Matthew Henry on 2 Chronicles 13:13–end
We do not find that Jeroboam offered to make any answer at all to Abijah's speech. Though it was much to the purpose, he resolved not to heed it, and therefore he heard it as though he heard it not. He came to fight, not to dispute. The longest sword, he thought, would determine the matter, not the better cause. Let us therefore see the issue, whether right and religion carried the day or no.
I. Jeroboam, who trusted to his politics, was beaten. He was so far from fair reasoning that he was not for fair fighting. We may suppose that he felt a sovereign contempt for Abijah's harangue. "One stratagem," thinks he, "is worth twenty such speeches; we will soon give him an answer to all his argume…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on 2 Chronicles 13:20
Neither did Jeroboam recover strength again in the days of Abijah--The disastrous action at Zemaraim, which caused the loss of the flower and chivalry of his army, broke his spirits and crippled his power.
the Lord struck him, and he died--that is, Jeroboam. He lived, indeed, two years after the death of Abijah (Kg1 14:20; Kg1 15:9). But he had been threatened with great calamities upon himself and his house, and it is apparently to the execution of these threatenings, which issued in his death, that an anticipatory reference is here made.
Next: 2 Chronicles Chapter 14
Adam Clarke on 2 Chronicles 13:22
Written in the story - במדרש bemidrash, "in the commentary;" this, as far as I recollect, is the first place where a midrash or commentary is mentioned. The margin is right.
His ways, and his sayings - The commentary of the prophet Iddo is lost. What his sayings were we cannot tell; but from the specimen in this chapter, he appears to have been a very able speaker, and one who knew well how to make the best use of his argument.
John Gill on 2 Chronicles 13:22
And the rest of the acts of Abijah, and his ways, and his sayings,.... Not only his warlike actions, and his course of life, but some remarkable sayings of his, he being a man of wisdom and eloquence, as his above speech shows:
are written in the story of the prophet Iddo; who might write the history of his own times; see 1 Kings 15:7.
