Elah... Zimri... Arza. 1 Kings 16:8-10 Elah, Zimri, and Arza J. Parker, D. D. There was once a king in Israel called Elah. He reigned over Israel in Tirzah two years. He had a servant called Zimri who was a captain of his chariots. Zimri was a born traitor. Treachery was in his very blood. In the case of Elah, Zimri had a marked advantage; for Elah was a drunken fool. He was in the habit of visiting the house of another of his servants, a steward called Arza, and there he had what drink he asked for; and he asked for a good deal, so much so that he was often drunk in his servant's house, and on one of these occasions, Zimri went in and killed him, and reigned in his stead. These are the facts which we have to deal with. Are they very ancient, or are they happening round about us every day? 1. Elah lives in every man who has great chances or opportunities in life, but allows them to slip away through one leak in the character. Elah was a king, and the son of a king, so his openings in life were wide and splendid; but he loved strong drink, and through that leak in his character all that might have made him a man oozed away, and left him a king in nothing but the barren name. Strong drink will ruin any man. What is true of this leak in a man's character is true of every other. Take indecision for example, or idleness, or love of company, or devotion to pleasure. A great merchant once said to me of a certain man in his employment, "I would to-morrow give that man a thousand a year to begin with, if he could do one thing, and that is, hold his tongue; but he would no sooner get the appointment than he would go into an ale-house, and tell the whole company everything I am doing." There is the leak in the character, and it means ruin! It is astounding what one leak will do. 2. Zimri still lives in all persons who take advantage of the weaknesses of others. Zimri knew that Elah was a drunkard, and he further knew that through his habit of drunkenness alone he could reach the king. On every other side of his character Elah may have been a strong man: acute, shrewd, far-sighted; but when in drink, weak and foolish. And Zimri played his game accordingly. Some people trade on the weaknesses of others. They study them. Thy adapt themselves to them. They watch for striking time, and seldom miss the mark. How else could the net be always ready for the bird? How else the pit be always prepared for the unexpected and bewildered traveller? There is an infernal science in these things — a devil's black art! 3. And does not Arza still live in those who find the means whereby men may conceal their evil habits and indulge their unholy desires? They seem to say, "In my house you may do what you please. I shall not look at you. Come when you please; go when you like; I am nobody, if you like to call me so." My wonder is that any young man can keep his morals uncorrupted in a strange city. Houses of destruction are open in every street. How foolish, too, are the wicked! If they would devote their talents to some virtuous end they would attain honourable success, sweetened with a sense of honesty. They often have great talents, fine powers, large capacities, and if they gave themselves with ardour and energy to the pursuit of good ends they would outrun many, and gain a prize worthy and lasting. ( J. Parker, D. D. ) So Tibni died, and Omri reigned. 1 Kings 16:22 Tibni and Omri J. Parker, D. D. We have often been struck by the difference in the lot of men upon the earth; for example, as between the rich man and Lazarus, and between the great king and the poor wise man. The text brings these differences before us sharply — "Tibni died, and Omri reigned." A short explanatory story is needed here. When Zimri killed Elah, the people proclaimed Omri as king; but the proclamation was not unanimous; half of the people wanted Tibni, and half wanted Omri: the half that wanted Omri prevailed; so Tibni died, and Omri reigned. Our purpose is to show that both Tibni and Omri are still living, and that we may learn a good deal from their different lots in life. 1. Tibni and Omri are both living in the persons of those who divide public opinion respecting themselves. Is there any man living with whom everybody is satisfied? Take a Christian minister — any minister in this great London, and see how public opinion is divided about him. To one set of men he is the supreme human teacher; to another set of men he is almost unfit to be in the pulpit at all. Take a statesman; to one class he is the salvation of the kingdom, to another he is an empiric, a traitor, or in some degree a political rascal. Take any friend in social life; to one man he is an idol, to another he is bore. There are great moral lessons coming out of these simple facts. Society will always be divided about its leading men; but let us insist that there may be difference without bitterness, and that you may make one man king without taking away the character and perhaps the life of his rival. Let us pray God to show us the best points in every man s character. 2. Tibni still lives in the man who comes very near being a king but just misses the throne. Half the people in the camp were in his favour. In some of the popular shouts you could hardly tell whether Tibni or Omri was the uppermost name. Now the one seemed to fill the whole wind and now the other. The men themselves did not know for certain which of them was to have the crown. Let us see if there be not a good deal of our own life in this apparently remote and uninteresting fact. Whatever you strive for most anxiously in life is the crown to you, because it is the thing you want beyond all others. Sometimes it is so near! You feel as if you could put out your hand and take it! And yet though so near, it is so far, like a star trembling in a pool. Here we come upon the very first lines of Providence, and the finer the lines the subtler the temptation. We are tempted to step over some lines; it seems right that we should do so; we say we ought to take advantage of our good fortune, and if God has come so near He means us to take the one last step. It is just there that many a man suffers the supreme trial of his faith and the supreme agony of his sensibilities. We have referred to the supreme trial of a man's sensibilities; let us explain our meaning. We often say of this man or that, How narrowly he escapes being a great man! There is only one thing wanting, one element, one force, one virtue — one thing thou lackest, one thing is needful! And the man himself is tormented by a sense of greatness which is always nearing the point of royalty but never absolutely reaching it. He feels that the great poem which would give him literary immortality is breathing within him and around him, but the moment he puts pen to paper the inspiration ceases and will not harden into words. He has m him strange wild dreamings of power; he can write a book, he can found a new school of philosophy, he can illumine the whole horizon of theology, he can save the State; innumerable things he attempts and completes in his dreams, but the day of execution never dawns! It is in such men that Tibni still lives; in disappointed hearts, in blighted hopes, in brilliant prospects overcast, in kingdoms made of cloud, in castles built in air. 3. Omri still lives in those who turn great powers and great openings to dishonourable and unholy uses. Omri got the throne. For twelve years he reigned in Israel, six of them in Tirzah. His rival died, and he was left in undisputed sovereignty. But his way was not honourable before the Lord. "Omri wrought evil in the eyes of the Lord, and did worse than all that were before him." Some providences seem to be altogether thrown away, and we stand aghast at the destruction, saying, "Why was this waste made?" Great talents are made to serve the devil; great voices of song are never heard in the sanctuary; noble powers of speech are dumb when the righteous cause has to be pleaded. Application: (1) If we cannot be great we can be good; (2) There is one throne which we need not miss. ( J. Parker, D. D. ) Omri slept with his fathers... Ahab his son reigned in his stead. &&& 1 Kings 16:28 Omri and Ahab J. Hall, D. D. A careful study of the two kingdoms, Israel and Judah, compels one