John Gill's Bible Commentary Ver. 7. And all the graven images thereof shall be beaten to pieces , etc.] By the Assyrian army, for the sake of the gold and silver of which they were, made, or with which they were adorned, as was usually done by conquerors to the gods of the nations they conquered; these were the calf of Samaria, and other idols; and not only those in the city of Samaria, but in all the other cities of Israel which fell into the hands of the Assyrian monarch; (see Isaiah 10:11); and all the hires thereof shall be burnt with fire ; this the Targum also interprets of idols; such as escaped the plunder of the soldiers should be burnt with fire: Kimchi, by “hires”, understands the beautiful garments, and other ornaments, with which they adorned their idols, which were gifts unto them; and they committing spiritual adultery with them, these are compared to the hire of a harlot: or it may design their fine houses, and the furniture of them, all their substance and riches, which they looked upon as obtained by entering into alliances with idolatrous nations, and as the hire and reward of their idolatry; all these should be consumed by fire when the city was taken: and all the idols thereof will I lay desolate ; such as were not broke to pieces, nor burnt, should be thrown down, and trampled upon, and made no account of, or carried away with other spoil. The Targum interprets it of the houses or temples of their idols, which should be demolished. By this and the preceding clause it appears, that, besides the golden calf, there were other idols worshipped in Samaria. In the times of Ahab was the image of Baal, with others, for which he built an altar and a temple in Samaria, and a grove, ( 1 Kings 16:31-33) ( 2 Kings 10:26,27); and at the time it was taken by Shalmaneser there were idols in it, as appears from ( Isaiah 10:10,11 36:19); and there were still more after a colony of the Babylonians and others were introduced into it; the names of which were Succothbenoth, Nergal, Ashima, Nibhaz, Tartak, Adrammelech, and Anammelech. The first of these is thought, by Selden to be Venus; and the two last, both by him and Braunius f30 , to be the same with Moloch, having the signification of a king in them, as that word signifies, and children being burnt unto them: they are all difficult to be understood. The account the Jews give of them is, that “Succothbenoth” were images of a hen and chickens; “Nergal”, a cock; “Ashima”, a goat without hair; “Nibhaz”, or “Nibchan”, as sometimes read, a dog; and “Tartak”, an ass; “Adrammelech”, a mule, or a peacock; and “Anammelech”, a horse, or a pheasant. And it was not unusual for some of these creatures to be worshipped by the Heathens, as a cock by the Syrians, and others; a goat by the Mendesians; and the dog Anubis, perhaps the same with Nibhaz, by the Egyptians f32 . And though the inhabitants of Samaria might be better instructed, after Manasseh and other Jews came to reside among them in later times, still they retained idolatrous practices; and, even in the times of our Lord, they were ignorant of the true object of religious worship, ( John 4:22); and they are charged by the Jewish writers with worshipping the image of a dove on Mount Gerizim, and also such strange gods, the teraphim, which Jacob hid under the oak at Sichem; however, let their idols be what they will they worshipped, they are now utterly destroyed, according to this prophecy; for she gathered [it] of the hire of an harlot, and they shall return to the hire of an harlot ; as all the riches of Samaria and its inhabitants were gathered together as the reward of their idolatry, as they imagined, so they should return to idolaters, the Assyrians; to Nineveh, called the well favoured harlot, ( Nahum 3:4); the metropolis of the Assyrian empire; and to the house or temple of those that worshipped idols, as the Targum; with which they should adorn their idols, or use them in idolatrous worship: or the sense in general is, that as their riches were ill gotten, as the hire of a harlot, and which never prospers, so theirs should come to nothing; as it came, so it should go: according to our proverb, “lightly come, lightly go”. The allusion seems to be to harlots prostituting themselves in the temples of idols, which was common among the Heathens, as at Comana and Corinth, as Strabo relates; and particularly among the Babylonians and Assyrians, which may be here referred to: for Herodotus says, it was a law with the Babylonians that every woman of that country should once in her life sit in the temple of Venus, and lie with a strange man: here women used to sit with a crown upon their heads: nor might they return home until some stranger threw money into their laps, and took them out of the temple, and lay with them; and he that cast it must say, I implore the goddess Mylitta for thee; the name by which the Assyrians call Venus; nor was it lawful to reject the price or the money, be it what it would, for it was converted to holy uses, and Strabo affirms much the same. So the Phoenician women used to prostitute themselves in the temples of their idols, and dedicate there the hire of their bodies to their gods, thinking thereby to appease their deities, and obtain good things for themselves f37 .
Matthew Henry Commentary
Verses 1-7 - The earth is called upon, with all that are therein, to hear the prophet. God's holy temple will not protect false professors. Neithe men of high degree, as the mountains, nor men of low degree, as the valleys, can secure themselves or the land from the judgments of God If sin be found in God's people he will not spare them; and their sin are most provoking to him, for they are most reproaching. When we fee the smart of sin, it behoves us to seek what is the sin we smart for Persons and places most exalted, are most exposed to spiritual diseases. The vices of leaders and rulers shall be surely and sorel punished. The punishment answers the sin. What they gave to idols never shall prosper, nor do them any good. What is got by one lust, i wasted on another.
Original Hebrew וכל3605 פסיליה6456 יכתו3807 וכל3605 אתנניה868 ישׂרפו8313 באשׁ784 וכל3605 עצביה6091 אשׂים7760 שׁממה8077 כי3588 מאתנן868 זונה2181 קבצה6908 ועד5704 אתנן868 זונה2181 ישׁובו׃7725
