But in his place he will honor the god of fortresses. He will honor a god whom his fathers didn’t know with gold, silver, precious stones, and pleasant things.
ExplanationCommentary
Verse 38. The god Maozim. That is, the god of forces or strong holds. Challoner.—Mahuzzim denotes “strong ones,” ( Bible.) guardians, and so forth Dr. Newton (Diss.) explains, the king (verse 36) of the Roman state; and supposes that here the guardian saints and angels are meant, whose worship he shews “began in the Roman empire, very soon after it became Christian. This exposition seems far preferable to that which interprets” Jupiter or the heavens, and understands the idol set up by Epiphanes. See Univ. Hist. x. Parkhurst.—If these authors speak of the inferior veneration shewn to saints and angels in the Catholic Church, it had a much earlier commencement, being coeval with religion itself. But only the blindest prejudice can represent this as idolatrous, and of course this system must fall to the ground. Bible.—Others suppose that Mars, Hercules, Azizus, or Jupiter, may be designated. Hebrew “He will rise up against all, (38) and against the strong God (of Israel. verse 31. Calmet. 8:10. Calmet.) he will, in his place, worship a strange god, “and so forth Jun.—None of the ancestors of Epiphanes had ever adored Jupiter on the altar of holocausts. Calmet.—He and antichrist adore either the great Jupiter or their own strength. Worthington.