to feel that communities do the best when they most honour God, and that forgetfulness of Him, and especially revolt from Him, brings disturbance and destruction. It is true these events transpired more than two thousand five hundred years ago, but they "are written for our learning." Why should they be if there is nothing that we need to learn from them? 1. We need not trouble ourselves with the settling of the periods making up the dozen years of Omri's reign, which had its opening portion in Tirzah, the royal seat (ver. 17). Omri had ability of a certain sort, and hence, probably, was able to secure the adhesion of so many of the people and the conquest of his two rivals. He showed it in the selection of a new capital. Shemer owned a tract of land with a hill of great strategic value. With an opening out into the wider distant plain through the level grounds which divided it elsewhere, all around, from the mountains, it had on one side a gentle slope, and on all the others it was easily made strong against an enemy, when bows and arrows and spears constituted the common weapons of assault. The town got its name from him who owned the hill, and most fitly, for it was the synonym of "watch-tower," the very thing at which Omri aimed, having in mind through the slaughter of how many enemies he had to wade to the throne, and how necessary it was to be strong against any future assaults. They who part with Jehovah as Guide and Protector, and trust to human resources, need to multiply these to the utmost. Jeroboam had not flung off God formally. He had only modified the way of serving Him. He had set up the calves. This was politic, expedient, necessary. It was in harmony too with the ways of the nations. This was "the Way of Jeroboam the son of Nebat" (ver. 26). It was not the way of loyalty to Jehovah; it was not the way of truth. It was the way of disobedience under the inspiration of policy. Between this sin and the others that followed it was only a question of degree, not of kind. Set up taste, usage, popular craving, fashion, artistic completeness, or anything else as changing, modifying the method of Divine appointment, and you enter on the inclined plane. How far down and how fast you will go is determined by circumstances. So Omri's working "evil in the eyes of the Lord," and doing "worse than all that were before him" (ver. 25), is only walking in all "the way of Jeroboam the son of Nebat," and in his corrupting and contaminating sin. So it is ever. Given the supremacy of Peter, then his control of all things, secular and sacred; then his infallibility! What was the effect of all these modifications? Toward man, to keep Israel together and from union with Judah. But in the other and higher direction — toward God — the effect was "to provoke (ver. 26) the Lord God of Israel to anger with their vanities." (See, for the "statutes of Omri," Micah 6:16 .) When Omri died, the chronicles of the kings of Israel (ver. 27) containing the record of his deeds, they buried him in his capital, Samaria, and the throne fell to his son Ahab in the thirty-eighth year of Asa of Judah (ver. 29), and about nine hundred and eighteen years before the coming of our Lord. His career is as full of darkness and weakness as a king's life could well be. His reign of twenty-two years was a continued curse to the people. He held on the way of his father, but, according to the common rule in such cases, descending lower and lower. Moral rottenness, like material putrefaction, must increase. "Evil men and seducers wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived." He married Jezebel, the daughter of Ethbaal, King of the Zidonians. We are not surprised at the character of the daughter when we know the career of her father as it is learned from outside history. Among the innovations of Ahab our version mentions a "grove," a misleading word into which the translators were led from its being really an idolatrous image or group of images, including the "sacred symbolic tree" so frequently seen in Assyrian monuments. That it could not be a grove, a wood, is clear from 2 Kings 22:4 , where Josiah brought out "the grove" — asherah in Hebrew — from the house of the Lord. It was doubtless a new and imposing idol, in keeping with the luxurious life now being lived by the Israelites as wealth grew through commerce.(1) There is a real connection between the moral and religious condition of a nation and its temporal affairs. If we as a people defy God or disregard His, laws, He in His government of the world may be expected to show that He is "contrary to us."(2) The temptation is always great to God's people to be like their neighbours; and if these neighbours be cultivated, be deemed standards of excellence in arts, in manners, or in arms; if they be wealthy; if their trade is of importance to us; if they be powerful and it is our interest to stand well with them — the inducements to conformity are all the greater. The distinctive elements of our religion are set aside. Why thrust our Bibles, our family worship, our Sabbaths, on them? True, God says of us that we are to be "holding forth the Word of life." Ah, yes, but that was in other circumstances.(3) The next step is to take up the ways of our friends. Much in their methods can be described as nice, impressive, beautiful — especially if we have taken their standard of "loveliness"; and, having done this, there is a stage of attempted combination. But it is awkward, difficult — in the end possible. One or other must go. And when man is choosing between his own products and God's orders, he prefers his own. So the light is superseded by the darkness; spiritual religion gives place to "impressive" forms, which put no check on tastes or lusts or passions, and make no conscience uncomfortable, while sin is swallowed as a sweet morsel. ( J. Hall, D. D. ).

Benson Commentary 1 Kings 16:1 Then the word of the LORD came to Jehu the son of Hanani against Baasha, saying, 1 Kings 16:1 . The word of the Lord came to Jehu — This Jehu was a prophet, and the son of a prophet. His father Hanani, who was a prophet before him, was sent to reprove Asa king of Judah for hiring Benhadad king of Syria to assist him against Baasha and for relying on the Syrians, instead of relying on the Lord, 2 Chronicles 16:7 . But Jehu, Hanani’s son, who was young and more active, was sent on this longer and more dangerous expedition to Baasha, king of Israel. It appears, he continued long in his usefulness; for we find him reproving Jehoshaphat, above forty years after, and writing the annals of that prince, 2 Chronicles 19:2 ; 2 Chronicles 20:24 . The gift of prophecy, thus happily entailed, and descending from the father to the son, was worthy of so much the more honour. It seems there was not wanting a succession of prophets, during the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, as Abarbinel has observed, their names being preserved in the Holy Scriptures. 1 Kings 16:2 Forasmuch as I exalted thee out of the dust, and made thee prince over my people Israel; and thou hast walked in the way of Jeroboam, and hast made my people Israel to sin, to provoke me to anger with their sins; 1 Kings 16:2 . Forasmuch as I exalted thee out of the dust — Probably from a mean family in the tribe of Issachar. Perhaps he was but a common soldier, or some very inferior officer in the army which besieged Gibbethon; but, being bold and daring, he formed a conspiracy against Nadab. The message which this prophet brought to Baasha is much the same with that which Ahijah sent to Jeroboam by his wife. 1st, He reminds him of the great things God had done for him: 2d, He charges him with high crimes and misdemeanours; and, 3d, He fore-tels the same destruction to come upon his family which he himself had been employed to bring on the family of Jeroboam. And made thee prince over my people Israel — But it may be asked, how Baasha’s exaltation to the kingdom can he ascribed to God, when it is manifest he obtained it by his own treachery and cruelty? To this Mr. Poole replies, that “though the manner of invading the kingdom was from himself and his own wicked heart, yet, the translation of the kingdom from Nadab to Baasha, simply considered, was from God, who by his decree and providence ordered it, and disposed of all occasions, and of the hearts of all the soldiers, and the people so, that Baasha should have the opportunity of executing God’s judgment upon Nadab, and such success thereon, as should procure him a present and quiet possession of the kingdom.” So that his accession to the kingdom was from the divine decree; but the form and manner of his accession was from himself, from his own ambition and covetousness, which induced him to kill Nadab; and as it was wicked and cruel, it is therefore charged upon him as a wilful murder, 1 Kings 16:7 . 