And the LORD rejected all the seed of Israel, and afflicted them, and delivered them into the hand of spoilers, until he had cast them out of his sight.
Though the destruction of the kingdom of the ten tribes was but briefly related, it is in these verses largely commented upon by our historian, and the reasons of it assigned, not taken from the second causes - the weakness of Israel, their impolitic management, and the strength and growing greatness of the Assyrian monarch (these things are overlooked) - but only from the First Cause. Observe, 1.
Commenting on 2 Kings 17:7-23
And the Lord rejected all the seed of Israel,.... The ten tribes, with loathing and contempt, and wrote a "loammi" on them, rejected them from being his people, gave them a bill of divorce, and declared them no more under his care and patronage: and afflicted them; as he did before he utterly cast them off, as by famine, drought, and pestilence, Amo 4:6.
SAMARIA TAKEN, AND ISRAEL FOR THEIR SINS CARRIED CAPTIVE. (2Ki. 17:7-41) For so it was, that the children of Israel had sinned--There is here given a very full and impressive vindication of the divine procedure in punishing His highly privileged, but rebellious and apostate, people.
Commenting on 2 Kings 17:7-41