2 Chronicles6chapter 6

2 Chronicles 6:12-13

Then Solomon stood before the altar of the LORD: Verse 13 supplies a detail 1 Kings 8:22 lacks, “a bronze platform five cubits long, five cubits wide, and three cubits high”. There Solomon knelt. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown call it a pulpit with no seat, since the king stood or knelt through the whole prayer.

a bronze platform: Solomon stood on the platform and then knelt. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown note that this bronze pulpit had no seat, and the king stood or knelt the whole time before the assembly. Clarke counts the differences between this account of the prayer and the one in Kings of small consequence.

2 Chronicles 6:14-17

there is no God like You in heaven or on earth: The prayer opens with the address of 1 Kings 8:23 almost word for word. The first request repeats 1 Kings 8:25-26 with its condition, “if only your descendants guard their way to walk in My law”. The Kings exposition sets that condition beside the partial keeping at 1 Kings 11:12-13.

fulfilled with Your hand: Solomon repeats the pairing of verse 4, the mouth that promised and the hand that performed. The finished house and his reign are that fulfillment. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read the close of the prayer at verse 42 as a plea grounded in this promise to David.

guard their way: The promise is the covenant of 2 Samuel 7 concerning the successor of David. The condition binds his sons to the law. The prayer returns to this promise at verse 42, which Wesley links with the sure mercies of David in Isaiah 55:3.

please confirm what You promised: Solomon asks God to confirm the word of verse 16 for the generations after him. The prayer returns to this plea at its close. Clarke quotes Jarchi on that closing plea: should Solomon's sake fail to move God, may He act for His own sake.

2 Chronicles 6:18-21

But will God indeed dwell with man upon the earth?: Solomon asks, “But will God indeed dwell with man upon the earth?” and answers that “Even heaven, the highest heaven, cannot contain You, much less this temple I have built”. The prayer turns on its refrain, “May You hear from heaven,” which answers every petition, as at 1 Kings 8:27-30.

regard the prayer and plea: The verse gathers three words for prayer: prayer, plea and cry. Henry holds a prayer which prevails must be warranted by the word of God, and Solomon grounds his plea in the word spoken to David. The request follows the confession of verse 18.

May Your eyes be open: Henry reads this verse as the request that God hear and accept every prayer made in or toward the house. Prayer toward the house recurs in the petitions that follow, at verses 21, 26, 29, 32, 34 and 38. The request rests on God's own word about His Name.

May You hear and forgive: Hear and forgive are joined in this plea. Henry quotes the maxim removendo prohibens: the evil that forgiveness drives away, it keeps away. Wesley reads the plea as God helping Israel in answer to their own prayers, and holds that the intercession of Christ encourages such prayer.

2 Chronicles 6:22-25

When a man sins against his neighbor: The first two petitions, an oath sworn before the altar and defeat before an enemy, repeat 1 Kings 8:31-34 with almost no change in wording. Adam Clarke's note on verse 22 sends the reader back to the seven cases at 1 Kings 8:31-46.

justifying the righteous man: Henry reads this petition as a plea for judgment according to equity on every appeal brought to God. The guilty receive their own deeds back, and the righteous are declared righteous. Henry adds that God sits on the throne judging right.

defeated before an enemy: The second petition treats defeat in battle as the fruit of sin against God. The way back runs through return, confession of His name, and prayer at the temple. Clarke treats the whole prayer at 1 Kings 8:22-53.

restore them to the land: Forgiveness comes first here, and return to the land follows. Henry holds that the forgiveness of sins makes way for every other answer to prayer. The later petition of verses 36 to 39 carries the same hope to captives in a land far or near.

2 Chronicles 6:26-27

When the skies are shut and there is no rain: The third petition, “When the skies are shut and there is no rain because Your people have sinned,” matches 1 Kings 8:35-36 word for word. At 1 Kings 17:1 Elijah will announce neither dew nor rain, the judgment named here before any king has brought it on.

teach them the good way: In verse 26 the people sin, and the skies are shut. The answer joins forgiveness with teaching, and rain on the inheritance follows once God has shown His people the good way. Henry places forgiveness before every other answer to prayer, and here it comes before the rain.