1 Kings 16:3 Behold, I will take away the posterity of Baasha, and the posterity of his house; and will make thy house like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat. 1 Kings 16:3 . Make thy house like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat — This threat was exactly verified; for as Nadab the son of Jeroboam reigned but two years, so Elah the son of Baasha reigned no longer; and as Nadab was killed by the sword, so was Elah: thus remarkable was the similitude between Jeroboam and Baasha, in their lives and in their deaths; in their sons, and in their families. See Bishop Patrick. 1 Kings 16:4 Him that dieth of Baasha in the city shall the dogs eat; and him that dieth of his in the fields shall the fowls of the air eat. 1 Kings 16:5 Now the rest of the acts of Baasha, and what he did, and his might, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel? 1 Kings 16:6 So Baasha slept with his fathers, and was buried in Tirzah: and Elah his son reigned in his stead. 1 Kings 16:7 And also by the hand of the prophet Jehu the son of Hanani came the word of the LORD against Baasha, and against his house, even for all the evil that he did in the sight of the LORD, in provoking him to anger with the work of his hands, in being like the house of Jeroboam; and because he killed him. 1 Kings 16:7 . And also by the hand of the Prophet Jehu — The order of the narrative seems to be here much confused, to restore which Houbigant places this seventh verse before the fifth and sixth. Came the word of the Lord against Baasha — The meaning is, the message which came from the Lord to Jehu, ( 1 Kings 16:1-4 ,) was here delivered by the hand, that is, the ministry of Jehu unto Baasha. Jehu did what God commanded in this matter, though it was not without apparent hazard to himself. And because he killed him — That is, Nadab; who though he be not expressed, is sufficiently understood. But why is he punished for doing God’s work? Because, 1st, Though God appointed that Jeroboam’s family should be cut off, yet he did not give Baasha commission to do it. 2d, Baasha did this not to fulfil God’s will, but his own lusts. See on 1 Kings 16:2 . 1 Kings 16:8 In the twenty and sixth year of Asa king of Judah began Elah the son of Baasha to reign over Israel in Tirzah, two years. 1 Kings 16:8-10 . Began Elah to reign in Tirzah two years — One complete and part of another. Zimri, captain, of half his chariots — Of all his military chariots, and the men belonging to them; the chariots, or carriages for necessary things being put into meaner hands. Conspired against him as he was in Tirzah — While his forces were elsewhere employed, ( 1 Kings 16:15 ,) which gave Zimri advantage to execute his design. Zimri went in and smote him — Here was a speedy execution of the vengeance threatened against him by Jehu. 1 Kings 16:9 And his servant Zimri, captain of half his chariots, conspired against him, as he was in Tirzah, drinking himself drunk in the house of Arza steward of his house in Tirzah. 1 Kings 16:10 And Zimri went in and smote him, and killed him, in the twenty and seventh year of Asa king of Judah, and reigned in his stead. 1 Kings 16:11 And it came to pass, when he began to reign, as soon as he sat on his throne, that he slew all the house of Baasha: he left him not one that pisseth against a wall, neither of his kinsfolks, nor of his friends. 1 Kings 16:11-13 . He slew all the house of Baasha, &c. — He not only destroyed all that were descended from Baasha, as Baasha had destroyed the families of Jeroboam, but he extended the destruction, and increased it, as Abarbinel speaks, for he killed all that were of kin to Baasha, with all his friends, which Baasha did not when he seized the kingdom from Jeroboam. According to the word of the Lord — Thus fulfilling the divine threatening, but undesignedly by him, and merely for his own ends. In provoking the Lord to anger with their vanities — Idols, called vanities, because they are but imaginary deities, and mere nothings, having no power to do either good or hurt. 1 Kings 16:12 Thus did Zimri destroy all the house of Baasha, according to the word of the LORD, which he spake against Baasha by Jehu the prophet, 1 Kings 16:13 For all the sins of Baasha, and the sins of Elah his son, by which they sinned, and by which they made Israel to sin, in provoking the LORD God of Israel to anger with their vanities. 1 Kings 16:14 Now the rest of the acts of Elah, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel? 1 Kings 16:15 In the twenty and seventh year of Asa king of Judah did Zimri reign seven days in Tirzah. And the people were encamped against Gibbethon, which belonged to the Philistines. 1 Kings 16:15-17 . The people were encamped against Gibbethon — Which had been besieged many years before, but, it seems, was then relieved or afterward recovered by the Philistines, while the Israelites were in a distracted condition through civil broils and contentions. It was, however, now again invested. The people heard say, Zimri has conspired, &c. — Notice was soon brought to the camp that Zimri had slain their king, and set up himself in Tirzah, the royal city; whereupon they chose Omri king in the camp, that they might, without delay, avenge the death of Elah upon Zimri. Thus proud aspiring men ruin one another, and involve others in ruin. Omri went up from Gibbethon — The siege of which was instantly quitted. And all Israel with him — All the army that were at the siege. 1 Kings 16:16 And the people that were encamped heard say, Zimri hath conspired, and hath also slain the king: wherefore all Israel made Omri, the captain of the host, king over Israel that day in the camp. 1 Kings 16:17 And Omri went up from Gibbethon, and all Israel with him, and they besieged Tirzah. 1 Kings 16:18 And it came to pass, when Zimri saw that the city was taken, that he went into the palace of the king's house, and burnt the king's house over him with fire, and died, 1 Kings 16:18 . When Zimri saw that the city was taken — Tirzah, though a beautiful city, it seems, was not fortified; so that Omri soon made himself master of it, and forced Zimri into the palace; which, as he was unable to defend, and yet unwilling to surrender it, he burned, and himself in it: grudging that his rival should ever enjoy so sumptuous a palace, and fearing that if he fell into the hands of his enemies, either alive or dead, he should be ignominiously treated. See to what desperate practices men’s wickedness sometimes brings them, and how it hurries them to their own ruin! See the disposition of incendiaries, who set palaces and kingdoms on fire, though they are themselves in danger of perishing in the flame! 1 Kings 16:19 For his sins which he sinned in doing evil in the sight of the LORD, in walking in the way of Jeroboam, and in his sin which he did, to make Israel to sin. 1 Kings 16:19 . For his sins which he sinned — Though he lived but a very short time after he usurped the crown, yet he gave sufficient demonstration of his resolution to continue the idolatry of Jeroboam; and therefore he was abandoned by God. Add to this, the whole course of his life seems to have been wicked, and this is justly charged upon him because of his impenitency. 