THE KINGS OF ISRAEL AND JUDAH. George Rawlinson

invasion of Israel on the north by Benhadad, and the speedy capture not only of the towns of Dan, Ijon, and Abelbeth-maachah, but of “all Cinneroth, with all the land of Naphtali” (1 Kings xv. 20), revealed the weakness of the Israelite kingdom in respect of its northern frontier, which was dominated by the more elevated tracts about Lebanon and Hermon that never formed any part of the actual territory of the chosen people, excepting under the brief dominion of David and Solomon. This weakness showed itself at other periods of Israelite history besides the present one, and must have caused Baasha some alarm. He seems to have hurriedly granted all the demands which Benhadad preferred, and to have thenceforth carefully abstained from provoking his hostility. A necessary result was the complete relinquishment of his aggressive designs against the kingdom of Judah, and a resumption of the defensive attitude towards it, which had been maintained by Jeroboam and Nadab.

      Thus any hopes that had been entertained in any quarters of an increment of military glory as a consequence of the change of dynasty, were disappointed, and Baasha found himself no whit further advanced on the path of military success than his predecessors. The honour and power of the kingdom would indeed seem to have “sunk lower under the new dynasty than under its predecessor.” Discontent consequently showed itself. A prophet denounced the murder by which Baasha had attained the throne (1 Kings xvi. 7), reproached him for his slavish adherence to the sins of Jeroboam, and prophesied for him and his house the very same fate which, a quarter of a century earlier, had been prophesied for the house of the son of Nebat—

      “Him that dieth of Baasha in the field,” he said, “shall the dogs eat;

      And him that dieth of his in the field shall the fowls of the air eat.”

      Baasha, however, maintained his power, like Jeroboam, till his death, and left his crown to his son Elah, who at once and without difficulty mounted the throne. The scene of Baasha’s death was Tirzah, which Jeroboam had made the capital (1 Kings xiv. 17); and there he was laid to rest with the customary honours.

      Elah

       Table of Contents

      THE figure of Elah, the son and successor of Baasha, is as shadowy in the sacred history as that of Nadab, the son and successor of Jeroboam. Of neither are we told his age at his accession, or any special trait of disposition. Both have short reigns, little if at all exceeding a year; both “continue in the way of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat” (1 Kings xvi. 2, 13), and “provoke God to anger with their vanities;” both, moreover, engage in a war against the Philistines within a short period of their accession; and in both reigns the special scene of the war is the Philistine city of Gibbethon (ibid. ver. 15). The only important difference between their histories is, that whereas Nadab put himself at the head of his army and proceeded to encounter the hardships of the siege in person, Elah sent against Gibbethon the captains of his host, Zimri and Omri, while he himself remained in the capital, Tirzah, drinking and revelling in the palace of the steward of his household, a certain Arza. We may assume that Zimri was kept acquainted with the king’s unkingly conduct, and saw in it his own opportunity. The associations of Gibbethon suggested that kings were not unassailable, and the special circumstances of Elah’s position were such as at once to provoke attack and to facilitate it. Zimri, without informing Omri or the army of his intention, withdrew himself from Gibbethon, and, returning to Tirzah, surprised the wretched monarch at his drinking-bout, and succeeded in assassinating him. Arza. was probably privy to his design, and his helper in it. Elah, who began to reign in the twenty-sixth year of Asa (1 Kings xvi. 8), perished in the same king’s twenty-seventh year (ibid. ver. 15), so that he probably did not hold the throne for more than a few months.

      Zimri

       Table of Contents

      THE bold soldier, who, imitating Baasha, brought the second Israelite dynasty to an end by the assassination of its second monarch, proceeded to follow up his first success by a further imitation of his model, and was no sooner seated upon the throne than he “destroyed all the house of Baasha” (1 Kings xvi. 11), not sparing any, either of his kinsfolk, or of his close friends. This extreme severity may have rendered him unpopular. At any rate, when the army which was at Gibbethon heard of his insurrection and of the bloody deeds by which he had followed it up, they were so exasperated that they broke out into revolt, refused to acknowledge Zimri as their monarch, and invested Omri, who had been left at Gibbethon in sole command, with the sovereignty. Omri was prompt in action. He did not hesitate for a moment to accept the rank conferred upon him; and he at once took steps to dispossess his rival of the throne. By his orders, the army broke up from before Gibbethon, raised the siege, and marching with all speed to Tiizah, besieged the pretender in his capital (1 Kings xvi. 16, 17). Zimri seems to have had no troops with him on whom he could depend. He did not dare to venture a battle, but remained within the walls and simply stood on the defensive. The siege did not last many days. Within a very short time the defences were forced, the town entered, and the place, for all practical purposes, taken (ver. 18). Zimri, however, was of too stubborn a spirit to submit himself. He had worn the crown, albeit but for seven days (ver. 15), and scorned the idea of descending to a private station. Neither would he trust his future to the tender mercies of the conqueror. Brave, fierce, and obstinate to the last degree, he took a desperate resolve, and throwing himself into the royal palace, which was no doubt a sort of fortress within a fortress, he there stood at bay, and, when further resistance was hopeless, gave orders that the palace should be set on fire, and burnt it over his head. So far, he resembled the traditional Sardanapalus, with whom Ewald has compared him, but there are no grounds for concluding that the resemblance extended any further. We have not the slightest evidence that Zimri was “effeminate” or sunk in luxury. On the contrary, the conception that we naturally form of him from the Scriptural narrative is that of a bold, brave, and reckless desperado, who, thinking that he saw an opportunity for seizing the crown, made his venture, and finding that he had failed, preferred death by his own hand to the chances that might possibly be offered him through the clemency of his conqueror. It would appear that Zimri, even in his short reign of seven days, found occasion to give formal approval to the religious system of Jeroboam, since it is declared of him (1 Kings xvi. 18, 19) that “he died 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 that he did, to make Israel to sin.”