2 Chronicles 22:2

Forty two and years old was Ahaziah when he began to reign,.... In 2 Kings 8:26, he is said to be but twenty two years old at his accession to the throne, which is undoubtedly most correct; for this

Forty and two years old was Ahaziah when he began to reign, and he reigned one year in Jerusalem. His mother's name also was Athaliah the daughter of Omri. Forty and two years old - (cf.

Forty and two years old was Ahaziah. Object. He was then only twenty-two years old, as is affirmed, . Besides, Joram his father died in his fortieth year, as is twice noted, ,20: how then can this be true? Answ. 1. In the Hebrew it is, a son of forty-two years, &c., which is an ambiguous phrase; and though it doth for the most part, yet it doth not always, signify the age of the person, as is manifest from , See Poole "". And therefore it is not necessary that this should note his age (as it is generally presumed to do, and that is the only ground of the difficulty); but it may note either, 1. The age of his mother Athaliah; who being so great, and infamous, and mischievous a person to the kingdom and royal family of Judah, it is not strange if her age be here described, especially seeing she herself did for a season sway this sceptre. Or rather, 2. Of the reign of that royal race and family from which by his mother he was descended, to wit, of the house of Omri, who reigned six years, ; Ahab his son reigned twenty-two years, ; Ahaziah his son two years, ; Joram his son twelve years, ; all which, put together, make up exactly these forty-two years; for Ahaziah began his reign in Joram’ s twelfth year, . And such a kind of computation of the years, not of the king’ s person, but of his reign or kingdom, we had before, , See Poole "". And so we have an account of the person’ s age in , and here of the kingdom to which he belonged. Answ. 2. Some acknowledge an error in the transcribers of the present Hebrew copies, in which language the numeral letters for twenty-two and forty-two are so like, that they might easily be mistaken. For that it was read twenty-two here, as it is in the Book of Kings, in other Hebrew copies, they gather from hence, that it is at this day so read in divers ancient Greek copies, as also in those two ancient translations, the Syriac and the Arabic, and particularly in that famous and most ancient copy of the Syriac, which was used by the church of Antioch in the primitive times, and to this day is kept in the church of Antioch, from which that most reverend, learned, pious, and public-spirited archbishop Usher did at his own great charge get another copy transcribed, in which he hath published to all the world that he found it here written twenty and two years old, &c.

2 Chronicles 22:2 Forty and two years old [was] Ahaziah when he began to reign, and he reigned one year in Jerusalem. His mother’ s name also [was] Athaliah the daughter of Omri.Ver. 2. Forty and two years old.] Heb., The son of two and forty years was Ahaziah when he began to reign; i.e., in the last of the two and forty years of the house of Omri, in which it fell, and Ahaziah with it. See on 2 Kings 8:26.

(2) Forty and two years old.—An error of transcription. 2 Kings 8:26, twenty and two; and so the Syriac and Arabic: the LXX. has “twenty.” Ahaziah could not have been forty when he succeeded, because his father was only forty when he died (2 Chronicles 21:20). Athaliah the daughter of Omri—i.e., granddaughter, she being daughter of Ahab and Jezebel. Kings adds, “king of Israel,” which the chronicler purposely omits. (Comp. Micah 6:16 : “The statutes of Omri,” “the works of the house of Ahab.”)

Verse 2. Forty and two years old was Ahaziah] 2Kg 8:26. Ahaziah might have been twenty-two years old, according to 2Kg 8:26, but he could not have been forty-two, as stated here, without being two years older than his own father! See the note there. The Syriac and Arabic have twenty-two, and the Septuagint, in some copies, twenty. And it is very probable that the Hebrew text read so originally; for when numbers were expressed by single letters, it was easy to mistake מ mem, FORTY, for כ caph, TWENTY. And if this book was written by a scribe who used the ancient Hebrew letters, now called the Samaritan, the mistake was still more easy and probable, as the difference between [Samaritan] caph and [Samaritan] mem is very small, and can in many instances be discerned only by an accustomed eye. The reading in 2Kg 8:26 is right, and any attempt to reconcile this in Chronicles with that is equally futile and absurd. Both readings cannot be true; is that therefore likely to be genuine that makes the son two years older than the father who begat him? Apage hae nugae!

2. Forty and two years old] LXX., ὢνεἴκοσιἐτῶν agreeing nearly with 2 Kings 8:26, “two-and-twenty years old” (Heb. and LXX.). daughter of Omri] So 2 Kings 8:26, but more correctly “daughter of Ahab” (2 Kings 8:18).

For “42” read “22” (see the marginal reference). Ahaziah’s father, Jehoram, was but 40 when be died 2 Chronicles 21:20.