1 Kings 16:20 Now the rest of the acts of Zimri, and his treason that he wrought, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel? 1 Kings 16:21 Then were the people of Israel divided into two parts: half of the people followed Tibni the son of Ginath, to make him king; and half followed Omri. 1 Kings 16:21 . Then were the people of Israel divided into two parts — Which contended, and went to war with each other about the person that should reign over them. For when it is said, ( 1 Kings 16:16 ,) all Israel made Omri king, the meaning is, only the whole army, and such as attended them. Half of the people followed Tibni — These, it is probable, did not like to have a king imposed upon them by the soldiery: and Tibni had as good a title as the other, being also a valiant man, and the person, perhaps, who succeeded Zimri, in his command, as captain of half the king’s chariots. The contest between him and Omri lasted some years, and, it is likely, cost much blood on both sides. But neither this civil war, nor any other of God’s dreadful judgments, could bring them to repentance, which is an evidence of their prodigious impiety and incorrigibleness, and how ripe they were for ruin. 1 Kings 16:22 But the people that followed Omri prevailed against the people that followed Tibni the son of Ginath: so Tibni died, and Omri reigned. 1 Kings 16:22 . But the people that followed Omri prevailed — Partly because they had the army on their side; and principally by the appointment of God, giving up the Israelites to him who was much the worse man, 1 Kings 16:25-26 . So Tibni died — A violent death, it seems, in battle: and doubtless many of the people died with him. But why, inquires Sir Walter Raleigh, (see his History of the World, 50:2, c. 19, § 6,) in all these confusions, and revolutions of the kingdom of Israel, did they never think of returning to the house of David? Probably, observes he, because the kings of Judah assumed a more absolute power over their subjects than the kings of Israel. It was the heaviness of the yoke which they complained of, when they first revolted from the house of David. And it is not unlikely but the dread of that made them averse to it ever after. 1 Kings 16:23 In the thirty and first year of Asa king of Judah began Omri to reign over Israel, twelve years: six years reigned he in Tirzah. 1 Kings 16:23 . Began Omri to reign — twelve years — That is, and he reigned twelve years: not from this thirty-first year of Asa, for he died in his thirty- eighth year, ( 1 Kings 16:29 ,) but from the beginning of his reign, which was in Asa’s twenty-seventh year, 1 Kings 16:15-16 . So he reigned four years in a state of war with Tibni, and eight peaceably. 1 Kings 16:24 And he bought the hill Samaria of Shemer for two talents of silver, and built on the hill, and called the name of the city which he built, after the name of Shemer, owner of the hill, Samaria. 1 Kings 16:24 . He bought the hill Samaria of Shemer — Where he built the noted city of that name, which ever after was the royal city of the kings of Israel, the palace of Tirzah being burned. This city, in process of time, became so considerable, that it gave name to the middle part of Canaan, which lay between Galilee on the north, and Judea on the south, and to the inhabitants of that country, who were called Samaritans. For two talents of silver — Something more than seven hundred pounds sterling. “Perhaps,” says Henry, “Shemer let him have the ground cheaper, on condition that it should be called after his name: for it was called Samaria, or Shemeren, as it is in the Hebrew, from Shemer, the former owner of the land.” Thus the kings of Israel often changed the seat of their government, which was Shechem first then Tirzah, now Samaria. But the kings of Judah were constant to Jerusalem, the city of God. 1 Kings 16:25 But Omri wrought evil in the eyes of the LORD, and did worse than all that were before him. 1 Kings 16:25 . Omri wrought evil in the sight of the Lord — He rendered himself infamous for his wickedness. And did worse than all that were before him — Not only walking in the way of Jeroboam, in worshipping the calves, but, as is likely, introducing other idolatries, which his son Ahab established among them. Or, perhaps, he compelled the people to worship the calves, and by severe laws restrained them from going up to Jerusalem, which laws some think are intended by the statutes of Omri, Micah 6:16 . Though he was brought to the throne with much difficulty, and providence had remarkably favoured him in his advancement, yet, he was more profane, or more superstitions, and a greater persecutor, than any prince that had preceded him, either of the house of Jeroboam or that of Baasha. He went further than any of them had done in establishing iniquity by a law, and forcing his subjects to comply with him in it. 1 Kings 16:26 For he walked in all the way of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and in his sin wherewith he made Israel to sin, to provoke the LORD God of Israel to anger with their vanities. 1 Kings 16:27 Now the rest of the acts of Omri which he did, and his might that he shewed, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel? 1 Kings 16:28 So Omri slept with his fathers, and was buried in Samaria: and Ahab his son reigned in his stead. 1 Kings 16:28 . So Omri slept with his fathers — He died in his bed, as Jeroboam and Baasha had done; but like them, left it to his posterity to fill up the measure, and then pay off the scores of his iniquity. 1 Kings 16:29 And in the thirty and eighth year of Asa king of Judah began Ahab the son of Omri to reign over Israel: and Ahab the son of Omri reigned over Israel in Samaria twenty and two years. 1 Kings 16:29-31 . In the thirty and eighth year of Asa, &c. — Asa saw six kings of Israel buried, while Judah flourished under him, the length of whose reign was doubtless a great advantage to them. Began Ahab the son of Omri to reign — Of whom we have more particulars recorded than of any of the other kings of Israel, and almost all of an infamous nature. For he did evil above all that were before him — He exceeded all his predecessors in wickedness, and reigned over Israel twenty-two years — Long enough to do a deal of mischief. He had seen the ruin of other wicked kings and their families; yet, instead of taking warning, his heart was hardened and enraged against God. As if it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam — To break the second commandment, by worshipping God through the medium of images of Jeroboam’s invention; as if that sin had not been heinous enough to express his contempt of God; as if he thought it below his genius and dignity to content himself with so vulgar a fault; he would set aside the first commandment too, by avowedly introducing other gods, the gods of his heathenish and idolatrous wife Jezebel. But the Hebrew, ???? ???? , vajehi hanakel, is more properly rendered, was it a light thing, &c., that is, was this but a small sin, that therefore he needed to add more abominations? the question, as is usual among the Hebrews, implying a strong denial, and intimating that this was no small sin, but a great crime, and might have satisfied his wicked mind, without any additions. He took to wife Jezebel — A woman infamous for her idolatries, cruelties, sorceries, and abominations of all kinds. The daughter of Ethbaal — Called Ithobalus, or Itobalus in heathen writers. So she was of a heathenish and idolatrous race, such as the kings and people of Israel were expressly forbidden to marry. And went and served Baal — The idol which the Sidonians worshipped, which some think to have been Hercules. But the word in Hebrew signifies lord, and in the plural lords, and was a name common to all false gods. And this idolatry was much worse than that of the calves; because in the calves they intended to worship the true God, through such images and representations, but in these, false gods or devils. 1 Kings 16:30 And Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the LORD above all that were before him. 1 Kings 16:31 And it came to pass, as if it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, that he took to wife Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Zidonians, and went and served Baal, and worshipped him. 1 Kings 16:32 And he reared up an altar for Baal in the house of Baal, which he had built in Samaria. 