Wherefore the LORD his God delivered him into the hand of the king of Syria; and they smote him, and carried away a great multitude of them captives, and brought them to Damascus. And he was also delivered into the hand of the king of Israel, who smote him with a great slaughter.
The Lord ... delivered him into the hand of the king of Syria. This verse, without alluding to the formation of a confederacy between the Syrian and Israelite kings to invade the kingdom of Judah, or relating the commencement of the war in the close of Jotham's reign (2 Kings 15:37), gives the issue only of some battles that were fought in the early part of the campaign.
And they smote him ... he was also delivered - i:e., his army, because Ahaz was not personally included in the number either of the slain or the captives. They attempted to besiege him in Jerusalem, which, however, they found impregnable, and raised the siege; but he ventured to pursue the retreating enemy, who resisted him on the plains north of the city in a pitched battle, and totally defeated his troops. The slaughter of 120,000 in one day was a terrible calamity, which, it is expressly said (2 Chronicles 28:6), was inflicted as a judgment on Judah, "because they had forsaken the Lord God of their fathers." Among the slain were some persons of distinction.