Moreover Amaziah gathered Judah together,.... The inhabitants thereof:
and made them captains over thousands, and captains over hundreds, according to the houses of their fathers, throughout all Judah and Benjamin; he divided the people, according to their families throughout his kingdom, into thousands and hundreds, and out of their respective families appointed captains over them:
and he numbered them from twenty years old and above; the usual age men were numbered at for war, to the fiftieth, according to Josephus; the Roman law a obliged none to be soldiers after fifty, nor might any be dismissed before b; the age of military men with the Romans was from seventeen to forty six, or, as some, forty five; but with the Persians from twenty as here to fifty c:
and found them three hundred thousand choice men, able to go forth to war, that could handle spear and shield; which shows that their number was greatly decreased since the times of Jehoshaphat, 2 Chronicles 17:14, occasioned by the wars under Jehoram, Ahaziah, and Joash; some copies of the Vulgate Latin d have only 30,000.
a Seneca de Brevitate Vitae, c. 20. b Liv. Hist. l. 42. c. 33. c Alex. ab. Alex. Genial. Dier. l. 1. c. 20. d Ed. of Sixtus V. the Lovain and MSS. in James's Corruption of the Fathers, p. 295.