1 Kings 16:32-33 . And he reared up an altar for Baal — On which to offer sacrifices to him, whereby they acknowledged their dependance upon him, and sought his favour. In the house of Baal which he had built in Samaria — The royal city, for the convenience of his worship. Because the temple of God was in Jerusalem, the royal city in the other kingdom, he would have Baal’s temple in Samaria, that, being near him, he might the more frequently attend it, protect, and put honour upon it. And Ahab made a grove — Another piece of idolatry which God had expressly prohibited, Deuteronomy 7:5 . He either made a natural one by planting shady trees there; or, if he thought these would be too long in growing, an artificial one in imitation thereof: somewhat that answered the intention of a grove, which was to conceal, and so to countenance the abominable impurities that were practised in the filthy worship of Baal. He that doth evil hates the light. O the stupidity of idolaters, who are at a great expense to do honour to mere imaginary beings, who have no existence, save in their own fancies, and to make those their friends who are no gods, and from whom they have nothing either to fear or hope! 1 Kings 16:33 And Ahab made a grove; and Ahab did more to provoke the LORD God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel that were before him. 1 Kings 16:34 In his days did Hiel the Bethelite build Jericho: he laid the foundation thereof in Abiram his firstborn, and set up the gates thereof in his youngest son Segub, according to the word of the LORD, which he spake by Joshua the son of Nun. 1 Kings 16:34 . In his days, &c. — This is mentioned here, 1st, As an instance of the certainty of the accomplishment of the divine predictions; that here referred to being fulfilled upward of five hundred years after it was delivered: a most striking proof of the divine prescience, as well as of the authority of those sacred writings which contain so remarkable a prophecy; 2d, It is recorded as an evidence of the horrible corruption of Ahab’s times, and of the high contempt of God which then reigned; this Hiel beginning to build in defiance of the curse well known in Israel, probably jesting with it as a bug-bear, or fancying its force worn out by length of time; and going on to build in defiance of the execution of the curse in part. For though his eldest son died when he began, yet he would proceed in spite of God and his wrath revealed from heaven against his ungodliness; 3d, It was intended to be a warning to the Israelites not to think themselves innocent or safe, because the judgment threatened against them by Ahijah was not yet executed. The Bethelite — Who lived in Beth-el, the seat and sink of idolatry, wherewith he was thoroughly leavened. He laid the foundation thereof in Abiram his firstborn — Whom God took away in the beginning of his building, and others of his children successively in the progress of the work, and the youngest when he finished it. So that he found by his own sad experience the truth of God’s word, the sentence which Joshua pronounced against the builder of this city being literally and exactly executed. (See Joshua, chapter 6. 1 Kings 16:26 .) A remarkable instance this of the certainty of the accomplishment of God’s threatenings, and that he never forgets what he has spoken! Benson Commentary on the Old and New Testaments Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.

Expositor's Bible Commentary 1 Kings 16:1 Then the word of the LORD came to Jehu the son of Hanani against Baasha, saying, 4 NADAB; BAASHA; ELAH 1 Kings 15:25-34 ; 1 Kings 16:1-10 "Wheresoever the carcass is, there will the vultures be gathered together." - Matthew 24:28 JEROBOAM slept with his fathers and went to his own place, leaving behind him his dreadful epitaph upon the sacred page. His son Nadab succeeded him. In his reign of twenty-two years the first king of Israel had outlived Rehoboam and his son Abijah. Asa, the great grandson of Solomon, was already on the throne of Judah. Of Nadab we are told next to nothing. The appreciation of the kings of Israel tends to drift into the meager formula that they did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, and walked in the way of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, and in his sin wherewith he caused Israel to sin. In the second year of his reign Nadab was engaged in a wearisome military expedition against Gibbethon in the Shephelah, which belonged to the Philistines. It was a Levitical city in the tribe of Dan, which had been assigned to the Kohathites, and its siege continued for twenty-seven years with no apparent result. {Jos 19:44; Jos 21:23 1Ki 15:27; 1Ki 16:15} That the Philistines, who had been so utterly crushed by David and who were an insignificant power, should have thus been able to assert themselves once more, is a proof of the weakness to which Israel had been reduced. While Nadab was thus occupied, an obscure conspirator, Baasha, son of Ahijah, of the tribe of Issachar, actuated perhaps by tribal jealousy, or stirred up as Jeroboam had been before him and as Jehu was after him by some prophetic message, conspired against him, and slew him. As soon as this military revolt had placed Baasha on the throne he fulfilled the frightful curse which Ahijah had uttered against the House of Jeroboam. He absolutely exterminated the family of Nebat, and left him neither kinsman nor friend to avenge his death. He seems to have been a powerful soldier, and he inflicted severe humiliation on the Southern Kingdom until Asa bribed Benhadad to invade his territory. He reigned at Tirzah for twenty-four years, of which nothing is recorded but the ordinary formula. Towards the close of his reign he received from the prophet Jehu, the son of Hanani, the message of his doom. Jehu must have been at this time a young prophet. According to the Chronicles his father Hanani rebuked Asa for the alliance which (as we shall see) he made with the Syrian against Baasha {2Ch 16:7-10} and he himself rebuked Jehoshaphat for his alliance with Ahab, and lived to be his annalist. {2Ch 20:34} Like Amos, he lived in Judah, but prophesied also against a king of Israel. He told Baasha that God, who had exalted him out of the dust to be king of Israel, should inflict on his family the same terrible extirpation which He had inflicted on the House of Jeroboam, whose sins he had, nevertheless, followed. Baasha "slept with his fathers," and his son Elah succeeded him. Elah seems to have been an incapable drunkard, and reigned in Tirzah for less than two years. While he was drinking himself drunk, not even secretly in his own palace, but in the house of his chamberlain Arza-a shamelessness which was regarded as an aggravation of his offense {Hos 7:3-7} -he was murdered by Zimri, the captain of half of his chariots, and the revolting tragedy of massacre was enacted once again. The fact that Baasha was a man of no distinction, but " exalted out of the dust " {1Ki 16:2} probably added to the weakness of his dynasty. From such meager records of horror there is not much to learn beyond the general truth of the nemesis which dogs the heels of crime; but there is one significant clause which throws great light on the judgment which we are asked to form of these events. The prophet Jehu rebukes Baasha for showing himself false to the destiny to which God had summoned him. He implies, therefore, that Baasha had some Divine sanction for the revolution which he headed; and certainly in his slaughter of the House of Jeroboam he was the instrument of a Divine decree. Yet we are expressly told that "he provoked the Lord to anger with the work of his hands, in being like the House of Jeroboam, and because he killed him," or, as it is rendered in the Revised Version margin, "because he smote it." This is not the only place where we find that a man may be in one sense commissioned to do a deed of blood, yet in another sense may be held guilty for fulfillment of the commission. The prophecy of extirpation had been passed, but the cruel agent of its accomplishment was not thereby condoned. God’s decrees are carried out as part of the vast scheme of Providence, and He may use guilty hands to fulfill His purposes. King Jehu is His minister of vengeance, but the tiger-like ferocity with which he carried out his work awoke God’s anger and received God’s punishment. The King of Babylon fulfils the purpose for which he had been appointed, but his ruthlessness receives its just recompense. The wrath of man may accomplish the decrees of God, but it worketh not His