancient Jews), Uzziah contributed to the most rational management of both industries - by building watchtowers in the steppe where cattle grazed, for protection from predators and by cutting out reservoirs both for watering livestock and for artificial field irrigation (cf. Josephus, “Antiquities of the Jews,” IX, 10.3). Prof. Olesnitsky, on the basis of (2 Chronicles 26:10), dates back to the time of Uzziah the digging of the Siloam tunnel and the drawing of the famous Siloam inscription (Olesnitsky, “Old Testament Church”, p. 814, note). “In the lowlands” (Heb.: Shephela, LXX: ἐν σεφηλᾶ, Vulgata: sephela, terra campestris, slav. Sephila, equal, floor, field) - one of the three parts of the territory of the tribe of Judah (Josh. 10:40; Judges 1:9; Jer. 32:44,33:13), adjoined from the south of Joppa (Jaffa) to the plain of Sharon, descended to Gaza, bordered on the sea on the west, and on the mountains of Judah on the east (Onomasticon, 865. Compare "Explanatory Bible", vol. II, pp. 68,158). "On Carmel". In the Bible, as noted by Eusebius and Blessed. Jerome (Onomasticon, 602), two different mountains and localities of this name are known: Mount Carmel in the north of Palestine, in the southern part of the tribe of Asser, where the prophet Elijah stayed (now Jebel Karmal; for the position of this Carmel, see the Explanatory Bible, vol. II, p. 453). Another Carmel is a locality and city in the mountainous part of the tribe of Judah (Joshua 15:55), mentioned in the history of Saul and David (1 Sam. 15:12,25:2), southeast of Hebron; see The Interpretive Bible, vol. II, p. 98 and 265. In this place (2 Chronicles 26:10) we can only mean this last Carmel, since northern Carmel, which lay far to the north of the kingdom of Israel, was not part of the kingdom of Judah and therefore could not belong to the possessions of Uzziah. Some interpreters (Philippson, Kautzsch), however, believe Heb. Karmel of this place is a household word: gardens, fruit plantations. 2 Chronicles 26:11. Uzziah also had an army that went out to war in detachments, according to the list of them compiled by the hand of Jeiel the scribe and Maaseiah the overseer, under the leadership of Hananiah, one of the chief dignitaries of the king. 2 Chronicles 26:12. The whole number of the heads of the generations, of the brave warriors, was two thousand six hundred, 2 Chronicles 26:13. and under their hand there was a military force of three hundred and seven thousand five hundred, who entered into battle with military courage to help the king against the enemy. The size of the military force of King Uzziah is indicated. Among the compilers of the army lists, in addition to the court scribe Jeiel (about the position of the court scribes, Heb.: Soferim, see comments on (2 Kings 4:3) in the “Explanatory Bible”, vol. II, p. 309), a certain Maaseia overseer, Heb.: shorter, LXX: κριτής, is also mentioned. Vulgata: doctor, slav.: “judge”. Prof. A.A. Olesnitsky sees Maasei as a chronicler of the period of Uzziah’s reign: “although Maasei is called here by the name “shoter,” the position of shoterim, or compilers of genealogies, was sometimes combined under the kings with the duties of a writer.” (“State Chronicle of the Kings of the Jews”, “Proceedings of the Kyiv Theological Academy”, 1879, No. 8, p. 427). True, the chronicle function of the Shoterim is still controversial (about it you can only find vague indications in places in (Exodus 5:6 et seq.; Deut.1:15,20:5), etc.), but there can be no doubt that for the rich information about the reign of Uzziah, which the sacred writer fills in (2 Chronicles 26), the condensed and general narrative about Uzziah (Azarin) of the 4th book of Kings must have been materials from a contemporary chronicler, precisely from a sphere close to the court, which Maaseya could have been. 2 Chronicles 26:14. And Uzziah prepared for them, for all the troops, shields and spears, and helmets and armor, and bows and sling stones. 2 Chronicles 26:15. And he made in Jerusalem skillfully designed machines, so that they were on the towers and on the corners for throwing arrows and large stones. And his name spread far and wide, because he miraculously protected himself and became strong. Here, for the first time in the Bible, there is news of the invention of stone throwing and siege weapons - “catapults, ballistae, rams, siege hooks, etc.” (I. Flavius, “Jewish Antiquities”, IX, 10, 3). This news, from which it follows that the introduction into the practice of military art of all these weapons was not the invention of the Greeks and Romans, but was previously known in the East (Pliny assigns Syrian origin to these weapons), arouses some bewilderment due to the lack of extraneous, extra-biblical evidence about the use of the above-mentioned projectiles in biblical times; According to Diodorus Siculus, the siege of Nineveh lasted 7 years precisely because the besiegers did not have stone-throwing weapons. Perhaps in this place, 2 Chronicles speaks of only primitive tools of the indicated kind, which, precisely because of their primitive imperfection, did not become part of the history of military art. (Images of various kinds of stone-throwing tools of antiquity can be seen in Philippson, “Die Israelitische Bibel”, Bd. Ill, s. 1138). The fame of the power of Uzziah, as in his time of his pious and powerful ancestors Asa and Jehoshaphat (2 Chronicles 14:14,20:29), spread far beyond the borders of the kingdom of Judah. 2 Chronicles 26:16. But when he became strong, his heart was lifted up to his destruction, and he became a transgressor before the Lord his God, for he entered the church of the Lord to burn incense on the incense altar. 2 Chronicles 26:17. And Azariah the priest went after him, and with him eighty priests of the Lord, excellent men, 2 Chronicles 26:18. and Uzziah opposed the king and said to him: It is not for you, Uzziah, to burn incense to the Lord; this is the work of the priests, the sons of Aaron, ordained to burn incense; come out of the sanctuary, for you have acted lawlessly, and this will not be an honor for you with the Lord God. 2 Chronicles 26:19. And Uzziah was angry, and in his hand he had a censer for incense; and when he was angry with the priests, leprosy appeared on his forehead, in the presence of the priests, in the house of the Lord, at the altar of incense. 