JEZREEL - RESOURCES
SAUL AND HIS SONS DIE AT GILBOA
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1 Samuel 29, 31
1 Now the Philistines fought against Israel; the Israelites fled before them, and many fell slain on Mount Gilboa.
2 The Philistines pressed hard after Saul and his sons, and they killed his sons Jonathan, Abinadab and Malki-Shua.
3 The fighting grew fierce around Saul, and when the archers overtook him, they wounded him critically.
4 Saul said to his armor-bearer, "Draw your sword and run me through, or these uncircumcised fellows will run me through and abuse me." But his armor-bearer was terrified and would not do it; so Saul took his own sword and fell on it.
5 When the armor-bearer saw that Saul was dead, he too fell on his sword and died with him.
6 So Saul and his three sons and his armor-bearer and all his men died together that same day.
7 When the Israelites along the valley and those across the Jordan saw that the Israelite army had fled and that Saul and his sons had died, they abandoned their towns and fled. And the Philistines came and occupied them.
8 The next day, when the Philistines came to strip the dead, they found Saul and his three sons fallen on Mount Gilboa.
9 They cut off his head and stripped off his armor, and they sent messengers throughout the land of the Philistines to proclaim the news in the temple of their idols and among their people.
10 They put his armor in the temple of the Ashtoreths and fastened his body to the wall of Beth Shan.
11 When the people of Jabesh Gilead heard of what the Philistines had done to Saul,
12 all their valiant men journeyed through the night to Beth Shan. They took down the bodies of Saul and his sons from the wall of Beth Shan and went to Jabesh, where they burned them.
13 Then they took their bones and buried them under a tamarisk tree at Jabesh, and they fasted seven days.
DAVID'S LAMENT
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2 Samuel 1:21-27
21 You mountains of Gilboa, let there be no dew, neither let there be rain, on you, nor fields of offerings: for there the shield of the mighty is vilely cast away, the shield of Saul, as though he had not been anointed with oil.
22 From the blood of the slain, from the fat of the mighty, the bow of Jonathan turned not back, and the sword of Saul returned not empty.
23 Saul and Jonathan were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their death they were not divided: they were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions.
24 You daughters of Israel, weep over Saul, who clothed you in scarlet, with other delights, who put on ornaments of gold on your apparel.
25 How are the mighty fallen in the middle of the battle! O Jonathan, you were slain in your high places.
26 I am distressed for you, my brother Jonathan: very pleasant have you been to me: your love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women.
27 How are the mighty fallen, and the weapons of war perished!
ELIJAH BREAKS THE DROUGHT
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1 Kings 18:36-46
36 At the time of the offering of the oblation, the prophet Elijah came near and said "O Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at our bidding.
37 Answer me, O Lord, answer me, so that this people may know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you have turned their hearts back."
38 Then the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt offering, the wood, the stones, and the dust, and even licked up the water that was in the trench.
39 When all the people saw it, they fell on their faces and said "The Lord indeed is God; the Lord indeed is God."
40 Elijah said to them, "Seize the prophets of Baal; do not let one of them escape." Then they seized them; and Elijah brought them down to the Wadi Kishon, and killed them there.
41 And Elijah said to Ahab, "Go, eat and drink, for there is the sound of a heavy rain."
42 So Ahab went off to eat and drink, but Elijah climbed to the top of Carmel, bent down to the ground and put his face between his knees.
43 "Go and look toward the sea," he told his servant. And he went up and looked. "There is nothing there," he said. Seven times Elijah said, "Go back."
44 The seventh time the servant reported, "A cloud as small as a man's hand is rising from the sea." So Elijah said, "Go and tell Ahab, 'Hitch up your chariot and go down before the rain stops you.' "
45 Meanwhile, the sky grew black with clouds, the wind rose, a heavy rain came on and Ahab rode off to Jezreel.
46 The power of the LORD came upon Elijah and, tucking his cloak into his belt, he ran ahead of Ahab all the way to Jezreel.
NABOTH'S VINEYARD
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1 Kings 21:1-16
1 Some time later there was an incident involving a vineyard belonging to Naboth the Jezreelite. The vineyard was in Jezreel, close to the palace of Ahab king of Samaria.
2 Ahab said to Naboth, "Let me have your vineyard to use for a vegetable garden, since it is close to my palace. In exchange I will give you a better vineyard or, if you prefer, I will pay you whatever it is worth."
3 But Naboth replied, "The LORD forbid that I should give you the inheritance of my fathers."
4 So Ahab went home, sullen and angry because Naboth the Jezreelite had said, "I will not give you the inheritance of my fathers." He lay on his bed sulking and refused to eat.
5 His wife Jezebel came in and asked him, "Why are you so sullen? Why won't you eat?"
6 He answered her, "Because I said to Naboth the Jezreelite, 'Sell me your vineyard; or if you prefer, I will give you another vineyard in its place.' But he said, 'I will not give you my vineyard.' "
7 Jezebel his wife said, "Is this how you act as king over Israel? Get up and eat! Cheer up. I'll get you the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite."