righteousness. Herod and Pontius Pilate, Jews and Gentiles, priests and Pharisees, rulers and the mob may rage against Christ, but all they can accomplish is "whatsoever God’s hand and God’s counsel determine before to be done." 1 Kings 16:11 And it came to pass, when he began to reign, as soon as he sat on his throne, that he slew all the house of Baasha: he left him not one that pisseth against a wall, neither of his kinsfolks, nor of his friends. THE KINGS OF ISRAEL FROM ZIMRI TO AHAB 1 Kings 16:11-34 As far as we can understand from our meager authorities-and we have no independent source of information-we infer that Elah, son of the powerful Baasha, was a self-indulgent weakling. The army of Israel was encamped against Gibbethon-originally a Levitical town of the Kohathites, in the territory of Dan-which they hoped to wrest from the Philistines. It was during the interminable and intermittent siege of this town that Nadab, the son of Jeroboam, had been murdered. Whatever may have been his sins, he was in his proper place leading the armies of Israel. Elah was not there, but in his beautiful palace at Tirzah. It was probably contempt for his incapacity and the bad example of Baasha’s successful revolt, that tempted Zimri to murder him as he was drinking himself drunk in the house of his chamberlain Arza. Zimri was a commander of half the chariots, and probably thinking that he could secure the throne by a coup de main he slew not only Elah, but every male member of his family. To extinguish any possibility: of vengeance, he even massacred all who were known to be friends of the royal house. It was a consummate crime, and it was followed by swift and condign judgment. Through that sea of blood Zimri only succeeded in wading to one week’s royalty, followed by a shameful and agonizing death. We are told that he did evil in the sight of the Lord by following the sin of Jeroboam’s calf-worship. The phrase must be here something of a formula, for in seven days he could hardly have achieved a religious revolution, and every other king of Israel, some of whom have long and prosperous reigns, maintained the unauthorized worship. But Zimri’s atrocious revolt had been so ill-considered that it furnished a proverb of the terrible fate of rebels. {2Ki 9:31} He had not even attempted to secure the assent of the army at Gibbethon. No sooner did the news reach the camp than the soldiers tumultuously refused to accept Zimri as king, and elected Omri their captain. Omri instantly broke up the camp, and led them to besiege the new king in Tirzah. Zimri saw that his cause was hopeless, and took refuge in the fortress ( birah ) attached to the palace. When he saw that even there he could not maintain himself, he preferred speedy death to slow starvation or falling into the hands of his rival. He set fire to the palace, and, like Sardanapalus, perished in the flames. The swift suppression of his treason did not save the unhappy kingdom from anarchy and civil war. However popular Omri might be with the army, he was unacceptable to a large part of the people. They chose as their king a certain Tibni, son of Ginath, who was supported by a powerful brother named Joram. For four years the contest was continued. At the end of that time Tibni and Joram were conquered and killed, and Omri began his sole reign, which lasted eight years longer. He founded the most conspicuous dynasty of Israel, and so completely identified his name with the Northern Kingdom that it was known to the Assyrians as Beit-Khumri , or "the House of Omri." They even speak of Jehu the destroyer of Omri’s dynasty, as "the son of Omri." Incidental allusions in the annals of his son show that Omri was engaged in incessant wars against Syria. He was unsuccessful, and Benhadad robbed him of Ramoth Gilead and other cities, enforcing the right of Syrians to have streets of their own even in his new capital of Samaria. On the other hand, he was greatly successful on the southeast against the Moabites and their warrior-king Chemosh-Gad, the father of Mesha. Few details of either war have come down to us. {1Ki 20:34} We learn, however, from the famous Moabite stone that he began his assault on Moab by the capture of Mediba, several miles south of Heshbon, overran the country, made the king a vassal, and imposed on Moab the enormous annual tribute of 100,000 sheep and 100,000 rams. {2Ki 3:4} Mesha in his inscription records that Omri "oppressed Moab many days," and attributed this to the fact that Chemosh was angry with his chosen people. He stamped his impress deep upon his subjects. It must have been to him that the alliance with the Tyrians was due, which in his son’s reign produced consequences so momentous. He "did worse we are told than all the kings that were before him." {1Ki 16:25} Although he is only charged with walking in the way of Jeroboam, the indignant manner in which the prophet Micah speaks of "the statutes of Omri" as still being kept, {Mic 6:16} seems to prove that his influence on religion was condemned by the prophetic order on special grounds. It is clear that he was a sovereign of far greater eminence and importance than we might suppose from the meagerness of his annals as here preserved; indeed, for thirty-four years after his accession the history of the Southern Kingdom becomes a mere appendix to that of the Northern. One conspicuous service he rendered to his subjects by providing them with the city which became their permanent and famous capital. This he did in the sixth year of his reign. The burning of the fortress-palace of Tirzah, and the rapidity with which the town had succumbed to its besiegers, may have led him to look out for a site, which was central, strong, and beautiful. His choice was so prescient that the new royal residence superseded not only Penuel and Tirzah, but even Shechem. It was, says Dean Stanley, "as though Versailles had taken the place of Paris, or Windsor of London?" He fixed his eye on an oblong hill, with long flat summit, which rose in the midst of a wide valley encircled with hills, near the edge of the plain of Sharon, and six miles northwest of Shechem. Its beauty is still the admiration of the traveler in Palestine. It gave point to the apostrophe of Isaiah: "Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower, which is on the head of the fat valleys of them that are overcome with wine! The crown of pride, the drunkards of Ephraim, shall be trodden under foot: and the fading flower of his glorious adornment, which is on the head of the fat valley, shall become as a fading flower and as an early fig." {Isa 28:1-4} All around it the low hills and rich ravines were clothed with fertility. They recall more nearly than any other scene in Palestine the green fields and parks of England It commanded a full view of the sea and the plain of Sharon on the one band, and of the vale of Shechem on the other. The town sloped down from the summit of this hill; a broad wall with a terraced top ran round it. "In front of the gates was a wide open space or threshing floor, where the kings of Samaria sat on great occasions. The inferior houses were built of white brick, with rafters of sycamore, the grandeur of hewn stones and Isaiah 9:9-10 . Its soft, rounded, oblong platform was, as it were, a vast luxurious couch, in which the nobles securely rested, propped and cushioned up on both sides, as in the cherished corner of a rich divan." Far more important in the eyes of Omri than its beauty was the natural strength of its position. It did not possess the impregnable majesty of Jerusalem, but its height and isolation, permitting of strong fortifications, enabled it to baffle the besieging hosts of the Aramaeans in B.C. 901 and in B.C. 892. For three long years it held out against the mighty Assyrians under Sargon and Shalmanezer. Its capture in B.C. 721 involved the ruin of the whole kingdom in its fall, {1Ki 20:1; 2Ki 6:24} Nebuchadnezzar took it in B.C. 554 after a siege of thirteen years. In later centuries it partially recovered. Alexander the Great took it, and massacred many of its inhabitants B.C. 332. John Hyrcanus, who took it after a year’s siege, tried to demolish it in B.C. 129. After various fortunes it was splendidly rebuilt by Herod the Great, who called it