12. other ten thousand ... carry away alive) Neither this capture nor the subsequent massacre is mentioned in Kings The huge scale of the victory may be only a product of the Chronicler’s free imagination. On the other hand, if any real information were available outside the canonical books this is the sort of tradition we might expect to survive, full allowance of course being made for great exaggeration in the numbers given. Further, it accords with the sequence of events given in Chronicles, see note on xxvi. 7.
13 (no parallel in Kings).
Outrages of the Ephraimite Mercenaries.
¹³But the men of the army[¹] which Amaziah sent back, that they should not go with him to battle, fell upon the cities of Judah, from Samaria even unto Beth-horon, and smote of them three thousand, and took much spoil.
[¹] Hebrew the sons of the troop.
13. the cities of Judah, from Samaria even unto Beth-horon] We might have expected the two names given to be names of cities belonging to the Southern Kingdom. But Samaria is given apparently as the base from which the marauders started.
14–16 (not in Kings).
Amaziah’s Idolatry and the Prophet’s Rebuke.
14–16. The great disaster which befell Amaziah at the hands of Joash king of Israel and which is about to be narrated in verses 17–24 seemed to require some heinous transgression for its cause. This the Chronicler supplies in the assertion that, after the defeat of Edom, Amaziah actually brought back Edomite images and set them up in Jerusalem for worship (verses 14–16): a truly horrible result of a victory which had resulted from obedience to Jehovah’s word by His prophet!
¹⁴Now it came to pass, after that Amaziah was come from the slaughter of the Edomites, that he brought the gods of the children of Seir, and set them up to be his gods, and bowed down himself before them, and burned incense unto them.
14. bowed down ... and burned incense] The tenses in the Hebrew are imperfects and imply that this became Amaziah’s practice. The act was according to a policy frequently pursued in ancient times. Solomon affords an instance of it (1 Kings xi. 7).
¹⁵Wherefore the anger of the Lord was kindled against Amaziah, and he sent unto him a prophet, which said unto him, Why hast thou sought after the gods of the people, which have not delivered their own people out of thine hand?