8 So she wrote letters in Ahab's name, placed his seal on them, and sent them to the elders and nobles who lived in Naboth's city with him.
9 In those letters she wrote: "Proclaim a day of fasting and seat Naboth in a prominent place among the people.
10 But seat two scoundrels opposite him and have them testify that he has cursed both God and the king. Then take him out and stone him to death."
11 So the elders and nobles who lived in Naboth's city did as Jezebel directed in the letters she had written to them.
12 They proclaimed a fast and seated Naboth in a prominent place among the people.
13 Then two scoundrels came and sat opposite him and brought charges against Naboth before the people, saying, "Naboth has cursed both God and the king." So they took him outside the city and stoned him to death.
14 Then they sent word to Jezebel: "Naboth has been stoned and is dead."
15 As soon as Jezebel heard that Naboth had been stoned to death, she said to Ahab, "Get up and take possession of the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite that he refused to sell you. He is no longer alive, but dead."
16 When Ahab heard that Naboth was dead, he got up and went down to take possession of Naboth's vineyard.
ELIJAH CURSES AHAB AT JEZREEL
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1 Kings 21:17-24
17 Then the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite:
18 "Go down to meet Ahab king of Israel, who rules in Samaria. He is now in Naboth's vineyard, where he has gone to take possession of it.
19 Say to him, 'This is what the Lord says: Have you not murdered a man and seized his property?' Then say to him, 'This is what the LORD says: In the place where dogs licked up Naboth's blood, dogs will lick up your blood—yes, yours!' "
20 Ahab said to Elijah, "So you have found me, my enemy!" "I have found you," he answered, "because you have sold yourself to do evil in the eyes of the Lord.
21 'I am going to bring disaster on you. I will consume your descendants and cut off from Ahab every last male in Israel—slave or free.
22 I will make your house like that of Jeroboam son of Nebat and that of Baasha son of Ahijah, because you have provoked me to anger and have caused Israel to sin.'
23 "And also concerning Jezebel the Lord says: 'Dogs will devour Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel.'
24 "Dogs will eat those belonging to Ahab who die in the city, and the birds of the air will feed on those who die in the country."
THE WOUNDED KING RETREATS TO JEZREEL
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2 Kings 8:25-29
25 In the twelfth year of Joram son of Ahab king of Israel, Ahaziah son of Jehoram king of Judah began to reign.
26 Ahaziah was twenty-two years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem one year. His mother's name was Athaliah, a granddaughter of Omri king of Israel.
27 He walked in the ways of the house of Ahab and did evil in the eyes of the LORD, as the house of Ahab had done, for he was related by marriage to Ahab's family.
28 Ahaziah went with Joram son of Ahab to war against Hazael king of Aram at Ramoth Gilead. The Arameans wounded Joram;
29 so King Joram returned to Jezreel to recover from the wounds the Arameans had inflicted on him at Ramoth in his battle with Hazael king of Aram. Ahaziah son of Jehoram king of Judah went down to Jezreel to see Joram son of Ahab, because he was wounded.
JEHU KILLS KINGS JORAM AND AHAZIAH
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2 Kings 9:14-28
14 So Jehu son of Jehoshaphat, the son of Nimshi, conspired against Joram. (Now Joram and all Israel had been defending Ramoth Gilead against Hazael king of Aram,
15 but King Joram had returned to Jezreel to recover from the wounds the Arameans had inflicted on him in the battle with Hazael king of Aram.) Jehu said, "If this is the way you feel, don't let anyone slip out of the city to go and tell the news in Jezreel."
16 Then he got into his chariot and rode to Jezreel, because Joram was resting there and Ahaziah king of Judah had gone down to see him.
17 When the lookout standing on the tower in Jezreel saw Jehu's troops approaching, he called out, "I see some troops coming." "Get a horseman," Joram ordered. "Send him to meet them and ask, 'Do you come in peace?' "
18 The horseman rode off to meet Jehu and said, "This is what the king says: 'Do you come in peace?' " "What do you have to do with peace?" Jehu replied. "Fall in behind me." The lookout reported, "The messenger has reached them, but he isn't coming back."
19 So the king sent out a second horseman. When he came to them he said, "This is what the king says: 'Do you come in peace?' " Jehu replied, "What do you have to do with peace? Fall in behind me."
20 The lookout reported, "He has reached them, but he isn't coming back either. The driving is like that of Jehu son of Nimshi—he drives like a madman."
21 "Hitch up my chariot," Joram ordered. And when it was hitched up, Joram king of Israel and Ahaziah king of Judah rode out, each in his own chariot, to meet Jehu. They met him at the plot of ground that had belonged to Naboth the Jezreelite.