Sebaste, in honor of Augustus. It still exists under the name of Sebastiyeh. When Omri chose it for his residence it belonged to a certain Shemer, who, according to Epiphanius, was a descendant of the ancient Perizzites or Girgashites. The king paid for this hill the large sum of two talents of silver, and called it Shomeron. The name means "a watch tower," and was appropriate both from its commanding position and because it echoed the name of its old possessor. The new capital marked a new epoch. It superseded as completely as Jerusalem had done the old local shrines endeared by the immemorial sanctity of their traditions; but as its origin was purely political it acted unfavorably on the religion of the people. It became a city of idolatry and of luxurious wealth; a city in which Baal-worship with its ritual pomp threw into the shade the worship of Jehovah; a city in which corrupted nobles, lolling at wine feasts on rich divans in their palaces inlaid with ivory, sold the righteous for silver and the needy for a pair of shoes. Of Omri we are told no more. After a reign of twelve years he slept with his fathers, and was buried in the city which was to be for so many centuries a memorial of his fame. The name of Omri marks a new epoch. He is the first Jewish king whose name is alluded to in Assyrian inscriptions. Assyria had emerged into importance in the twelfth century before Christ under Tiglath-Pileser I, but during the eleventh and down to the middle of the tenth century it had sunk into inactivity. Assurbanipal, the father of Shalmanezer II (884-860), enlarged his dominions to the Mediterranean westwards and to Lebanon southwards. In 870, when Ahab was king, the Assyrian warriors had exacted tribute from Tyre, Sidon, and Bibles. It is not impossible that Omri also had paid tribute, and it has even been conjectured that it was to Assyrian help that he owed his throne. The Book of Kings only alludes to the valor of this warrior-king in the one word his might; but it is evident from other indications that he had a stormy and checkered reign. 1 Kings 16:29 And in the thirty and eighth year of Asa king of Judah began Ahab the son of Omri to reign over Israel: and Ahab the son of Omri reigned over Israel in Samaria twenty and two years. KING AHAB AND QUEEN JEZEBEL 1 Kings 16:29-34 "Besides what that grim wolf with privy paw Daily devours apace, and nothing said." - LYCIDAS OMRI was succeeded by his son Ahab, whose eventful reign of upwards of twenty years occupies so large a space even in these fragmentary records. His name means "brother-father," and has probably some sacred reference. He is stigmatized by the historians as a king more wicked than his father, though Omri had "done worse than all who were before him." That he was a brave warrior, and showed some great qualities during a long and on the whole prosperous career; that he built cities, and added to Israel yet another royal residence; that he advanced the wealth and prosperity of his subjects; that he was highly successful in some of his wars against Syria, and died in battle against those dangerous enemies of his country; that he maintained unbroken, and strengthened by yet closer affinity, the recent alliance with the Southern Kingdom, -all this goes for nothing with the prophetic annalists. They have no word of eulogy for the king who added Baal-worship to the sin of Jeroboam. The prominence of Ahab in their record is only due to the fact that he came into dreadful collision with the prophetic order, and with Elijah, the greatest prophet who had yet arisen. The glory and the sins of the warrior-king interested the young prophets of the schools solely because they were interwoven with the grand and somber traditions of their mightiest reformer. The historian traces all his ignominy and ruin to a disastrous alliance. The kings of Judah had followed the bad example of David and had been polygamists. Up to this time the kings of Israel seem to have been contented with a single wife. The wealth and power of Ahab led him to adopt the costly luxury of a harem, and he had seventy sons. {2Ki 10:7} This, however, would have been regarded m those days as a venial offence, or as no offence at all; but just as the growing power of Solomon had been enhanced by marriage with a princess of Egypt, so Ahab was now of sufficient importance to wed a daughter of the King of Tyre. "As though it had been a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, he took to wife Jezebel, the daughter of Ethbaal, King of the Zidonians." It was an act of policy in which religious considerations went for nothing. There is little doubt that it flattered his pride and the pride of his people, and that Jezebel brought riches with her and pomp and the prestige of luxurious royalty. The Phoenicians were of the old race of Canaan, with whom all affinity was so strongly forbidden. Ethbaal-more accurately, perhaps, Ittobaal (Baal is with him)-though he ruled all Phoenicia, both Tyre and Sidon, was a usurper, and had been the high priest of the great Temple of Ashtoreth in Tyre. Hiram, the friend of Solomon, had now been dead for half a century. The last king of his dynasty was the fratricide Phelles, whom in his turn his brother Ethbaal slew. He reigned for thirty-two years, and founded a dynasty which lasted for sixty-two years more. He was the seventh successor to the throne of Tyre in the fifty years which had elapsed since the death of Hiram. Menander of Ephesus, as quoted by Josephus, shows us that in the history of this family we find an interesting point of contact between sacred and classic history. Jezebel was the aunt of Virgil’s Belus, and great-aunt of Pygmalion, and of Dido, the famous foundress of Carthage. A king named after Baal, and who had named his daughter after Baal-a king whose descendants down to Maherbal and Hasdrubal and Hannibal bore the name of the Sun-god-a king who had himself been at the head of the cult of Ashtoreth, the female deity who was worshipped with Baal-was not likely to rest content until he had founded the worship of his god in the realm of his son-in-law. Ahab, we are told, "went and served Baal and worshipped him." We must discount by recorded facts the impression which might prima facie be left by these sweeping denunciations. It is certain that to his death Ahab continued to recognize Jehovah. He enshrined the name of Jehovah in the names of his children. He consulted the prophets of Jehovah, and his continuance of the calf-worship met with no recorded reproof from the many true prophets who were active during his reign. The worship of Baal was due to nothing more than the unwise eclecticism which had induced Solomon to establish the Bamoth to heathen deities on the mount of offence. It is exceedingly probable that the permission of Baal-worship had been one of the articles of the treaty between Tyre and Israel, which, as we know from Amos, had been made at this time. It had probably been the condition on which the fanatical Phoenician usurper had conceded to his far less powerful neighbor the hand of his daughter. It was, as we see, alike in sacred and secular history a time of treaties. The menacing specter of Assyria was beginning to terrify the nations. Hamath, Syria, and the Hittites had formed a league of defense against the northern power, and similar motives induced the kings of Israel to seek alliance with Phoenicia. Perhaps neither Omri nor Ahab grasped all the consequences of their concession to the Sidonian princess. But such compacts were against the very essence of the religion of Israel, which was "Yahveh Israel’s God, and Israel Yahveh’s people." The new queen inherited the fanaticism as she inherited the ferocity of her father. She acquired from the first a paramount sway over the weak and uxorious mind of her husband under her-influence Ahab built in Samaria a splendid temple and altar to Baal, in which no less than four hundred orgiastic priests served the Phoenician idol in splendid vestments, and with the same pompous ritual as in the shrines at Tyre. In front of this temple, to the disgust and horror of all faithful worshippers of Jehovah, stood an Asherah in honor of the Nature-goddess, and Matstseboth pillars or obelisks which represented either sunbeams or the