Bible Commentaries

Three years reigned he in Jerusalem. And his mother's name [was] Maachah, the daughter of ^a Abishalom.

(a) Some think that this was Absalom Solomon's son.

Nevertheless for David's sake did the LORD his God give him a ^b lamp in Jerusalem, to set up his son after him, and to establish Jerusalem:

(b) Meaning, a son to reign over Judah.

And forty and one years reigned he in Jerusalem. And his ^c mother's name [was] Maachah, the daughter of Abishalom.

(c) That is, his grandmother, as David is often called the father of those who are his grandchildren.

And also Maachah his mother, even her he ^d removed from [being] queen, because she had made an idol in a grove; and Asa destroyed her idol, and burnt [it] by the brook Kidron.

(d) Neither kindred nor authority should be regarded when they blaspheme God and become idolaters, but must be punished.

But the high places were not removed: nevertheless Asa's heart was ^e perfect with the LORD all his days.

(e) Though he permitted them to worship God in other places than he had appointed it came from ignorance, and not from malice.

And Baasha king of Israel went up against Judah, and built ^f Ramah, that he might not suffer any to go out or come in to Asa king of Judah.

(f) For the same reason that Jeroboam did, because the people should not go up to Jerusalem, least they follow Asa.

[There is] a league between me and thee, [and] between my father and thy father: behold, I have sent unto thee a present of silver and gold; come and break thy league with Baasha king of Israel, that he may ^g depart from me.

(g) And vex me no longer.

The rest of all the acts of Asa, and all his might, and all that he did, and the cities which he built, [are] they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah? Nevertheless in the time of his old age he was diseased in his ^h feet.

(h) He had gout and put his trust physicians rather than in the Lord, (2 Chronicles 16:12).

And Asa slept with his fathers, and was buried with his fathers in the city of David his ⁱ father: and Jehoshaphat his son reigned in his stead.

(i) His great-grandfather.

And it came to pass, when he reigned, [that] he ^k smote all the house of Jeroboam; he left not to Jeroboam any that breathed, until he had destroyed him, according unto the saying of the LORD, which he spake by his servant Ahijah the Shilonite:

(k) So God stirred up one tyrant to punish the wickedness of another.

Because of the sins of Jeroboam which he sinned, and which he made Israel sin, by his ^l provocation wherewith he provoked the LORD God of Israel to anger.

(l) By causing the people to commit idolatry with his calves, and so provoking God to anger.

In the third year of Asa king of Judah began Baasha the son of Ahijah to reign over all Israel in ^m Tirzah, twenty and four years.

(m) Which was the place where the kings of Israel remained.