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GREAT KINGS OF THE BIBLE
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always heads the list of great kings of Israel because no other king could match him for verve, charisma and all the contradictory qualities of a real human being. He was wise and foolish, merciful and cruel, forgiving and ruthless. He loved his friends and then betrayed them; he used women callously but truly loved them; he spoilt his children and paid the price for this foolishness. Duplicitious. God-fearing. Charming. Dismissive. Cunning. Beloved.
David had the knack of getting noticed by powerful people, of being in the right place at the right time. The prime example of this is his fight with Goliath - a story the Israelites loved because they too were poorly equipped and outnumbered by their Philistine enemies, just as David was with Goliath. Ousted from the royal court of Saul, he became a brigand who eventually stole the throne. He married women when they could help him, then ditched them when they became a burden - except for Bathsheba, who was as clever as he was. He had the qualities of a great leader: he could rally people to his side in a crisis, make them believe in him then carry them to victory. He managed to unify a group of disparate tribes into something resembling a nation, and is seen as the founder of the ancient kingdom of Israel. His sons fought over the spoils, rebelling against his authority, so that in the end he was at the mercy of his own family.
who was David's youngest son, came to the throne under questionable circumstances - but this was not unusual in Israel. He had an older brother Adonijah, whom people assumed would succeed King David, but through the machinations of a court clique headed by Solomons's clever mother Bathsheba, he was able to take over power.
Soon afterwards he got rid of his brother on trumped up charges. In Adonijah's trial the main witness against him was Bathsheba, hardly a disinterested witness. Solomon's reign was long, prosperous and peaceful - he happened to be king at a time when Egypt and Mesopotamia were having troubles of their own, and these great powers left him alone. This meant he was able to organize a great building program, and it was at this time that the First Temple was built in Jerusalem. As well, he built palaces, worship centers and fortifications throughout his kingdom. He was also an astute administrator, which is part of the reason he was said to have great wisdom. He used diplomacy rather than force to hold his kingdom together. Our politicians could study Solomon more.
The Bible levels some charges against him - that he married far too many women, and foreign women at that, who brought their strange gods with them. Had he been questioned about this, Solomon would have defended himself by saying that each of these women represented an alliance between Israel and the woman's native country, guaranteeing peace and stability with Israel's neighbors. The trouble was that Solomon used large amounts of money for his projects, and this meant that people had to pay much more tax. There was also a system of forced labor, to build the temple and palace in Jerusalem and the cities of Hazor, Megiddo and Gezer. These were deeply resented by ordinary people, and towards the end of his reign the cracks were beginning to show. Revolts broke out. The clock was quietly ticking..
'The first generation makes the money, the second learns to spend it, the third loses it all...' Never was this more true than in the case of King Rehoboam. When he inherited the kingdom from his father Solomon, it was in trouble. But the young king lost almost all of it, and when the dust settled his once-great kingdom was divided into Israel in the north, which he lost, and little Judah in the south, which he kept.
Rehoboam was like Edward VIII of England, the king famous for abdicating the throne in order to marry Wallis Simpson. Like him, Rehoboam was too ready to listen to the counsel of his young, sophisticated friends, rather than the sound advice of older, more experienced courtiers. On the advice of his friends, Rehoboam not only refused to lessen the taxes and forced labor the northern tribes had endured under Solomon, but threatened to increase the burden. In response, the ten tribes rebelled, breaking away and forming their own kingdom in the north. Rehoboam tried repeatedly to re-conquer them, but was never successful. The other event that blighted Rehoboam's reign was the raid into Judah of the Egyptian pharaoh Sheshonq I. To buy him off and avert wholesale destruction, Rehoboam had to hand over the treasure of Solomon's newly-built Temple and of the royal palace. In short, he inherited a small kingdom but died having lost at least two-thirds of it. He surrendered much of the wealth that Solomon had accumulated during his long reign.
was one of the most successful kings of ancient Israel, but the Bible has blackened his name. He did not favor the Yahwist priesthood over the agricultural gods, but instead attempted to reconcile them, to get them to live together side by side - something the Bible suggests he failed to achieve. He completed work on the new capital at Samaria begun by his father, and is credited with building the fabled Ivory House, as well as a number of cities and fortifications throughout Israel - among them Hazor and Megiddo. These included elaborate water systems that could withstand any siege.
The large number of chariots and soldiers listed in the Assyrian records show that Ahab had a formidable army. He probably used this against troublesome neighbors such as Moab, and Judah may also have been under his control. He continued his father Omri's policy of alliances with other small states, often through marriage - Jezebel, his wife from Sidon, probably brought the Mount Carmel area as her dowry, which would have come in handy. In religious matters, Ahab was a pragmatist. He encouraged tolerance for his wife's religion which centered on the rain god Baal, a popular deity among farmers. The Bible criticizes him for the confiscation of Naboth's vineyard, which flouted traditional ownership of land, but Ahab's high-handed behavior fits with an autocratic system of strong leadership accompanied by economic prosperity and new (though not necessarily better) ways of doing things. He died fighting in the battle at Ramoth-gilead, and was buried in his city of Samaria, which is probably as he would have wished.
succeeded to the throne of Israel after his older brother 'fell' from a high balcony in the palace. He was not the son of Jezebel for nothing. He was king of the northern kingdom of Israel from about 852-841BC. The great power at that time was Syria, and Jehoram was seriously wounded fighting the Syrians at Ramoth-gilead, at the same place his father Ahab had been killed - and fighting the same enemy. Jehoram also fought Mesha, the king of Moab, when Mesha rebelled against Israelite rule after the death of Ahab. The Bible says Jehoram was successful, but the Mesha Stele (right) tells a different story - see a translation of part of the story under the illustration. What probably happened was that Jehoram was successful at first, as described in 2 Kings 3, but lost the overall war against Moab. In any event, there seems to have been growing internal opposition to Jehoram, led by the Yahwist priests, in particular Elisha. What followed was a coup d'etat led by the very unpleasant army captain, Jehu. Jehoram was lured out of the city of Jezreel, where he had been recovering from wounds, then shot with an arrow in his back. His cousin King Ahaziah of Judah was also murdered. Jehoram's mother Jezebel, standing above on a tower of the city of Jezreel, saw her son die. Knowing there was no hope of rescue, she went into the palace, donned the regalia of a queen and high priestess, and went out to face her own death. These people knew how to die. Bible reference 2 Kings 3; 8-9
was the founder of the longest-lasting dynasty of the northern kingdom of Israel.
