1 Kingschapter 21
29 verses · Jeremiah, by tradition · 6th century BC · History
Key verse
And Ahab spake unto Naboth, saying, Give me thy vineyard, that I may have it for a garden of herbs, because it is near unto my house: and I will give thee for it a better vineyard than it; or, if it seem good to thee, I will give thee the worth of it in money.
It stands in The inheritance of my fathers is not for sale, verses 1 to 4.
The chapter
Chapter summary
Naboth the Jezreelite refuses to sell the inheritance of his fathers, and Ahab lies on his bed with his face to the wall and will eat no bread. Jezebel writes letters in the king's name, proclaims a fast, seats two base fellows to swear that Naboth cursed God and the king, and has him stoned outside the city. Ahab rises to take possession, and Elijah is waiting in the vineyard: 'Hast thou killed, and also taken possession?' Where dogs licked the blood of Naboth, dogs shall lick his own, and dogs shall eat Jezebel by the rampart of Jezreel. Then a hinge no one expects: Ahab rends his clothes and fasts, and the evil is deferred to his son's days.
Context
History · Jeremiah · 1 Kings overview
The world of this chapter
- Who
- Israelites whose whole security rested on the family plot they had inherited
- Where
- A vineyard beside the royal residence at Jezreel, and the elders' court of that town
- When
- The reign of Ahab, at Jezreel. about 855 BC on Thiele's chronology, in the years between the Aramean wars
Historical context
The chapter belongs to Naboth the Jezreelite, a landholder with one field beside a palace, and to Jezebel, a Phoenician princess who was queen of Israel.
The time is a stretch of peace between the Aramean campaigns, with Ahab holding a second residence at Jezreel besides the capital at Samaria.
The place is Jezreel, a town in the valley that carries its name, and the ground in question is a vineyard next to the king's own house.
The occasion is an offer and a refusal, since Ahab offers a better vineyard or its value in silver and Naboth answers with an oath.
A first hearer knew that Naboth was quoting the law. Land in Israel was assigned to families by clan and tribe and was held rather than traded. Leviticus 25:23 has the LORD call the land His own, and Numbers 36:7 kept an inheritance from moving between tribes.
He also knew what a proclaimed fast signalled, that a hidden offence had brought guilt on a town and that a culprit had to be found. Deuteronomy 19:15 had required two witnesses to protect an accused man, and here the safeguard is the weapon.
The letters carry the king's own seal, so the elders of Jezreel are obeying what looks like a royal order.
Significance
The first hearers understood exactly what had been taken, and it was a principle rather than a garden. A farmer with one ancestral acre could stand in front of a king and say no, and the machinery of a town court had just been used to end that.
Elijah meets Ahab in the stolen vineyard and the sentence is dogs at the pool of Samaria. Then Ahab tears his clothes and fasts, and the calamity is deferred to the next generation.
Where the chapter sits
1 Kings 21 falls in Divided kingdom and Elijah (chapters 13–22). The man of God from Judah; Ahijah's oracle to Jeroboam's wife; the parade of kings evaluated in formulaic regnal summaries. Elijah arrives in ch. 17 and dominates through Carmel (18), Horeb (19), Naboth's vineyard (21), and the LORD's word that stands against four hundred false prophets (22).
Naboth's vineyard. Jezebel's letter; Naboth stoned; ‘hast thou killed, and also taken possession?’
Before it: Division at Shechem, chapters 12.
The whole shape of 1 Kings→The structure of this chapter
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
The inheritance of my fathers is not for sale
Naboth the Jezreelite had a vineyard: Naboth refuses a fair price and a better vineyard because Ahab is not the last owner of Israelite land, the LORD is, and the law forbade trading a tribal inheritance away in perpetuity. The oath the Lord forbid it me sets Naboth's ground beneath the covenant law of Leviticus 25:23, the land is mine, and the ruling secured for the daughters of Zelophehad at Numbers 36:7, that an inheritance should not remove from tribe to tribe. Ahab hears a business offer declined; Naboth is standing on ground the king has no authority to buy.
1 Kings 21:1
“An ancient story tells of the two neighbors, King Ahab and a poor man, Naboth. Which of these do we consider the poorer, which the richer: the one who had been endowed with a king's measure of wealth, insatiable and unsatisfied with his wealth, who longed for the little vineyard of the poor man; or the other, heartily despising a "king's fortune of much gold" and imperial wealth, who was satisfied with his vineyard?”