22 When Joram saw Jehu he asked, "Have you come in peace, Jehu?" "How can there be peace," Jehu replied, "as long as all the idolatry and witchcraft of your mother Jezebel abound?"
23 Joram turned about and fled, calling out to Ahaziah, "Treachery, Ahaziah!"
24 Then Jehu drew his bow and shot Joram between the shoulders. The arrow pierced his heart and he slumped down in his chariot.
25 Jehu said to Bidkar, his chariot officer, "Pick him up and throw him on the field that belonged to Naboth the Jezreelite. Remember how you and I were riding together in chariots behind Ahab his father when the LORD made this prophecy about him:
26 'Yesterday I saw the blood of Naboth and the blood of his sons, declares the LORD, and I will surely make you pay for it on this plot of ground, declares the LORD.' Now then, pick him up and throw him on that plot, in accordance with the word of the LORD."
27 When Ahaziah king of Judah saw what had happened, he fled up the road to Beth Haggan. Jehu chased him, shouting, "Kill him too!" They wounded him in his chariot on the way up to Gur near Ibleam, but he escaped to Megiddo and died there.
28 His servants took him by chariot to Jerusalem and buried him with his fathers in his tomb in the City of David.
JEHU KILLS JEZEBEL
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2 Kings 9:30-37
30 Then Jehu went to Jezreel. When Jezebel heard about it, she painted her eyes, arranged her hair and looked out of a window.
31 As Jehu entered the gate, she asked, "Have you come in peace, Zimri, you murderer of your master?"
32 He looked up at the window and called out, "Who is on my side? Who?" Two or three eunuchs looked down at him.
33 "Throw her down!" Jehu said. So they threw her down, and some of her blood spattered the wall and the horses as they trampled her underfoot.
34 Jehu went in and ate and drank. "Take care of that cursed woman," he said, "and bury her, for she was a king's daughter."
35 But when they went out to bury her, they found nothing except her skull, her feet and her hands.
36 They went back and told Jehu, who said, "This is the word of the Lord that he spoke through his servant Elijah the Tishbite: On the plot of ground at Jezreel dogs will devour Jezebel's flesh.
37 Jezebel's body will be like refuse on the ground in the plot at Jezreel, so that no one will be able to say, 'This is Jezebel.' "
JEHU MURDERS THE FAMILY OF KING AHAB
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2 Kings 10:1-11
1 Now there were in Samaria seventy sons of the house of Ahab. So Jehu wrote letters and sent them to Samaria: to the officials of Jezreel, to the elders and to the guardians of Ahab's children. He said,
2 "As soon as this letter reaches you, since your master's sons are with you and you have chariots and horses, a fortified city and weapons,
3 choose the best and most worthy of your master's sons and set him on his father's throne. Then fight for your master's house."
4 But they were terrified and said, "If two kings could not resist him, how can we?"
5 So the palace administrator, the city governor, the elders and the guardians sent this message to Jehu: "We are your servants and we will do anything you say. We will not appoint anyone as king; you do whatever you think best."
6 Then Jehu wrote them a second letter, saying, "If you are on my side and will obey me, take the heads of your master's sons and come to me in Jezreel by this time tomorrow." Now the royal princes, seventy of them, were with the leading men of the city, who were rearing them.
7 When the letter arrived, these men took the princes and slaughtered all seventy of them. They put their heads in baskets and sent them to Jehu in Jezreel.
8 When the messenger arrived, he told Jehu, "They have brought the heads of the princes." Then Jehu ordered, "Put them in two piles at the entrance of the city gate until morning."
9 The next morning Jehu went out. He stood before all the people and said, "You are innocent. It was I who conspired against my master and killed him, but who killed all these?
10 Know then, that not a word the LORD has spoken against the house of Ahab will fail. The LORD has done what he promised through his servant Elijah."
11 So Jehu killed everyone in Jezreel who remained of the house of Ahab, as well as all his chief men, his close friends and his priests, leaving him no survivor.
JOSEPHUS, BOOK 8, CHAPTER 13
How Ahab when he took Jezebel to Wife became more wicked than the Kings before
1. NOW Ahab the king of Israel dwelt in Samaria, and held the government for twenty-two years; and made no alteration in the conduct of the kings that were his predecessors, but only in such things as were of his own invention for the worse, and in his most gross wickedness.
He imitated them in their wicked courses, and in their injurious behavior towards God, and more especially he imitated the transgression of Jeroboam; for he worshipped the heifers that he had made; and he contrived other absurd objects of worship besides those heifers.
He also took to wife the daughter of Ethbaal, king of the Tyrians and Sidonians, whose name was Jezebel, of whom he learned to worship her own gods.
This woman was active and bold, and fell into so great a degree of impurity and madness, that she built a temple to the god of the Tyrians, which they call Belus, and planted a grove of all sorts of trees; she also appointed priests and false prophets to this god.
The king also himself had many such about him, and so exceeded in madness and wickedness all [the kings] that went before him.
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