2 Chronicles 6:28-31

When famine or plague comes upon the land: The fourth petition gathers “famine or plague,” “blight or mildew or locusts or grasshoppers,” and siege into one list. These are the curses Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28 attach to covenant unfaithfulness. Charles Spurgeon preached on this text at the Metropolitan Tabernacle in his sermon numbered 2637.

knowing his own afflictions: The petition narrows to each person and his own affliction. Spreading out the hands was the posture of prayer, the posture Solomon himself took at verse 13. Wesley notes that the prayer asks God to help His people in answer to their own prayers.

You alone know the hearts: God alone knows every heart. Repayment follows the ways of each man, so the answer fits the one who prays. Henry writes that all thoughts, aims and affections lie open before God, however hidden from men, angels and devils.

fear You and walk: Forgiveness has a purpose beyond relief: a people who fear God and walk in His ways for all their days in the land. The Targum at verse 37, quoted by Clarke, speaks of the fear of God returning into the heart. The land was the gift made to their fathers.

2 Chronicles 6:32-33

as for the foreigner who is not of Your people Israel: The fifth petition turns to “the foreigner who is not of Your people Israel,” drawn from a distant land by the report of God's name. It repeats 1 Kings 8:41-43 with its stated purpose, that “all the peoples of the earth will know Your name and fear You”.

all the peoples of the earth: The answer to the foreigner has a wider aim, that all the peoples of the earth come to know the name of the LORD. Henry calls the house a figure of Christ, the great Mediator through whom all prayer is offered. The house bears the Name of God.

2 Chronicles 6:34-35

When Your people go to war against their enemies: The sixth petition covers an army sent “wherever You send them,” praying toward the chosen city and the house from a distance. This repeats 1 Kings 8:44-45 with no change in sense. It is one of the shortest petitions in the prayer and asks only that God “uphold their cause”.

uphold their cause: asks God to take the side of His army and maintain its right. The same plea returns at verse 39 for captives. Wesley notes that Solomon asks God to help His people in answer to their prayers, here prayed from the field of war.

2 Chronicles 6:36-39

The seventh petition states what the others leave unsaid, “for there is no one who does not sin”. The captives are asked to come to their senses, confess “We have sinned and done wrong; we have acted wickedly”. The Chronicler wrote after the exile this petition describes.

come to their senses: The Targum, quoted by Clarke, renders the phrase as the return of the fear of God into their hearts. The confession that follows uses three verbs for sin: sinned, done wrong and acted wickedly. Clarke treats the whole prayer at 1 Kings 8:22-53.

with all their heart and soul: Captives far from the temple are asked to pray toward three things: the land, the chosen city and the house. The turning must be with the whole heart and soul. The Targum at verse 37, quoted by Clarke, places that turning in the fear of God returning to the heart.

forgive Your people who sinned: The seventh petition ends where the first requests of verse 21 began, with hearing from heaven and forgiveness. Henry holds that forgiveness makes way for every other answer to prayer, and it closes the list of cases here. Israel's cause, Henry adds, is God's own cause.

may Your eyes be open and Your ears attentive: Chronicles closes the body of the prayer with “may Your eyes be open and Your ears attentive to the prayer offered in this place”. Kings runs longer at 8:52-53. Barnes notes the difference and holds that both writers drew on a fuller record, each shortening it in its own way.

2 Chronicles 6:41-42

arise, O LORD God, and enter Your resting place: Clarke notes that 1 Kings 8 lacks these two verses, and Barnes takes the Chronicler and the psalm as drawing on one liturgy of dedication. The closing plea calls in the promise of 2 Samuel 7, which Isaiah 55:3 names “My loving devotion promised to David”.

Remember Your loving devotion: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read the second plea as an appeal to the loving devotion promised to David, as in Psalm 132:10. Clarke notes these closing words have no parallel in Kings. Henry observes that the psalm fit this very work.