Ambrose of Milan· written before 397· Letter 38 (To Simplician), Section 8patristic
1 Kings 21:2
“He had tamely quitted the great advantages God had given him of enlarging his dominion for the honour of his kingdom, by his victory over the Syrians, and now is eager to enlarge his garden, only for the convenience of his house, as if to be penny wise would atone for being pound foolish.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 more voice on this verse
1 Kings 21:2
“And he said to me, 'And I will have a vegetable garden.' This, therefore, was all madness, this was all madness, that the space should be sought for cheap vegetables. Therefore, you do not desire to possess it as something useful, but you want to exclude others. Your concern for the spoils of the poor is greater than for your own profits. You consider it an injury to you if a poor person has anything that can be valued as worthy of a wealthy possession. You consider it a loss to you, whatever is someone else's.”
Ambrose of Milan· written before 397· On Naboth the Jezreelite, Chapter 3, 11patristic
1 Kings 21:3
“The Lord forbid it me - Or, “Yahweh forbid it me.” Naboth, as a worshipper of Yahweh, not of Baal, considers it would be wrong for him to comply with the king’s request, as contrary to the Law (margin). His was not a mere refusal arising out of a spirit of sturdy independence, or one based upon the sentiment which attaches men to ancestral estates.”
1 Kings 21:4-6
heavy and displeased: A king who has just heard one poor man's no takes to his bed, turns away his face, and refuses bread, and the narrator gives the grief no dignity. The throne that could withstand Ben-hadad's army is undone by a vegetable garden. Jezebel finds him sullen rather than angry, and his own account to her in verse six repeats the offer nearly word for word, as though saying it again could make the answer different.
1 Kings 21:4
He laid him down upon his bed - Poor soul! he was lord over ten-twelfths of the land, and became miserable because he could not get a poor man’s vineyard added to all that he possessed! It is a true saying, “That soul in which God dwells not, has no happiness: and he who has God has a satisfying portion.” Every privation and cross makes an unholy soul unhappy; and privations and crosses it must ever meet with, therefore: - “Where’er it goes is hell; itself is hell!”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Jezebel's letters, a proclaimed fast, and two sons of Belial
1 Kings 21:5
“But Jezebel his wife came unto him, and said, why is thy spirit so sad, that thou eatest no bread? She perceived he was low spirited, and supposed he had met with something that had ruffled him, and made him so uneasy that he could not eat his food; and she desired to know what it was, that she might relieve him if possible.”
1 Kings 21:6
“And he said, because I spake unto Naboth the Jezreelite, and said unto him, give me thy vineyard for money,.... Sell it him at his own price: or else, if it please thee; if he liked it better: I will give thee another vineyard for it; as good, or better; and he answered, I will not give thee my vineyard; he represents this answer as surly and ill natured, and as the effect of obstinacy, concealing the reason Naboth alleged for his denial.”
Dost thou now govern the kingdom: Jezebel answers Ahab's sulk with a question that exposes the whole marriage, Dost thou now govern the kingdom of Israel, and takes on herself the deed a king's own law forbids him. She writes in Ahab's name and seals the letters with his own seal, so the crime that follows carries his authority whether or not he ever reads a word of it. Henry notes this was likely not the first time the royal seal had done Jezebel's bidding, recalling the slaughter of the prophets she had already ordered.
1 Kings 21:7
The meaning is, “Art thou king, and yet sufferest thyself to be thwarted in this way by a mere subject? I, the queen, the weak woman, will give thee the vineyard, if thou, the king, the strong man, wilt do nothing.”
1 Kings 21:8
“She wrote letters in Ahab’s name - She counterfeited his authority by his own consent; and he lent his signet to stamp that authority.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
1 Kings 21:8
“She borrows the privy-seal, but the king shall not know what she will do with it. It is probable this was not the first time he had lent it to her, but that with it she had signed warrants for the slaying of the prophets.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Proclaim a fast, and set Naboth on high: The letters order a fast, the outward form of national repentance, to stage Naboth's death as a righteous verdict rather than a murder. Two sons of Belial are set to accuse him of blaspheming God and the king, satisfying on paper the two-witness requirement of Deuteronomy 19:15 that no man be put to death on the word of one witness alone. The law meant to protect the innocent becomes the exact instrument of Naboth's death, and Wesley reads the fast itself as theater, meant to make Ahab look zealous for God rather than guilty of murder.
