2 Kings 17:33 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

They feared the Lord and served their own gods, &c.— The imaginary vengeance which the tutelary god was supposed to take on those, who, inhabiting his land, yet slighted his worship, was really taken on the Cutheans, when they came to cultivate the land of Israel; for the Almighty having, in condescension to the prejudices of the Israelites, assumed the title of a tutelary local god, and chosen Judea for his peculiar regency, it appeared but fit that he should discharge in good earnest the imaginary functions of those tutelary gods, in order to distinguish himself both to the Jews from lying vanities, and to the Gentiles by some illustrious display of power. Therefore when so great a portion of his chosen people had been led captive, and a rabble of pagans were put into their possessions, he sent plagues among them for their idolatrous profanation of the Holy Land; which calamity their own pagan principles enabled them easily to account for. The account is given, 2 Kings 17:24, &c. But lest this miraculous interposition should be misunderstood as an encouragement of the notion of local gods, or of an intercommunity of worship, rather than a vindication of the sanctity of that country which was consecrated to the God of Israel, the sacred historian goes on to acquaint us with the perverse influence that this judgment had on the new inhabitants, so contrary to the divine intention. They feared the Lord, and served their own gods; i.e. they feared the vengeance impending on the exclusion of the worship of the God of Israel: but they feared not the Lord, neither did they after their statutes; i.e. they transgressed the commandment which they found so frequently repeated in the Pentateuch, of joining no other worship to that of the God of Israel. Div. Leg. vol. 4: p. 43.