(3) At that time.--The time when the Temple had just been reopened (2Chronicles 29:8), in the first month of Hezekiah's first year. The Purification of the Temple was not completed until the 16th of Nisan (2Chronicles 29:17); but perhaps the Passover would have been held, had not the hindrances here mentioned prevented it. (See 2Chronicles 29:34).

Sufficiently.--L?madday. Literally, unto what was enough (l?-mah-day), an expression only met with here. (Comp. a similar formation, 1Chronicles 15:13.) The meaning is that a sufficient number of priests had not observed the legal ceremonies of self-purification in time to hold Passover in Nisan.

Verse 3. - At that time. The words seem like a reminiscence of the "at that day," twice occurring in ver. 6 of Numbers 9. But anyway the meaning is plain "at the appointed season."

30:1-12 Hezekiah made Israel as welcome to the passover, as any of his own subjects. Let us yield ourselves unto the Lord. Say not, you will do what you please, but resolve to do what he pleases. We perceive in the carnal mind a stiffness, an obstinacy, an unaptness to compel with God; we have it from our fathers: this must be overcome. Those who, through grace, have turned to God themselves, should do all they can to bring others to him. Numbers will be scorners, but some will be humbled and benefited; perhaps where least expected. The rich mercy of God is the great argument by which to enforce repentance; the vilest who submit and yield themselves to the Lord, seek his grace, and give themselves to his service, shall certainly be saved. Oh that messengers were sent forth to carry these glad tidings to every city and every village, through every land!For they could not keep it at the time,.... In the month Nisan, as the Targum adds, on the fourteenth day of the month, as the law enjoined, because the cleansing of the temple was not finished until the sixteenth day, see 2 Chronicles 29:17 and, besides this, two other reasons follow:

because the priests had not sanctified themselves sufficiently; that is, a sufficient number of them were not sanctified, to slay all the passover lambs the people that came to the feast would want:

neither had the people gathered themselves together to Jerusalem; they had no notice of it, nor summons for it; and it was required that, at such a time, all the males in the land should appear at Jerusalem; but this custom having been long disused, it required time to acquaint them of the revival of it.