(4) The kings.--With the striking picture of the advance and sudden collapse of a hostile expedition that follows, comp. Isaiah 10:28-34; possibly of the very same event.

The kings.--Evidently known to the writer, but, alas! matter of merest conjecture to us. Some suppose the kings of Ammon, Moab, and Edom, who attacked Jehoshaphat (2Chronicles 20:25); others, the tributary princes of Sennacherib. In his annals, as lately deciphered, this monarch speaks of setting up tributary kings or viceroys in Chaldaea, Phoenicia, and Philistia, after conquering these countries. (See Assyrian Discoveries, by George Smith, p. 303.) Others again, referring the psalm to the time of Ahaz, understand Pekah and Rezin (2Kings 15:37). The touches, vivid as they are, of the picture, are not so historically defined as to allow a settlement of the question.

Assembled.--Used of the muster of confederate forces (Joshua 11:5).

Passed by--i.e., marched by. So, according to the time reading, the LXX. A frequent military term (Judges 11:29; 2Kings 8:21; Isaiah 8:8). Others, "passed away," but it is doubtful if the verb can have this meaning.

Together.--Notice the parallelism, they came together, they passed by together.

Verse 4. - For lo, the kings were assembled; they passed by together. Some see in these "kings" Sennacherib's princes, who, according to him (Isaiah 10:8), were "altogether kings." But actual monarchs, each leading his own army, seem rather to be intended.

48:1-7 Jerusalem is the city of our God: none on earth render him due honour except the citizens of the spiritual Jerusalem. Happy the kingdom, the city, the family, the heart, in which God is great, in which he is all. There God is known. The clearer discoveries are made to us of the Lord and his greatness, the more it is expected that we should abound in his praises. The earth is, by sin, covered with deformity, therefore justly might that spot of ground, which was beautified with holiness, be called the joy of the whole earth; that which the whole earth has reason to rejoice in, that God would thus in very deed dwell with man upon the earth. The kings of the earth were afraid of it. Nothing in nature can more fitly represent the overthrow of heathenism by the Spirit of the gospel, than the wreck of a fleet in a storm. Both are by the mighty power of the Lord.For, lo, the kings were assembled,.... As the princes of the Philistines to seek for David, when in the strong hold of Zion, 2 Samuel 5:17; as the Ethiopians in the time of Asa, 2 Chronicles 14:9; and the Moabites and Ammonites in the times of Jehoshaphat, 2 Chronicles 20:1; and the kings of Syria and Israel in the times of Ahaz, Isaiah 7:1; and Sennacherib with his princes, who, in his esteem, were kings, in the times of Hezekiah, 2 Kings 18:17; which are instances of the kings, of the nations' gathering together against Zion, the city of Jerusalem, and people of the Jews, who were typical of the church of Christ; and that without success, and to their own confusion and destruction; though this seems to refer to the latter day of the Gospel dispensation, when all the kings of the earth, Pagan, Papal, and Mahometan, will be gathered together at the instigation of Satan, to the battle of the great day of the Lord God Almighty, in a place called Armageddon, where they will be defeated by Christ the King of kings, Revelation 16:13. Jarchi and Kimchi interpret the passage of Gog and Magog gathering together to fight against Jerusalem, with which compare Revelation 20:8;

they passed by together; either to the battle, as Jarchi explains it; or they passed by Jerusalem, the city of our God, the church, without entering into it, or doing it any harm.