(12) God himself.--The (true) God. So in 2 Chronicles 13:15. Literally, and behold there are with us at the head the God and his priests, and the trumpets of alarm to sound alarm against you. (See Numbers 10:9; Numbers 31:6.) The trumpets were "the divinely appointed pledges that God would remember them in war." The Syriac gives this verse thus: "But ye have forsaken him, and gone after dead gods, and worshipped and bowed down to them, and forsaken the Lord God of your fathers; and also ye shall not prosper in the world." Then there is a lacuna extending to 2 Chronicles 13:15.
Verse 12. - The concluding utterances of Abijah certainly did not fall below what had preceded or the occasion in itself; and the echoes of them, while they died on the ear, must have lived, indeed, and stirred life in the hearts of many (Joshua 5:14; Numbers 10:9; Numbers 31:6; our ver. 14, and ch. 5:12, 13).
13:1-22 Abijah overcomes Jeroboam. - Jeroboam and his people, by apostacy and idolatry, merited the severe punishment Abijah was permitted to execute upon them. It appears from the character of Abijah, 1Ki 15:3, that he was not himself truly religious, yet he encouraged himself from the religion of his people. It is common for those that deny the power of godliness, to boast of the form of it. Many that have little religion themselves, value it in others. But it was true that there were numbers of pious worshippers in Judah, and that theirs was the more righteous cause. In their distress, when danger was on every side, which way should they look for deliverance unless upward? It is an unspeakable comfort, that our way thither is always open. They cried unto the Lord. Earnest prayer is crying. To the cry of prayer they added the shout of faith, and became more than conquerors. Jeroboam escaped the sword of Abijah, but God struck him; there is no escaping his sword.
And, behold, God himself is with us for our Captain,.... To go before our armies, and fight our battles for us:
and his priests with sounding trumpets to cry alarm against you; which was one use of the trumpets, that the people might be remembered by the Lord, and saved from their enemies, Numbers 10:9, so that this circumstance was against Jeroboam and his army, and for Abijah and his:
O children of Israel, fight ye not against the Lord God of your fathers; for fighting against his people, that retained the pure worship of him, was fighting against him:
for you shall not prosper; he seems to be assured of victory.
and his priests with sounding trumpets to cry alarm against you; which was one use of the trumpets, that the people might be remembered by the Lord, and saved from their enemies, Numbers 10:9, so that this circumstance was against Jeroboam and his army, and for Abijah and his:
O children of Israel, fight ye not against the Lord God of your fathers; for fighting against his people, that retained the pure worship of him, was fighting against him:
for you shall not prosper; he seems to be assured of victory.