2 Chronicles 26:20. And Azarias the high priest and all the priests looked at him; and behold, he had leprosy on his forehead. And they forced him to leave there, and he himself was in a hurry to leave, since the Lord had struck him. However, Uzziah did not maintain his former (vv. 4-5) piety. The prosperity and happiness of his reign blinded Uzziah: in this prosperity he did not see an incentive to thank Jehovah (as befitted a truly theocratic king), but, on the contrary, he found a reason for self-exaltation and sacrilegious admiration for the gift of the priesthood: bearing in mind, perhaps, the custom of combining royal power and priesthood among many peoples (for example, among the ancient Romans the king was both pontifex maximus), Uzziah attempted to perform functions that belonged exclusively to the high priest and priests - entering the sanctuary (Hebrew gehal, i.e. “holy” - the front or most part of the church) and burning incense there. Meanwhile, in the Law of Moses, outsiders, not priests, were prohibited on pain of death (Ex.30:32,34–38; Num.8:7); (cf. “The Expository Bible,” vol. I, p. 548), and examples remained factual evidence of the reality of such a threat for all centuries: the sudden death of Nadab and Abihu ((Lev.10:1–4), see “The Expository Bible,” vol. I, pp. 436–437), as well as the defeat of Miriam by leprosy ((Num. 12:10); see “The Expository Bible,” vol. I, pp. 533–534). The fate of the latter befell King Uzziah for his exaltation and sacrilege. Josephus Flavius, who in more detail in the Bible, obviously conveys this event according to popular legends, complements the biblical story: firstly, with the news that Uzziah’s fatal attempt to “put on priestly attire” and perform sacred acts took place “on the day of a solemn national holiday”; secondly, the message that when Uzziah responded to the admonitions of the high priest Azariah and the priests with threats, then “suddenly the ground shook with a strong earthquake, the clouds were divided, and a brilliant ray of the sun slid between them and struck the king’s eyes, so that the latter instantly fell ill with leprosy, and near the city, in a place called Eroga, half of the rock facing the west was separated, rolled a distance of four furlongs to the east and fell on the place where the royal roads and park were located, and covered them up” (“Antiquities of the Jews,” IX, 10, 4). Addition made by I. Josephus to the biblical story about the defeat of Uzziah by leprosy, it is this historian’s mention of the earthquake that took place in this case that cannot be considered one of the poetic embellishments found in I. Flavius ​​in the transmission of the biblical narrative, as an attempt to introduce a natural element into the biblical story about the miraculous defeat of Uzziah; rather, the earthquake is a historical fact: the prophet Amos ( Amos 1:1 ) speaks of the earthquake under Uzziah as a well-known event, considered a kind of era; an indication of the same earthquake, although the indication is unclear and controversial, is also seen in the so-called Siloam inscription (discovered by Shik in 1880), where (line 3) mentions some kind of boiling that appeared in the rock (Prof. A.A. Olesnitsky, “The Old Testament Church”, pp. 813–814, note). The moral side of Uzziah’s offense is revealed by Saint John Chrysostom: “Uzziah, having forgotten himself as a result of the success of his deeds and become proud of his happiness, began to exalt himself above his dignity. Being a king, he thought that he could officiate, invaded the church, entered the Holy of Holies, and when the priest prevented and forbade him to enter there, he did not stop, but continued to go mad, despising the words of the priest. For such shamelessness, God struck him with leprosy on his forehead, so that he, desiring more honor than due, lost even that which he had; for not only did he not receive the priesthood, but, having become unclean, he lost his kingdom, and out of shame he lived all the time secretly in a certain house.” (Interpretation of the 6th chapter of the prophet Isaiah, paragraph 1. Conversations on various places of Holy Scripture. St. Petersburg, 1861, vol. I, p. 126). 2 Chronicles 26:21. And King Uzziah was a leper until the day of his death, and lived in a separate house, and was excommunicated from the house of the Lord. And Jotham his son was ruler over the royal house and governed the people of the land. 2 Chronicles 26:22. The other acts of Uzziah, the first and the last, were described by Isaiah, the son of Amos, the prophet. 2 Chronicles 26:23. And Uzziah slept with his fathers, and they buried him with his fathers in the field of the king's tombs, for they said, He is a leper. And Jotham his son reigned in his stead. What was the “separate house” (Hebrew bet gahofshit or according to Ketib - gahofshot) in which Uzziah lived from the day he was struck by leprosy until his death, as well as in general about the reign of Uzziah and his sad end, see the commentary on (2 Kings 15: 1-7) ("Explanatory Bible", vol. II, pp. 524,525). While in (2 Kings 15:6) the source of information about the reign of Uzziah-Azariah is called “the chronicle of the kings of Judah,” here (v. 22), some writings of the prophet Isaiah are indicated as such a source. Of course, this writing was a completely different work from the canonical book of the prophet Isaiah, since in the prophetic book of Isaiah there is only a simple mention of Uzziah (Is. 1: 1, 6: 1), and the work mentioned here contained detailed information about the long reign of Uzziah, was undoubtedly of a chronicle nature and could form part of the “chronicle of the kings of Judah”, which, as we said, was the work of the prophets (“Explanatory Bible” vol. II, p. 359). You might be interested in: