Bible Commentaries

In the six and thirtieth year of the reign of Asa ^a Baasha king of Israel came up against Judah, and built ^b Ramah, to the intent that he might let none go out or come in to Asa king of Judah.

(a) Who reigned after Nadab the son of Jeroboam.

(b) He fortified it with walls and ditches: it was a city in Benjamin near Gibeon.

[There is] a league between me and thee, as [there was] between my father and thy father: behold, I have sent thee silver and gold; go, ^c break thy league with Baasha king of Israel, that he may depart from me.

(c) He thought to repulse his adversary by an unlawful means, that is, by seeking help from infidels, as they who seek the help of Turks, thinking by it to make themselves stronger.

Then Asa was wroth with the seer, and put him in a prison house; for [he was] ^d in a rage with him because of this [thing]. And Asa oppressed [some] of the people the same time.

(d) Thus instead of turning to God in repentance, he disdained the admonition of the prophet, and punished him, as the wicked do when they are told of their faults.

And Asa in the thirty and ninth year of his reign was diseased in his feet, until his disease [was] ^e exceeding [great]: yet in his disease he sought not to the LORD, but to the ^f physicians.

(e) God plagued his rebellion and by this declared that it is nothing to begin well, unless we continue to the end, that is, zealous of God's glory and put our whole trust in him.

(f) He shows that it is useless to seek the physicians unless we first seek God to purge our sins, which are the chief cause of all our diseases, and later use the help of the physicians as a means by which God works.