[141] The following genealogy may help to elucidate the troublesome identity of names:--
OMRI ____|____ | | JEHOSHAPHAT Ahab = Jezebel | _______|__________________ | | | | | Ahaziah Jehoram Athaliah = Jehoram (of Israel). (of Israel). | (of Judah). | Ahaziah (of Judah).
[142] Jotham ben-Uzziah was not the colleague of his father, but his public representative.
[143] The only other king of Judah whose mother's name is not mentioned (perhaps because his father Jotham had but one wife) is Ahaz.
[144] 2 Kings xi. 18; 2 Chron. xxi. 11, xxiv. 7.
[145] Vulg., _Seira_; Arab., _Sa'ir_ (but the historian never uses the name Mount Seir); LXX., Σιώρ. There is perhaps some corruption in the text, and the reading of the Chronicler "with his princes" shows that it may have once been צַמ־שָׂרָיו.
[146] 2 Kings viii. 21. "The people" (_i.e._, the army of Judah) "fled to their tents." Apparently this means that they slunk away home. The word "tents" is a reminiscence of their nomad days, like the treasonable cry, "To your tents, O Israel."
[147] Josh. x. 29-39.
[148] Jos., _Antt._, IX. vi. 1.
2 KINGS ix. 1-37
"Te semper anteit sæva Necessitas Clavos trabales et cuneos manu, Gestans ahenâ." HORAT., _Od._, I. xxxv. 17.
A long period had elapsed since Elijah had received the triple commission which was to mark the close of his career. Two of those Divine behests had now been accomplished. He had anointed Elisha, son of Shaphat, of Abel-Meholah, to be prophet in his room;[149] and Elisha had anointed Hazael to be king over Syria;[150] the third and more dangerous commission, involving nothing less than the overthrow of the mighty dynasty of Omri, remained still unaccomplished.
If the name of Jehu ("Jehovah is He")[151] had been actually mentioned to Elijah, the dreadful secret must have remained buried in the breast of the prophet and in that of his successor for many years. Further, Jehu was yet a very young man, and to have marked him out as the founder of a dynasty would have been to doom him to certain destruction. An Eastern king, whose family has once securely seated itself on the throne, is hedged round with an awful divinity, and demands an unquestioning obedience. Elijah had been removed from earth before this task had been fulfilled, and Elisha had to wait for his opportunity. But the doom was passed, though the judgment was belated. The sons of Ahab were left a space to repent, or to fill to the brim the cup of their father's iniquities.
"The sword of Heaven is not in haste to smite, Nor yet doth linger."
Ahaziah, Ahab's eldest son, after a reign of one year, marked only by crimes and misfortunes, had ended in overwhelming disaster his deplorable career. His brother Jehoram had succeeded him, and had now been on the throne for at least twelve years, which had been chiefly signalised by that unsuccessful attempt to recover the territory of revolted Moab, to which we owe the celebrated Stone of Mesha. We have already narrated the result of the campaign which had so many vicissitudes. The combined armies of Israel, Judah, and Edom had been delivered by the interposition of Elisha from perishing of thirst beside the scorched-up bed of the Wady-el-Ahsy; and availing themselves of the rash assault of the Moabites, had swept everything before them. But Moab stood at bay at Kir-Haraseth (Kerak), his strongest fortress, six miles from Ar or Rabbah, and ten miles east of the southern end of the Dead Sea. It stood three thousand feet above the level of the sea, and is defended by a network of steep valleys. Nevertheless, Israel would have subdued it, but for the act of horrible despair to which the King of Moab resorted in his extremity, by offering up his eldest son as a burnt-offering to Chemosh upon the wall of the city. Horror-stricken by the catastrophe, and terrified with the dread that the vengeance of Chemosh could not but be aroused by so tremendous a sacrifice, the besieging host had retired. From that moment Moab had not only been free, but assumed the _rôle_ of an aggressor, and sent her marauding bands to harry and carry the farms and homesteads of her former conqueror.[152]