Two Kingdoms · c. 841 BC
Chapter 11
Jehu
The watchman said, “He came to them, and isn’t coming back. The driving is like the driving of Jehu the son of Nimshi, for he drives furiously.”
For parents
This chapter has many killings, told plainly and with no detail beyond the text. Jehu shoots King Joram of Israel and has his body thrown onto a field, King Ahaziah of Judah is struck down, and Jezebel is thrown from a window, trampled, and eaten by dogs (2 Kings 9:24–37). The leaders of Samaria kill Ahab’s seventy sons and send their heads to Jehu in baskets (10:6–8); Jehu kills the rest of Ahab’s family and friends and forty-two of Ahaziah’s brothers (10:11–17), and tricks the worshipers of Baal into Baal’s temple, where his guards kill them (10:18–25).
the prophet called one of the . “Put your belt on,” he told him, “take this small bottle of oil in your hand, and go to . Once you’re there, find , the son of Jehoshaphat and grandson of Nimshi. Go in, call him away from the men he is with, and take him into an inner room. Pour the oil from the bottle on his head and say, ‘The Lord says, “I have you king over Israel.”’ Then open the door and get out of there. Don’t wait.”
The young prophet set off for Ramoth Gilead. When he got there, the army’s captains were sitting together. “I have a message for you, captain,” he said.
“Which one of us?” asked Jehu.
“To you, captain.”
Jehu got up and went in, and the young prophet poured the oil on his head. “The Lord, the God of Israel, says this,” he told him. “‘I have anointed you king over the Lord’s people, over Israel. You must strike down your master ’s family, so that I can avenge the deaths of my servants the prophets, and of all the Lord’s servants who died at ’s hands. Ahab’s whole family will die. I will destroy every male of Ahab’s family in Israel, whether he is shut away or free.
“‘I will make Ahab’s family like the families of son of Nebat and son of Ahijah. The dogs will eat Jezebel on the plot of ground at , and there will be no one to bury her.’” Then he opened the door and fled.
When Jehu came back out to the king’s other officers, one of them said to him, “Is everything all right? Why did this madman come to you?”
“You know the man,” Jehu said, “and the way he talks.”
“That’s a lie,” they said. “Tell us.”
Jehu said, “He told me, ‘The Lord says, “I have anointed you king over Israel.”’”
At once each man took his cloak and laid it under Jehu at the top of the stairs. Then they blew the trumpet and called out, “Jehu is king!”
So Jehu, the son of Jehoshaphat and grandson of Nimshi, plotted against . Joram and all Israel had been guarding Ramoth Gilead from king of . But King Joram had gone back to Jezreel to heal from the wounds the Syrians had given him when he fought Hazael.
“If you really mean this,” Jehu said to the officers, “then don’t let anyone get away from the city to carry the news to Jezreel.”
Then Jehu climbed into a chariot and drove to Jezreel, because that was where Joram lay. king of Judah had come down to see Joram.
In Jezreel a watchman was standing on the tower. He saw Jehu’s men coming. “I see a group of men!” he called.
“Send a man on horseback out to meet them,” Joram said. “Have him ask, ‘Do you come in peace?’”
So a rider went out to meet Jehu. “The king says, ‘Do you come in peace?’”
“What do you care about peace?” Jehu answered. “Fall in behind me!”
The watchman called out, “The messenger got to them, but he isn’t coming back.”
Then a second horseman was sent out. He came to them and said, “The king says, ‘Do you come in peace?’”
Jehu answered, “What do you care about peace? Fall in behind me!”
The watchman called out again. “He got to them too, and he isn’t coming back. And the driver drives like Jehu son of Nimshi. He drives furiously!”
“Get ready!” Joram ordered, and they got his chariot ready. Then Joram king of Israel and Ahaziah king of Judah went out, each in his chariot, to meet Jehu. They found him on the land of , the man from Jezreel.
“Jehu, do you come in peace?” Joram asked when he saw him.
“What peace,” Jehu answered, “while your mother Jezebel’s and witchcraft go on and on?”
Joram turned his chariot around and fled, shouting to Ahaziah, “We’ve been betrayed, Ahaziah!”
Jehu drew his bow with his full strength and struck Joram in the back. The arrow came out through his heart, and he sank down in his chariot.
