(22) Received the blood.—Caught it in bowls of sprinkling (Numbers 8:14).

And sprinkled it on the altar.—Threw it against (literally, towards) the altar (Leviticus 8:19; Leviticus 8:24).

Likewise, when.—And they slaughtered the rams . . . and they slaughtered the lambs. The three clauses of the verse are symmetrical. The repetition is a mark of the writer’s anxiety to show how carefully the legitimate ritual was observed in each instance.

Killed.—Slaughtered (shahat; σφάζω, Genesis 37:31). Specially used of slaying sacrificial victims (Leviticus 1:5).

29:20-36 As soon as Hezekiah heard that the temple was ready, he lost no time. Atonement must be made for the sins of the last reign. It was not enough to lament and forsake those sins; they brought a sin-offering. Our repentance and reformation will not obtain pardon but in and through Christ, who was made sin, that is, a sin-offering for us. While the offerings were on the altar, the Levites sang. Sorrow for sin must not prevent us from praising God. The king and the congregation gave their consent to all that was done. It is not enough for us to be where God is worshipped, if we do not ourselves worship with the heart. And we should offer up our spiritual sacrifices of praise and thanksgiving, and devote ourselves and all we have, as sacrifices, acceptable to the Father only through the Redeemer.Hezekiah commenced his restoration of the Yahweh-worship with an unusually comprehensive sin-offering, embracing the four chief kinds of sacrificial animals, and seven animals of each kind: he intended to atone for the sins, both conscious and unconscious, of the king, the priests, the people of Judah, and the people of Israel. After the completion of these expiatory rites, he proceeded to the offering of the burnt-offering 2 Chronicles 29:27. 20-30. Then Hezekiah the king rose early, and gathered the rulers of the city—His anxiety to enter upon the expiatory service with all possible despatch, now that the temple had been properly prepared for it, prevented his summoning all the representatives of Israel. The requisite number of victims having been provided, and the officers of the temple having sanctified themselves according to the directions of the law, the priests were appointed to offer sacrifices of atonement successively, for "the kingdom," that is, for the sins of the king and his predecessors; for "the sanctuary," that is, for the sins of the priests themselves and for the desecration of the temple; "and for Judah," that is, for the people who, by their voluntary consent, were involved in the guilt of the national apostasy. Animals of the kinds used in sacrifice were offered by sevens, that number indicating completeness. The Levites were ordered to praise God with musical instruments, which, although not originally used in the tabernacle, had been enlisted in the service of divine worship by David on the advice of the prophets Gad and Nathan, as well calculated to animate the devotions of the people. At the close of the special services of the occasion, namely, the offering of atonement sacrifices, the king and all civic rulers who were present joined in the worship. A grand anthem was sung (2Ch 29:30) by the choir, consisting of some of the psalms of David and Asaph, and a great number of thank offerings, praise offerings, and freewill burnt offerings were presented at the invitation of the king. No text from Poole on this verse.

So they killed the bullocks,.... The seven bullocks, that is, the priests killed them:

and the priests received the blood; into basins provided for that purpose:

and sprinkled it on the altar; according to the law of Moses, Leviticus 1:5 and so they did with the rams and lambs.

So they killed the bullocks, and the priests received the blood, and {i} sprinkled it on the altar: likewise, when they had killed the rams, they sprinkled the blood upon the altar: they killed also the lambs, and they sprinkled the blood upon the altar.

(i) For without sprinkling of blood nothing could be sanctified, He 9:21, Ex 24:8.