(9) Seduced them.--Led them astray. Chronicles renders the same verb made them to err.

To do more evil.--To do the evil more . . . The LXX. adds: "in the eyes of Jehovah." The idolatry of Judah was worse than that of the Canaanites, because they worshipped only their national gods, whereas Judah forsook its own God and was ready to adopt almost any foreign cultus with which it was brought into contact (Jeremiah 2:11).

Verse 9. - But they hearkened not. The people, and not Manasseh alone, were disobedient. Had they remained faithful, Manasseh's sin would not have affected their future. And Manasseh seduced them. The influence of a young and gay king, always great, is in the East immense. When such a king succeeds one of strict and rind principles, he easily carries away the multitude with him, and leads them on to any excess of profligacy and irreligion. The beginnings of sin are delightful, and the votaries of pleasure, readily beguiled into evil courses, know not where to stop. Manasseh seduced them, we are told, to do more evil than did the nations whom the Lord destroyed before the children of Israel; that is, than the Hivites, Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Gergashites, and Jebusites (Deuteronomy 7:1, etc.). The sin of Israel exceeded that of the Canaanitish nations, not so much in any outward and tangible features, as in the fact that it was committed against light, in spite of the Law, and against all the warnings and denunciations of the prophets (comp. 2 Kings 17:13, 14).

21:1-9 Young persons generally desire to become their own masters, and to have early possession of riches and power. But this, for the most part, ruins their future comfort, and causes mischief to others. It is much happier when young persons are sheltered under the care of parents or guardians, till age gives experience and discretion. Though such young persons are less indulged, they will afterwards be thankful. Manasseh wrought much wickedness in the sight of the Lord, as if on purpose to provoke him to anger; he did more evil than the nations whom the Lord destroyed. Manasseh went on from bad to worse, till carried captive to Babylon. The people were ready to comply with his wishes, to obtain his favour and because it suited their depraved inclinations. In the reformation of large bodies, numbers are mere time-servers, and in temptation fall away.But they hearkened not,.... To the voice of God in his law by Moses, and were not obedient to it:

and Manasseh seduced them to do more evil than did the nations whom the Lord destroyed before the children of Israel: he set up more idols, and drew the people into more and greater idolatries, than the old Canaanites; and these were the more aggravated by having a law given to them, and prophets sent to instruct them in it, and by the benefits and blessings bestowed upon them by the lawgiver, which laid them under greater obligations to him; see Jeremiah 2:11.