1st Kings Chapter 15 verse 22 Holy Bible

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 22. - Then king Asa made a proclamation [Heb. made all to hear] throughout all Judah; none was exempted [Heb. none free], and they took away [Heb. took up] the stones of Ramah, and the timber thereof, wherewith Baasha [It is noticeable that it is generally "king Asa," but never "king Baasha"] had bullded; and king Asa built with them Geba of Benjamin [Sometimes "the Geba," i.e., height; in Joshua 18:24, Gaba; now Jeba, only 45' northeast of Ramah. This was the northern limit of the southern kingdom (2 Kings 23:8). It occupied a striking position, standing on a rocky knoll on the south side of the great gorge of Michmash (now known as the Wady Suweinit), a "great crack or fissure in the country, with vertical precipices some 800 feet high" (Conder, p. 254; cf. Dict. Bib., 1. p. 658 and Porter, 1. p. 214). As Geba would command the pass, it is easy to understand why Asa fortified it, the more so as this defile "appears to have been more than once the meeting place between the Jews and their enemies" (Conder)], and Mizpah. [Heb. the Mizpah, i.e., watch tower (Genesis 31:49). The name points to an eminence, but it is remarkable that while so many sites of minor importance have been recovered, this old gathering place of the tribes (Judges 21:1; 1 Samuel 7:5; 1 Samuel 10:17-25), and the seat of Gedaliah's government (Jeremiah 40:6), cannot be identified with certainty. It has been conjectured that it is now represented by the commanding eminence of Nebi Samwil (Robinson, 2 p. 328; Van de Velde, 2 p. 53),but Stanley (S. and P., 2. p. 213-4) and Grove (Dict. Bib., 2 p. 389) argue in favour of Seopus, and "the survey has done little to throw light on this question" (see Conder, pp. 257-9). It is to be hoped that the "pit," or well, which Asa made (Jeremiah 41:9), probably "to provide Mizpah with a plentiful supply of water in ease of a siege" (Ewald), may yet be brought to light.

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(22) Throughout all Judah.--Asa was not content to destroy or occupy the hostile fortress, but pushed his own fortifications further on. Geba, named in Joshua 21:17 as a city of the priests, in the territory of Benjamin, the scene of Jonathan's victory over a Philistine garrison in the days of Samuel (1Samuel 13:3)--identified with the modern Jeba--lies on the edge of a valley some distance to the north. It is noted in 2Kings 23:8 as still the northern outpost of the kingdom of Judah. The Mizpah here referred to--for there were many places so called--a city of Benjamin (Joshua 18:26), famous in the earlier history (see 1Samuel 7:5-13; 1Samuel 10:17-25), seems to have been situated at the place afterwards called Scopim ("the watch-tower"), on "the broad ridge which forms the continuation of the Mount of Olives to the north and east, from which the traveller gains his first view" of Jerusalem (Dict. of the Bible: MIZPAH). . . .