2 Kings 17:24-41--Assyria Resettles Samaria

2 Kings 17:24-41
English Standard Version

Assyria Resettles Samaria
24 And the king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria instead of the people of Israel. And they took possession of Samaria and lived in its cities. 25 And at the beginning of their dwelling there, they did not fear the LORD. Therefore the LORD sent lions among them, which killed some of them. 26 So the king of Assyria was told, “The nations that you have carried away and placed in the cities of Samaria do not know the law of the god of the land. Therefore he has sent lions among them, and behold, they are killing them, because they do not know the law of the god of the land.” 27 Then the king of Assyria commanded, “Send there one of the priests whom you carried away from there, and let him go and dwell there and teach them the law of the god of the land.” 28 So one of the priests whom they had carried away from Samaria came and lived in Bethel and taught them how they should fear the LORD.

29 But every nation still made gods of its own and put them in the shrines of the high places that the Samaritans had made, every nation in the cities in which they lived. 30 The men of Babylon made Succoth-benoth, the men of Cuth made Nergal, the men of Hamath made Ashima, 31 and the Avvites made Nibhaz and Tartak; and the Sepharvites burned their children in the fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of Sepharvaim. 32 They also feared the LORD and appointed from among themselves all sorts of people as priests of the high places, who sacrificed for them in the shrines of the high places. 33 So they feared the LORD but also served their own gods, after the manner of the nations from among whom they had been carried away.

34 To this day they do according to the former manner. They do not fear the LORD, and they do not follow the statutes or the rules or the law or the commandment that the LORD commanded the children of Jacob, whom he named Israel. 35 The LORD made a covenant with them and commanded them, “You shall not fear other gods or bow yourselves to them or serve them or sacrifice to them, 36 but you shall fear the LORD, who brought you out of the land of Egypt with great power and with an outstretched arm. You shall bow yourselves to him, and to him you shall sacrifice. 37 And the statutes and the rules and the law and the commandment that he wrote for you, you shall always be careful to do. You shall not fear other gods, 38 and you shall not forget the covenant that I have made with you. You shall not fear other gods, 39 but you shall fear the LORD your God, and he will deliver you out of the hand of all your enemies.” 40 However, they would not listen, but they did according to their former manner.

41 So these nations feared the LORD and also served their carved images. Their children did likewise, and their children's children—as their fathers did, so they do to this day.

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The Land is going to be resettled by Gentiles who have no right to it.  The Assyrians will bring in people from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath, and Sepharvaim (all places the Babylonians had conquered and taken people away from) to place them in the land of the Israelites.  It was standard practice of the Assyrians to separate peoples from each other and their native land to help make them lose their identity and instead make them assimilate into the Assyrian culture.  These people took possession of Samaria (that is the northern kingdom of Israel) and lived in its cities.

These people that moved in did not fear the LORD (they neither obeyed Him, nor did they worship Him), so the LORD sent lions among them that killed some of them.  Someone however knew that this was a direct result of the curses of the Law and told the king of Assyria that the lions killing people were because the people he put in the Land did not know the Law of the God of that Land (that is the LORD).  The king of Assyria understood this and said that they would send back one priest from among the people of Israel so that he might teach the Law of the LORD to the people that resettled in Samaria.  That priest who is not named here lived in Bethel and was responsible for teaching all the new occupants of Samaria.

The idolatry did not stop though.  Each nation that came in continued to worship their gods and make idols to worship in the high places that the Samaritans (God has stopped calling them Israelites at this point as they are no longer living according to that name).  The specific names of the gods of these regions that were worshiped are listed there and it is told that some of the people that were brought into the land worshiped their gods by offering child sacrifices to them.  They tried to have it both ways and add the LORD as just another one of the pantheon of gods that they believed in and worshiped, and they made their own priests to mediate with these false gods and make sacrifices to them in all the high places they set up, yet they still claimed that they feared the LORD and worshiped Him too.

They cannot have a foot in each kingdom.  They must choose to be citizens of the kingdom of darkness or the kingdom of His marvelous light.  They loved the darkness and clung to it and they rejected the Law of the LORD.  They did not follow His rules, statutes, law, or commandments (just about every word you could think of to summarize the Law of the LORD) that were given to the children of Jacob who were called Israelites.  It shouldn't be a shock to us that non-Israelites would just imagine that these rules were not for them since they weren't a part of that nation that the Law was given to (that is the same argument many of us as Gentiles today make about the Law), but God seems to be saying in this passage that the curses of the Law are coming on the Gentiles living in the Land because the Law made no distinction between Jew or Gentile.  Anyone who lived in the Land was expected to worship the LORD as God and to serve Him only.  If they wanted to worship their gods, they were to do that in their land within the boundaries that the LORD had given to them.

A reminder of the covenant made with the Israelites is given here:

“You shall not fear other gods or bow yourselves to them or serve them or sacrifice to them, 36 but you shall fear the LORD, who brought you out of the land of Egypt with great power and with an outstretched arm. You shall bow yourselves to him, and to him you shall sacrifice. 37 And the statutes and the rules and the law and the commandment that he wrote for you, you shall always be careful to do. You shall not fear other gods, 38 and you shall not forget the covenant that I have made with you. You shall not fear other gods, 39 but you shall fear the LORD your God, and he will deliver you out of the hand of all your enemies.”

These people refused to heed the word of the LORD and continued in their old ways.  They thought they would receive the blessings of the Law simply by calling themselves followers of the LORD in name only without any repentance or obedience.  That didn't work for the children of Israel that the LORD just kicked out of the Land in judgment for their acting in a similar manner, and it certainly won't work for these Gentile pagans who are trying to take the inheritance of the Israelites as their own.

So the Samaritans as we know them in the New Testament became a group of people that were not the children of Israel living in the Land and claiming to worship the LORD while still worshiping their idols and engaging in all their pagan practices.  They were only taught the first five books of the Old Testament (the Law) and knew nothing else of the LORD's revelation to His people (they didn't have the books of History, or Poetry, or Prophecy).  They had incomplete revelation, but they also didn't listen to the revelation that they did have, so why would we expect the LORD to give them more revelation for them to disobey?  They made their choice that they wanted the lions to go away, but still preferred their gods that let them live whatever way they wanted to, for the Law of the LORD is hard--even impossible.  That is the whole point of it.  No one in their own born in sin with a sin nature will ever satisfy all the righteous requirements of the Law.  It is what Adam and Eve were supposed to live like before they fell, but one had to be born without a sin nature to be the Last Adam so that He could be Savior not only of the Jews, but also the Samaritans, and we'll see that in the book of John when Jesus intentionally goes to them, as well as in the book of Acts when Philip the evangelist will take the gospel to them.  Perhaps this passage sheds a little bit of light though on why the Jews hated the Samaritans so much and thought of them as worse than ordinary Gentiles.