2 Chronicles 10 –36: Guilt and Atonement

by William Johnstone

Publisher:

Sheffield Academic Press

, 1997

Overview

This commentary argues that Chronicles, placed as it is among the “historical books” in the traditional Old Testament of the Christian church, is much misunderstood. The Chronicler begins his work with the problem facing the whole human race in Adam —the forfeiture of the ideal of perfect oneness with God's purpose. He explores the possibility of the restoration of that ideal through Israel's place at the centre of the world of the nations. This portrayal reaches its climax in an idealized presentation of the reign of Solomon, in which all the rulers of the earth, including most famously the Queen of Sheba, bring their tribute in acknowledgment of Israel's status.

As subsequent history only too clearly shows, however, that Israel itself, through unfaithfulness to Torah, has forfeited its right to possession of its land and is cast adrift among these same nations of the world. But the Chronicler's message is one of hope. By a radical transformation of the chronology of Israel's past into theological terms, the generation whom the Chronicler addresses becomes the fiftieth since Adam. It is the generation to whom the jubilee of return to the land through a perfectly enabled obedience to Torah, and thus the restoration of the primal ideal of the human race, is announced.

Product Details

• Title: 2 Chronicles 10 –36: Guilt and Atonement
• Author: William Johnstone
• Series: Studies on 1 & 2 Chronicles Collection
• Publisher: Sheffield Academic
• Publication Date: 1997
• Pages: 305

About William Johnstone

William Johnstone is Professor of Hebrew and Semitic Languages and former Head of the Department of Divinity with Religious Studies at University of Aberdeen in Scotland. He is also the author of Chronicles and Exodus: An Analogy and its Application.