1 Kings 21:9
“The object of this fast was at once to raise a prejudice against Naboth, who was assumed by the elders to have disgraced the town; and at the same time to give an air of religion to the proceedings, which might blind persons to their real injustice. Set Naboth on high among his people - This was not an order to do Naboth any, even apparent, honor; but simply a command to bring him forward before a court or assembly, where he might be seen by all, tried, and condemned.”
2 more voices on this verse
1 Kings 21:9
“How clearly the custom of the rich is portrayed! They are made sad if they are not seizing the property of others; they renounce food, they fast, not that they may lessen their sin but that they may commit crime. You may see them at such times coming to church, dutiful, humble and assiduous, in order that they may deserve to obtain the accomplishment of their wickedness.”
Ambrose of Milan· written before 397· On Naboth the Jezreelite 10.44-45patristic
1 Kings 21:9
“Proclaim a fast, &c.--Those obsequious and unprincipled magistrates did according to orders. Pretending that a heavy guilt lay on one, or some unknown party, who was charged with blaspheming God and the king and that Ahab was threatening vengeance on the whole city unless the culprit were discovered and punished, they assembled the people to observe a solemn fast.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
1 Kings 21:10
“Set two men - For life could not be attainted but on the evidence of two witnesses at least. Sons of Belial - Men who will not scruple to tell lies and take a false oath. Thou didst blaspheme God and the king - Thou art an atheist and a rebel. Thou hast spoken words injurious to the perfections and nature of God; and thou hast spoken words against the crown and dignity of the king.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
1 Kings 21:10
“Blaspheme God and the king - Indeed his blaspheming God would only be the forfeiture of his life, not his estate. Therefore he is charged with treason also, that his estate may be confiscated, and so Ahab have his vineyard.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
did as Jezebel had sent unto them: The elders and nobles of Jezreel, men who owed Naboth nothing but common citizenship, carry out a queen's forged order against a neighbor without any recorded objection. They proclaim the fast, seat him where the crowd can see him, hear the false charge, and stone him outside the city, then send word back to Jezebel in four words, Naboth is stoned, and is dead. Barnes notes the parallel record that Naboth's sons died with him, so that no heir was left to reclaim the vineyard Jezebel intended for the king.
1 Kings 21:11
“The ready submission of the elders and nobles implies a deep moral degradation among the Israelites, the fruit of their lapse into idolatry.”
1 Kings 21:12
“They proclaimed a fast,.... Or called a court; see Gill on 1Ki 21:9. and set Naboth on high among the people; placed him at the bar as a criminal; see Gill on 1Ki 21:9, though Josephus (c) thinks he was set on an high place in the court, because he was of an illustrious birth. (c) Antiqu. l. 3. c. 13. sect. 8.”
1 Kings 21:13
“Naboth had sons who were also put to death at this time (marginal reference). It is not improbable that they were stoned together with their parent (compare Jos 7:24-25). In the East, a parent’s guilt constantly involves the punishment of his children. Contrast 2Ki 14:6.”
1 Kings 21:14
“Here let us observe that, as obsequious as the elders of Jezreel were to Jezebel's orders which she sent from Samaria for the murder of Naboth, so obsequious were the elders of Samaria afterwards to Jehu's orders which he sent from Jezreel for the murder of Ahab's seventy sons, only that was not done by course of law, 2 Kings x.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Arise, take possession of the vineyard of Naboth: Jezebel's message strips the murder down to a real estate transaction, Naboth is not alive, but dead, so arise and take what is now unclaimed. Ahab asks no question about how the vineyard came free and goes down that same day to take possession, and his silence is its own answer. Henry calls it a case of might prevailing against right, with God's patience letting the wicked devour a more righteous man for a season before judgment falls.
1 Kings 21:15
“Might often prevails against right, and wonderful is the divine patience that suffers it to do so. God is certainly of purer eyes than to behold iniquity, and yet for a time keeps silence when the wicked devours the man that is more righteous than he, Hab. i.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 Kings 21:16
“To take possession of it - The goods of traitors appear to have been forfeited to the crown by the Jewish law as they still are almost universally throughout the East. Compare 2Sa 16:4.”
