Therefore shalt thou give presents to Moreshethgath: the houses of Achzib [shall be] a lie to the kings of Israel.
Ver. 14. Therefore shalt thou give presents, &c.] And so seek to make thee friends among the Philistines; but such carnal confederacies never prosper. The Greek Churches, A. D. 1438, afraid of the Turks, sent and subjected themselves to the Bishop of Rome, that they might have the help of the Latin Churches; but shortly after they were destroyed, their empire subdued, and swallowed up by the Ottoman greatness, &c. How much better were it to send a lamb to the ruler of the earth! Isaiah 16:1, to bring presents unto him that ought to be feared! Psalms 76:11, even to God, who cutteth off the spirits of princes, and is terrible to the kings of the earth! Micah 1:12. Was he not so to Sennacherib, whom Lachish here feared, and fled from? to Nebuchadnezzar, Belshazzar, Xerxes, who, after he had wasted over two million men into Greece, and whipped the Hellespont (for battering his bridge of boats over it) with three hundred stripes, was defeated, routed, and forced to flee back in a poor fisher's boat, to save his own life? (Herod.)
The houses of Achzib (that is, of a lie) shall be a lie to the kings of Israel] Or have been a lie to the kings of Israel; never true to those that trusted them: and wilt thou confederate with them, and confide in them?