Useful Bible Studies > 2 Kings Commentary > chapter 17
Lions are bold and fierce animals, so of course the foreigners in Samaria were very afraid of them. They prayed for help to their false gods, but those gods could not help them. So they realised that only Israel’s God could save them from the lions. However, they knew nothing about the true God or about the kind of religion that would please him. So they appealed to the king of Assyria who had sent them there. They needed to learn urgently about Israel’s God – otherwise, they were sure that the lions would kill them all.
The king of Assyria knew nothing about Israel’s God. So, he did not arrange for one of the priests to come from the temple, God’s house in Jerusalem. Instead, he sent back one of the priests who had led the people in northern and central Israel in their religion. It was the task of this priest to teach the foreigners how to serve the God of Israel.
We do not know how well this priest knew the true God or his law. God had appointed only one family – the family of Aaron, Moses’s brother – to be his priests. However, the people in northern and central Israel allowed all kinds of people, from any family, to be their priests (1 Kings 12:31). They did not obey God’s law. In Jeroboam’s wrong religion, they seemed to believe that they were praying to the true God (1 Kings 22:11-12). However, they used idols (images) in their religion, which God’s law does not permit (Deuteronomy 5:8). After some time, they began to serve false gods.
That was very similar to the religion that the foreigners in Samaria learned from this priest. He taught them to pray to the real God, but not to turn from their false gods. He probably urged them to live in a moral manner – but they still did some very wicked things in order to please their false gods.
Next part: A mixture of religions (2 Kings 17:29-33)
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