Hast thou killed, and also taken possession?
the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite: The prophet who vanished under Jezebel's threat in chapter nineteen is sent to meet her victim's killer in the stolen vineyard itself. Elijah's charge is one unanswerable question, Hast thou killed, and also taken possession, followed by a sentence that binds Ahab's death to the ground he has just walked onto, in the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth shall dogs lick thy blood, even thine. This is the third house condemned by the dogs formula, after Jeroboam's at 14:11 and Baasha's at 16:4, and 22:38 records it kept to the word.
1 Kings 21:17
“What good canst thou expect from it when it is purchased with blood ( Hab. ii. 12 ) and thou hast caused the owner thereof to lose his life? " Job xxxi. Now that he is pleasing himself with his ill-gotten wealth, and giving direction for the turning of this vineyard into a flower-garden, his meat in his bowels is turned.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 Kings 21:18
“Go down to meet Ahab - This was the next day after the murder, as we learn from the above quotation, 2Ki 9:26.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 Kings 21:19
“Divine justice is moved by this and condemns the greedy with worthy severity, saying: 'You have killed and taken possession of the inheritance? For this reason, in the place where the dogs licked up the blood of Naboth, they will lick up your blood; and the prostitutes will wash themselves in your blood.' How just, how severe is this sentence, that the bitterness of death that he inflicted on another should be dissolved by the horror of his own death!”
Ambrose of Milan· written before 397· On Naboth the Jezreelite, Chapter 11, 48-49patristic
3 more voices on this verse
1 Kings 21:19
“Hast thou killed, and also taken possession? - These words rebuke especially Ahab’s indecent haste. He went to Jezreel the very day after Naboth’s execution 2Ki 9:26. The prophecy following had a double fulfillment. The main fulfillment was by the casting of the dead body of Jehoram into Naboth’s plot of ground at Jezreel, where, like Naboth’s, it was left for the dogs to eat 2Ki 9:25. This spot, which was just outside the city wall, and close to a gate 2Ki 9:31, was probably the actual scene of Naboth’s execution.”
1 Kings 21:19
“He killed, for he took possession. If he takes the garden, he takes the guilt with it. Terra transit cum onere--The land with the incumbrance. [2.] He passes judgment upon him.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 Kings 21:19
In the place where dogs licked, &c.--a righteous retribution of Providence. The prediction was accomplished, not in Jezreel, but in Samaria; and not on Ahab personally, in consequence of his repentance (1Ki 21:29), but on his son (2Ki 9:25). The words "in the place where" might be rendered "in like manner as."
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Hast thou found me, O mine enemy?: Ahab's greeting names Elijah his enemy on sight, the same dread Obadiah voiced in chapter eighteen now confirmed, the prophet's arrival always costs the king something he does not want to pay. Elijah refuses the label and reassigns it, I have found thee, because thou hast sold thyself to work evil, language Paul later uses of himself at Romans 7:14 under sin's dominion, though there as a captive who groans against it rather than a willing seller. Ahab sold himself freely, and the text lets that difference stand.
1 Kings 21:20
“Sold thyself - Thou hast wholly resigned up thyself to be the bondslave of the devil, as a man that sells himself to another is totally in his master's power. To work evil, &c. - Impudently and contemptuously. Those who give themselves up to sin will certainly be found out, sooner or later, to their unspeakable amazement.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
2 more voices on this verse
1 Kings 21:20
“Thou hast sold thyself to work evil - See a similar form of speech, Rom 7:14 (note). Thou hast totally abandoned thyself to the service of sin. Satan is become thy absolute master, and thou his undivided slave.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 Kings 21:20
“Ahab, having sold himself to sin, was resolved to stand to his bargain, and could not endure him that would have helped him to recover himself, [2.] That he feared him: Hast thou found me? intimating that he shunned him all he could, and it was now a terror to him to see him.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
him that pisseth against the wall: The sentence Ahab hears matches a sentence already carried out twice in this book, his house made like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat and like the house of Baasha, both dynasties erased down to the last male heir. The ground given is the refrain that falls seventeen times across these two books, made Israel to sin, first spoken over Jeroboam at 14:16 and now spoken over the king who married the sin to a Phoenician cult. Gill reads him that pisseth against the wall as the plain idiom for every male, the same phrase already used of Jeroboam's house at 14:10.
1 Kings 21:21
“Behold, I will bring evil upon thee,.... Upon his own person, by cutting him off with a violent death, though his family was so numerous, having no less than seventy sons: and will cut off from Ahab him that pisseth against the wall, and him that is shut up and left Israel; See Gill on 1Ki 14:10.”
