2 Kings 20:9

2Ki 20:9 And Isaiah said, This sign shalt thou have of the LORD, that the LORD will do the thing that he hath spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten degrees, or go back ten degrees?

Ver. 9. Shall the shadow go forward ten degrees?] This was in God Almighty stupenda dignatio, a wonderful condescension, thus to gratify a mortal man - stooping so low to his meanness. If Hezekiah were - as the Rabbis say he was - studious of the mathematics, how suitable was this sign! These degrees were half-hours, or quarters, or haply less. The shadow was that of the style of a sundial. Neither did the shadow only go backward, but the sun itself ran retrograde, {Isa 38:8} whereof the Rabbis give this foolish reason, that when wicked Ahaz was buried, the sun hastened faster than ordinary to his setting, that there might be no time for funeral rites, to recompense which loss of time then, the day was thus prolonged now. Those ancients do better, who, allegorising the text, tell us that sick Hezekiah signifieth all mankind as sick of sin; but this is an infallible sign of the saint’s recovery, that the sun hath gone ten degrees back in the dial. The Sun of righteousness Jesus Christ, hath for our sakes made himself lower by many degrees in the earth. "My Father is greater than I": there he is gone back ten degrees below his Father. "Thou hast made him lower than the angels": there he is gone back ten degrees below the angels. "I am a worm, and no man": there he has gone back ten degrees below men. "A live dog is better than a dead lion": there he has gone back ten degrees below worms: for he was not counted so good as a live worm, but was buried in the earth, as a dead lion, to be meat for the worms, if it had been possible for "his holy One to see corruption."

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

(9) Shall the shadow go forward ten degrees, or go back ten degrees?—Rather, the shadow hath marched (or travelled) ten steps; shall it return ten steps? This is what the Hebrew text seems to say at a first glance. But Hezekiah’s answer apparently implies an alternative; and we might render: “the shadow shall have travelled ten steps; or shall it return ten steps?” (Comp. the LXX. πορεύσεται.) The Targum has: “shall the shadow march ten hours or return ten hours?” The Vulgate also makes it a double question. The Syriac is: “the shadow shall march ten steps, or return ten steps.”

It is very probable that the Hebrew text is corrupt. We might read the first word as an infinitive instead of a perfect, after the analogy of 2Ki_19:29 (“ye shall eat”). Or we might read “shall it march?” as a question (hã-yçlçk); or better still, “shall it go up” (hã-yçlçk), after the hint afforded by the Vulgate: “Vis ut ascendat umbra . . . Et ait Ezeehias, Facile est umbram crescere,” &c. It is obvious that a kind of sun-dial is meant, though what kind is not so clear. The word “degrees” (ma‘ãlôth) means “steps” or “stairs” wherever it occurs. (See Exo_20:26; Eze_40:6; Eze_40:22; Eze_40:26; Eze_40:31, &c. 1Ki_10:20; Neh_3:15.) There is probability, therefore, in Knobel’s conjecture that “the dial of Ahaz” consisted of a column rising from a circular flight of steps, so as to throw the shadow of its top on the top step at noon, and morning and evening on the bottom step. This, or some similar device, was set up in the palace court, and was probably visible to Hezekiah lying on his sick bed and facing the window. Herodotus (ii. 9) ascribes the invention of the gnomon to the Babylonians. From the inscriptions we know that they divided time into periods of two hours, each called in Sumerian kasbumi, and in Assyrian asli. Each kasbu or aslu was subdivided into sixty equal parts.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

9. shall the shadow go forward ten degrees [R.V. steps], or go back ten degrees] R.V. steps. In the Hebrew there is no sign of interrogation in the first clause. But instances are not rare in which the interrogative sign is left out (cf. 1Sa_16:4; 2Sa_18:29). A greater difficulty is in the tense of the first verb. The clause, if it stood alone, would be translated, ‘The shadow hath gone forward ten steps, (what) if it shall go back ten steps? But Hezekiah’s answer implies that an alternative question was asked. Thus both A.V. and R.V. have translated it, but how the grammar is to be made to yield a double question is not easy to see. For if the omitted interrogation be supplied, we have still only, ‘Hath the shadow gone forward ten steps?’