reproductive powers of nature. In these ways Ahab "did more to provoke the Lord God to anger than all the kings of Israel that were before him." {1Ki 16:23; 2Ki 3:2; 2Ki 10:27} When we learn what Baal was, and how he was worshipped, we are not surprised at so stern a condemnation. Half Sun-god, half Bacchus, half Hercules, Baal was worshipped under the image of a bull, "the symbol of the male power of generation." In the wantonness of his rites he was akin to Peor; in their cruel atrocity to the kindred Moloch; in the demand for victims to be sacrificed to the horrible consecration of lust and blood he resembled the Minotaur, the wallowing "infamy of Crete," with its yearly tribute of youths and maidens. What the combined worship of Baal and Asherah was like-and by Jezebel with Ahab’s connivance they were now countenanced in Samaria-we may learn from the description of their temple at Apheka. It confirms what we are incidentally told of Jezebel’s devotions. It abounded in wealthy gifts, and its multitude of priests, women, and mutilated ministers-of whom, Lucian counted three hundred at one sacrifice-were clad in splendid vestments. Children were sacrificed by being put in a leathern bag and flung down from the top of the temple, with the shocking expression that "they were calves, not children." In the forecourt stood two gigantic phalli. The Galli were maddened into a tumult of excitement by the uproar of drums, shrill pipes, and clanging cymbals, gashed themselves with knives and potsherds, and often ran through the city in women’s dress. Such was the new worship with which the dark murderess insulted the faith in Jehovah. Could any condemnation be too stern for the folly and faithlessness of the king who sanctioned it? A consequence of this tolerance of polluted forms of worship seems to have shown itself in defiant contempt for sacred traditions, At any rate, it is in this connection that we are told how Hiel of Bethel set at naught an ancient curse. After the fall of Jericho Joshua had pronounced a curse upon the site of the city. It was never to be rebuilt, but to remain under the ban of God. The site, indeed, had not been absolutely uninhabited, for its importance near the fords of Jordan necessitated the existence of some sort of caravan serai in or near the spot. {2Sa 10:5; Jdg 3:28} At this time it belonged to the kingdom of Israel, though it was in the district of Benjamin and afterwards reverted to Judah. {2Ch 28:15} Hiel, struck by the opportunities afforded by its position, laughed the old cherem to scorn, and determined to rebuild Jericho into a fortified and important city. But men remarked with a shudder that the curse had not been uttered in vain. The laying of the foundation was marked by the death of his firstborn Abiram, the completion of the gates by the death of Segub, his youngest son. {Comp. Jos 6:26; 2Sa 10:5}The shadow of Queen Jezebel falls dark for many years over the history of Israel and Judah. She was one of those masterful, indomitable, implacable women who, when fate places them in exalted power, leave a terrible mark on the annals of nations. What the Empress Irene was in the history of Constantinople, or the "She-wolf of France" in that of England, or Catherine de Medicis in that of France, that Jezebel was in the history of Palestine. The unhappy Juana of Spain left a physical trace upon her descendants in the perpetuation of the huge jaw which had gained her the soubriquet of Maultasch ; but the trace left by Jezebel was marked in blood in the fortunes of the children born to her. Already three of the six Kings of Israel had been murdered, or had come to evil ends; but the fate of Ahab and his house was most disastrous of all, and it became so through the "whoredoms and witchcrafts" of his Sidonian wife. A thousand years later the name of Jezebel was still ominous as that of one who seduced others into fornication and idolatry. {Rev 2:20} If no king so completely "sold himself to work wickedness"’ as Ahab, it was because "Jezebel his wife stirred him up." {1Ki 21:25-26} Yet, however guilty may have been the uxorious apostasies of Ahab, he can hardly be held to be responsible for the marriage itself. The dates and ages recorded for us show decisively that the alliance must have been negotiated by Omri, for it took place in his reign and when Ahab was too young to have much voice in the administration of the kingdom. He is only responsible for abdicating his proper authority over Jezebel, and for permitting her a free hand in the corruption of worship, while he gave himself up to his schemes of worldly aggrandizement. Absorbed in the strengthening of his cities and the embellishment of his ivory palaces, he became neglectful of the worship of Jehovah, and careless of the more solemn and sacred duties of a theocratic king. The temple to Baal at Samaria was built; the hateful Asherah in front of it offended the eyes of all whose hearts abhorred an impure idolatry. Its priests and the priests of Astarte were the favorites of the court. Eight hundred and fifty of them fed in splendor at Jezebel’s table, and the pomp of their sensuous cult threw wholly into the shade the worship of the God of Israel. Hitherto there had been no protest against, no interference with the course of evil. It had been suffered to reach its meridian unchecked, and it seemed only a question of time that the service of Jehovah would yield to that of Baal, to whose favor the queen probably believed that her priestly father had owed his throne. There are indications that Jezebel had gone further still, and that Ahab, however much he may secretly have disapproved, had not interfered to prevent her. For although we do not know the exact period at which Jezebel began to exercise violence against the worshippers of Jehovah, it is certain that she did so. This crime took place before the great famine which was appointed for its punishment, and which roused from cowardly torpor the supine conscience of the king and of the nation. Jezebel stands out on the page of sacred history as the first supporter of religious persecution. We learn from incidental notices that, not content with insulting the religion of the nation by the burdensome magnificence of her idolatrous establishments, she made an attempt to crush Jehovah-worship altogether. Such fanaticism is a frequent concomitant of guilt. She is the authentic authoress of priestly inquisitions. The Borgian monster, Pope Alexander VI, who founded the Spanish Inquisition, is the lineal inheritor of the traditions of Jezebel. Had Ahab done no more than Solomon had done in Judah, the followers of the true faith in Israel would have been as deeply offended as those of the Southern Kingdom. They would have hated a toleration which they regarded as wicked, because it involved moral corruption as well as the danger of national apostasy. Their feelings would have been even more wrathful than were stirred in the hearts of English Puritans when they heard of the Masses in the chapel of Henrietta Maria, or saw Father Petre gliding about the corridors of Whitehall. But their opposition was crushed with a hand of iron. Jezebel, strong in her entourage of no less than eight hundred and fifty priests, to say nothing of her other attendants, audaciously broke down the altars of Jehovah-even the lonely one on Mount Carmel-and endeavored so completely to extirpate all the prophets of Jehovah that Elijah regarded himself as the sole prophet that was left. Those who escaped her fury had to wander about in destitution, and to hide in dens and caves of the earth. The apostasy of Churches always creeps on apace, when priests and prophets, afraid of malediction, and afraid of imperiling their worldly interests become cowards, opportunists, and timeservers, and not daring to speak out the truth that is in them, suffer the cause of spirituality and righteousness to go by default. But "when Iniquity hath played her part, Vengeance, leaps upon the stage. The comedy is short, but the tragedy is long. The black guard shall attend upon you: you shall eat at the table of sorrow, and the crown of death shall be upon your heads, many glittering faces looking upon you." The Expositor's Bible Text Courtesy of BibleSupport.com . Used by Permission.