1 more voice on this verse
1 Kings 21:21
“The prophet changes, without warning, from speaking in his own person to speaking in the person of God. The transition is abrupt, probably because the compiler follows his materials closely, compressing by omission. One fragment omitted here is preserved in 2Ki 9:26.”
1 Kings 21:22
“And will make thine house like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and like the house of Baasha the son of Ahijah,.... Two of his predecessors, whose families were utterly destroyed, 1Ki 15:29, for the provocation wherewith thou hast provoked me to anger, and made Israel to sin: not only by his worship of the calves, but of the idols of the Zidonians, particularly Baal, and also of the Amorites, 1Ki 21:26.”
The dogs shall eat Jezebel by the wall: Jezebel receives her own named sentence, the dogs shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel, distinct from the sentence just pronounced on Ahab's house and remembered at her death at 2 Kings 9:36 in nearly the same words spoken here. Verse 24 extends the same dogs and fowls formula to the whole house, city and field both covered, so that no member of it receives burial. Revelation 2:20 later makes Jezebel's name a standing label for the same seduction into idolatry inside a church at Thyatira, the queen's name outliving the queen by centuries.
1 Kings 21:23
“And of Jezebel also spake the Lord,.... To Elijah, and by him: saying, the dogs shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel or in the inheritance or portion of Jezreel, as the Targum; Jarchi interprets it, the valley of Jezreel; the fulfilment of this see in 2Ki 9:30.”
2 more voices on this verse
1 Kings 21:23
“And of Jezebel also spake the Lord, saying - These are not the words of Elijah, but of the writer, who notes a special prophecy against Jezebel, whose guilt was at least equal to her husband’s. Wall - The marginal rendering “ditch,” is preferable. There is always in Oriental towns a space outside the walls which lies uncultivated, and which is naturally used for the deposit of refuse of every kind. Here the dogs prowl, and the kites and vultures find many a feast.”
1 Kings 21:23
“Finally, even Jezebel herself was eaten by dogs and the birds of the air, in order to show that the spiritual wickedness becomes the prey of the rich burial. Therefore, flee, rich man, from such an end. But you will flee from such an end if you flee from such a disgrace. Do not be like Ahab, desiring a neighboring possession. Do not let that fatal greed of Jezebel dwell in you, which persuades you with bloodshed.”
Ambrose of Milan· written before 397· On Naboth the Jezreelite, Chapter 11, 48-49patristic
1 Kings 21:24
“Him that dieth of Ahab in the city the dogs shall eat, and him that dieth in the field the fowls of the air shall eat. That is, they shall have no burial, see 1Ki 14:11 hitherto are the words of the Lord by Elijah; next follow the remarks of the historian.”
Ahab in sackcloth: the evil deferred to his son's days
sell himself to work wickedness: The historian steps in with his own verdict on the reign just narrated, there was none like unto Ahab, which did sell himself to work wickedness, repeating verse twenty's own language and naming Jezebel as the one who stirred him to it. His idolatry is measured against the Amorites the LORD cast out of Canaan before Israel ever arrived, the same nations whose cup of iniquity Genesis 15:16 said was not yet full in Abraham's day. Four centuries later Ahab fills the same cup on his own account.
1 Kings 21:25
“And these, tho' lighting on the body only, yet undoubtedly were designed as figures of the soul's misery in an after state. 25 Was none - None among all the kings of Israel which had been before him. Whom Jezebel - This is added to shew, that temptations to sin are no excuse to the sinner.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
1 Kings 21:25
“He was wholly given up to sin, and, upon condition he might have the pleasures of it, he would take the wages of it, which is death, Rom. vi. Blessed Paul complained that he was sold under sin ( Rom. vii. 14 ), as a poor captive against his will; but Ahab was voluntary: he sold himself to sin; of choice, and as his own act and deed, he submitted to the dominion of sin.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 Kings 21:26
“And he did very abominably in following idols,.... Which were abominable to the Lord; "dunghill gods", as the Tigurine version: according to all things as did the Amorites, whom the Lord cast out before the children of Israel; meaning the seven nations that formerly inhabited Canaan, but were driven out for their sins, to make way for the children of Israel, of which the Amorites were one, and here put for all the rest.”