He was a commander in the Israelite army, and so he was able to take advantage of the situation when Jehoram, already unpopular, was wounded. He deposed the king, killing him and every member of his extended family - see the two sections on Jehu in Bible Murders The coup, while horrifyingly brutal, seems to have gone off smoothly, probably because Jehoram's reign had seen considerable loss of territory in Moab, as well as sieges at Samaria by the Syrian army. Jehoram was not the soldier his father had been. With these setbacks, it is hardly surprising that an ambitious soldier took advantage of the situation by winning over the army and proclaiming himself king. The conspiracy seems to have been well-planned, and involved the Yahwist priests.. According to 2 Kings 9:1-13, the prophet Elisha told one of his followers to travel to Ramoth-gilead and anoint Jehu as king - even though an anointed king still lived. This was done in secret and was blatently treasonous, but when Jehu gave the other commanders a choice between joining him or dying, they understandably rallied to his cause. Sad to say, despite his record of appalling violence, Jehu seems to have eventually died a peaceful death.
had the longest reign of any monarch in Israel or Judah. He ruled for fifty-five years, which was a real achievement in those violent days.
He is also the king with the worst record, as far as the writers of the Bible were concerned. They hated him. His great crime was that he aimed at partnership, rather than confrontation, with the Yahwist and Canaanite factions. Altars to Baal were erected and the image of Asherah appeared in the Temple precincts. The religious practices of the agricultural gods were given as much respect as the worship of Yahweh. This of course was anathema to the biblical writers, who in the Book of Chronicles accuse Manasseh of child sacrifice. Whether this practice ever occurred is debatable: evidence for it is always based on the testimony of enemies, never a reliable source of information. At one stage of Manasseh's rule he was carried off to Babylon, probably by Ashurbanipal. The Assrian texts show that Manasseh was a vassal of Ashurbanipal as early as 667BC, but his deportation suggests that he must have violated his agreements with Ashurbanipal. He was taken into captivity in hooks and fetters, a punishment meant to humiliate him - which it no doubt did. There is no way of knowing how long he spent in Babylon. The manner of his death is not recorded. Bible reference 2 Kings 21:1ff; 2 Chronicles 33
was king of Judah shortly before the Exile to Babylon, ruling from 639-609BC. He was one of the great reformers in Jewish history. Josiah came to the throne when he was eight years old after his father was assassinated, and he ruled for thirty years. In the eighteenth year of his reign he began to restore the faded glory of the Temple in Jerusalem. While his workmen were doing this, they are said to have come across a lost set of scrolls - these may have been hidden for safe-keeping during a previous reign, or they may have been a 'plant' - at this distance it is impossible to tell which. These newly discovered scrolls gave instructions on how the Jewish people were to live, and were read to the assembled Jewish people (or representatives of them). Consequently there was a renewal of faith and religious practice among the Jewish people.
The main point of the reforms was that there was to be only one sanctuary where sacrifice to God could be offered: Jerusalem. All the popular religious centers throughout the land were to be closed down, and their priests dispersed. Since these centers mostly catered to worshippers of the agricultural gods, it meant that there was a very real power shift - from the local sanctuaries to a centralized priesthood in Jerusalem. The reforms affected the way that Passover was celebrated. Previously it had been a family celebration with the lamb killed at the local sanctuary. Now sacrifice was carried out in the Temple in Jerusalem, no longer performed at the local altar. Josiah was killed at the fortress of Megiddo, fighting the Egyptian pharaoh Necho II.
was the third son of King Josiah, installed as a puppet king by Nebuchadnezzar in 597BC. He ruled until the fall of Jerusalem in 587BC. The people of Judah never seem to have really accepted him as king - they saw him more as a regent ruling in place of the real, exiled king.
Zediakah was in a difficult situation, dominated by two super-powers who squabbled over his land. The Assyrians who had conquered Judah were stronger, but the Egyptians offered to help him get rid of them. He wavered between the two. In the fourth year of his reign he went in person to Babylon to show his loyalty, but he also formed a new coalition with Edom, Moab, Ammon and Phoenicia, laying the groundwork for secret plans to rebel. Nebuchadnezzar seems to have guessed what was happening, because in 588BC he moved his army against Jerusalem and began a siege that finally led to the downfall of the city and the end of the Judean monarchy. The Egyptians tried to help Zedekiah, but one by one his fortresses fell, until only Lachish stood between Nebuchadnezzar and Jerusalem. What happened at Lachish can be guessed by the broken pieces of pottery known as the Lachish Letters, clay fragments on which were written hastily scrawled letters from Hoshaiah, the commander of an outpost, to the commander of the Judean forces at Lachish. The outpost must have fallen and Lachish went too. Then it was Jerusalem's turn. Zedekiah fled for his life, but he was captured near Jericho and brought to Nebuchadnezzar's headquarters near Riblah. His children were murdered in front of him, and then his own eyes were put out. Zedekiah was then taken to Babylon along with many other captives. His eventual fate is unknown.
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