2 Kings 21:18 - Exposition

And Manasseh slept with his fathers, and was buried in the garden of his own house. We have already seen reason for believing that the catacomb of David was full, and that Hezekiah was buried outside it, though in the neighborhood, on this account (see the comment on 2 Kings 20:21 ). Manasseh seems to have made a new family tomb in a garden belonging to his house. It is quite impossible to fix its site. In the garden of Uzza. Probably an addition to the old palace garden; perhaps a purchase made by Manasseh with the object of converting it into a burial-ground. "Uzza," or "Uzzah," was a common name among the Jews ( 2 Samuel 6:8 ; Ezra 2:49 ; Nehemiah 7:51 ; 1 Chronicles 6:29 ; 1 Chronicles 8:7 ; 1 Chronicles 13:7-11 ), and does not point to any definite individual. And Amen his son reigned in his stead. "Amon" in Hebrew means "Nursling," or "Darling," and it is quite possible that Manasseh gave his son the name in this sense. But it is also the ordinary Hebrew form of the term ("Amen," or "Amun") by which the Egyptians designated the great god of Thebes, whom the Greeks and Romans called "Ammon." It has therefore been thought by many that it was given by Manasseh to his son "in an idolatrous spirit." So Bishop Cotton in Smith's 'Dictionary of the Bible,' vol. 1. p. 61, and others.