1 more voice on this verse
1 Kings 21:26
“The Amorites appear here as representatives of the old Canaanite nations (Gen 15:16 note). It seems to be implied here that their idolatries were in the main identical with those of the Phoenicians which Ahab had adopted.”
rent his clothes, and put sackcloth: Ahab tears his clothes, wears sackcloth on his bare flesh, fasts, and goes softly, the same outward signs Nineveh will later wear at Jonah's preaching. Barnes calls it real while it lasts and shallow because it never touches the idols or restores the vineyard to Naboth's heirs, springing from fear of consequence rather than love of God or hatred of sin. The text does not require Ahab's motive to be pure before it records what his humbling produces in the next verse.
1 Kings 21:27
“Delivered in 1Ki 21:21, that he rent his clothes, and put sackcloth upon, his flesh, tore off his clothes, and stripped himself of all, even of his very shirt, and put sackcloth on his bare flesh, a coarse cloth made of hair, and such as sacks are made with: and fasted, how long it is not said: and lay in sackcloth; in the night on his bed, would have no linen on him day nor night: and went softly: step by step, as persons mourning, grieving, and pensive, do; the Targum renders it "barefoot", and so Jarchi.”
4 more voices on this verse
1 Kings 21:27
“The repentance of Ahab resembles that of the Ninevites Jon 3:5. It has the same outward signs - fasting and sackcloth - and it has much the same inward character. It springs, not from love, nor from hatred of sin, but from fear of the consequences of sin. It is thus, although sincere and real while it lasts, shallow and exceedingly short-lived.”
1 Kings 21:27
“The rich become angry and slander in order to harm, if they do not obtain what they desire. However, when they have harmed through slander, they pretend to be sorry: yet they go forth sad and mournful, not in their hearts but in their appearance, and they seize the place of the property they have seized by their unfairness.”
Ambrose of Milan· written before 397· On Naboth the Jezreelite 11.47patristic
1 Kings 21:27
“Going softly, that is, barefoot, and with a pensive manner, within doors. He manifested all the external signs, conventional and natural, of the deepest sorrow. He was wretched, and so great is the mercy of God, that, in consequence of his humiliation, the threatened punishment was deferred.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
1 Kings 21:27
“He obtained hereby a reprieve, which I may call a kind of pardon. Though it was but an outside repentance (lamenting the judgment only, and not the sin), though he did not leave his idols, nor restore the vineyard to Naboth's heirs, yet, because he did hereby give some glory to God, God took notice of it, and bade Elijah take notice of it: Seest thou how Ahab humbles himself?”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying: The word of the LORD returns to Elijah with a question that asks the prophet to see what the reader has just seen, Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me. Because he humbles himself, the evil is not brought in Ahab's own days but in his son's, a real deferral of a real sentence rather than its cancellation, and the text states the grace as plainly as it stated the judgment nine verses earlier. Wesley calls the humiliation real though not lasting, and Henry draws the wider point that if an outward, partial repentance wins a reprieve, a sincere one wins more.
1 Kings 21:28
“And the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite,.... After he was gone from Ahab, and Ahab had been some time in this humble posture; the Targum calls it the word of prophecy, and so it was, as the next verse shows: saying: as follows.”
1 Kings 21:29
“Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself before me?.... Which yet was but an external humiliation, to be seen only with bodily eyes, as were all his actions and postures, before observed.”
3 more voices on this verse
1 Kings 21:29
“Seest thou how Ahab humbleth himself - He did abase himself; he did truly repent him of his sins, and it was such a repentance as was genuine in the sight of God: He humbleth himself Before Me. The penitent heart ever meets the merciful eye of God; repentance is highly esteemed by the Father of compassion, even where it is comparatively shallow and short-lived. Any measure of godly sorrow has a proportionate measure of God’s regard; where it is deep and lasting, the heart of God is set upon it.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 Kings 21:29
“Humbleth himself - His humiliation was real, though not lasting, and accordingly pleasing to God. This discovers the great goodness of God, and his readiness to shew mercy. It teaches us to take notice of that which is good, even in the worst of men.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
1 Kings 21:29
“God is rewarding their external services with external mercies. (4.) This encourages all those that truly repent and unfeignedly believe the holy gospel. If a pretending partial penitent shall go to his house reprieved, doubtless a sincere penitent shall go to his house justified.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Keep studying
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Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes on the Old Testament; Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament; Keil, The Books of the Kings and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.