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And Hezekiah answered, it is a light thing for the shadow to go down ten degrees,.... That is, it was comparatively so, otherwise to go down ten degrees at once would be extraordinary and miraculous; but that was more agreeable to the nature and course of it to go forward, and so the miracle would be less apparent:

nay, but let the shadow return backward ten degrees; which was directly contrary to its natural order and course, whereby the miracle would appear more clear and manifest: these degrees are by some said (x) to be half hours, and not full ones, since it is observed the sun shines not twenty full hours on any dial, unless under the pole; the sun is supposed to have been now at the fifth full hour; the sun was brought back five whole hours, then came forward five, then came forward two degrees, or one hour, to the sixth hour; which made sixteen; then it was six hours to sunset; so that day was prolonged twenty two hours: the Chinese (y) relate, that, in the time of Kingcungus, the planet Mars, for sake of the king, went back three degrees.

(x) Weemse's Christ. Synagog. l. 1. c. 6. sect. 6. p. 167. See his Exposition of the Judicial Laws, c. 25. p. 90. &c. (y) Martin. Sinic. Hist. l. 4. p. 138.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Ten degrees - literally, “ten steps.” It is not, perhaps, altogether certain whether the “dial of Ahaz” 2Ki 20:11 was really a dial with a gnomon in the center, and “degrees” marked round it, or a construction fur marking time by means of “steps.” Sundials proper had been invented by the Babylonians before the time of Herodotus; but the instrument here was probably an instrument consisting of a set of steps, or stairs, with an obelisk at the top, the shadow of which descended or ascended the steps according as the sun rose higher in the heavens or declined.

The question as to the mode whereby the return of the shadow was produced is one on which many opinions have been held. Recently, it has been urged that the true cause of the phenomenon was a solar eclipse, in which the moon obscured the entire upper limb of the sun; and it has been clearly shown that if such an occurrence took place a little before mid-day, it would have had the effect described as having taken place - i. e., during the obscuration of the sun’s upper limb shadows would be sensibly lengthened, and that of the obelisk would descend the stairs; as the obscuration passed off the reverse would take place, shadows would shorten, and that of the obelisk would once more retire up the steps. If this be the true account, the miracle would consist in Isaiah’s supernatural foreknowledge of an event which the astronomy of the age was quite incapable of predicting, and in the providential guidance of Hezekiah’s will, so that he chose the “sign” which in the natural course of things was about to be manifested.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

9. Shall the shadow go forward — A more accurate rendering of the Hebrew is that of Keil: The shadow has advanced ten degrees; if it should return ten degrees. This concise and idiomatic Hebrew might thus be paraphrased: The shadow has now advanced ten degrees; if it go back ten degrees, would that be a convincing sign to thee? Hezekiah’s answer in the next verse seems, however, to show that Isaiah had put it to him to decide whether the sign should be an advance or return of ten degrees, and so favours the common version.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And Isaiah said, This sign shalt thou have of the Lord, that the Lord will do the thing that he hath spoken. Hezekiah is no more reproved for asking for a sign than was Gideon. (Jud_1:6:37, 39) Ahaz, his father, had been reproved for not asking. (Isa_7:13) It would be faithless now for Christians to demand signs; but in an age of miracles, when there were prophets upon the earth empowered to give signs, faithful men might request them without incurring God"s displeasure. Shall the shadow go forward ten degrees? The Hebrew text will scarcely bear this translation, which, however, seems to be required by Hezekiah"s answer. Perhaps for we should read Or go back ten degrees? literally, in both clauses, ten steps. There are abundant reasons for believing that the early dials consisted of a gnomon set up on the top of a flight of steps, and that time was measured by the number of steps on which the shadow of the gnomon fell (see a paper by Mr. Bosanquet, in the "Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology" for 1874, pp. 1-82).

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Should the shade advance ten steps or should it go back ten steps? This is an abbreviated verse. The shade had already advanced the steps that are made [to measure] the hours of the day, like, oriloje, in O. F., the clocks that people make to determine the hour of the day. [He asked,] “Do you wish it to stay in the place where it is, for as long as it takes it to walk in ten hours, or should it go back up ten steps so that it will appear as though it is morning?”

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.