Jehu said to , his captain, “Pick him up and throw him onto the field of Naboth of Jezreel. Remember when you and I were riding together behind his father Ahab? The Lord spoke this message against Ahab then: ‘Yesterday I saw the blood of Naboth and his sons,’ says the Lord. ‘And I will pay you back on this plot of ground,’ says the Lord. So pick him up and throw him onto the plot of ground, just as the Lord said.”
When Ahaziah king of Judah saw this, he fled by the road to the garden house. Jehu went after him, shouting, “Strike him too, in his chariot!” They struck him where the road climbs to Gur, by Ibleam. He fled to and died there.
His servants carried him in a chariot to Jerusalem. They buried him with his ancestors, in his own tomb in .
When Ahaziah became king of Judah, Joram son of Ahab was in his eleventh year as king.
Jehu reached Jezreel, and Jezebel heard that he had come. She painted her eyes, did up her hair, and went to the window to look out.
As Jehu came in through the gate, she called down, “Do you come in peace, , you murderer of your master?”
Years before, Zimri had been captain of half the chariots of King Elah of Israel. He plotted against his master, killed him, and became king in his place. His reign lasted seven days.
Jehu looked up at the window. “Who is on my side?” he called. “Who?” Two or three looked out at him.
“Throw her down!” he said. So they threw her down. Some of her blood splashed on the wall and on the horses, and he trampled her underfoot.
Jehu went inside and ate and drank. Then he said, “Go and take care of this cursed woman. Bury her, because she is a king’s daughter.”
They went to bury her, but all they found of her was the skull, the feet and the palms of her hands.
They came back and told Jehu. “This is what the Lord said through his servant the Tishbite,” he said. “‘The dogs will eat Jezebel’s flesh on the plot of ground at Jezreel. Her body will be like dung lying on the field in the land of Jezreel, so that nobody can say, “This is Jezebel.”’”
Ahab had seventy sons in . Jehu wrote letters and sent them to Samaria, to the rulers of Jezreel, the elders, and the men who were raising Ahab’s sons.
“Your master’s sons are there with you,” he wrote, “and you have chariots and horses, a walled city, and armor. So the moment this letter comes, pick the best and fittest of your master’s sons, set him on his father’s throne, and fight for your master’s family.”
But they were terribly afraid. “Not even the two kings could stand up to him,” they said. “So how can we?”
So the man in charge of the palace, the man in charge of the city, the elders and the men raising the children sent this answer to Jehu: “We are your servants. We will do whatever you ask. We won’t make anyone king. Do whatever you think is best.”
Then Jehu wrote to them again. “If you are on my side, and you will do what I say, take the heads of the men who are your master’s sons, and come to me at Jezreel by this time tomorrow.” The king’s sons, all seventy of them, were with the important men of the city, who were raising them.
When the letter came, those men took the king’s sons and killed them, all seventy. They put the heads in baskets and sent them to him in Jezreel.
A messenger came and told Jehu, “They have brought the heads of the king’s sons.”
“Lay them in two heaps at the entrance of the gate until morning,” said Jehu.
In the morning he went out and stood before all the people. “You are innocent,” he said. “Yes, I plotted against my master and killed him. But who killed all these? So know this: everything the Lord said about Ahab’s family will happen, every word of it. The Lord has done what he said he would do, when he spoke through his servant Elijah.”
Then Jehu killed everyone who was left of Ahab’s family in Jezreel, and all of Ahab’s important men, his trusted friends and his priests. He left Ahab no one at all.
Then Jehu got up and left for Samaria. On the way, at the house where the shepherds sheared their sheep, he met the brothers of Ahaziah king of Judah. “Who are you?” he asked.
“We are Ahaziah’s brothers,” they answered. “We are going down to greet the king’s children and the queen’s children.”
“Take them alive!” Jehu ordered. So they took them alive, and then they killed all forty-two of them at the pit by the shearing house. He did not leave a single one of them.
From there he went on, and met son of Rechab, who was coming to meet him. Jehu greeted him and asked, “Are you truly with me, as I am with you?”
“I am,” Jehonadab answered.
“If you are, give me your hand,” said Jehu. Jehonadab gave him his hand, and Jehu brought him up into the chariot with him.
“Come with me,” Jehu said, “and see my zeal for the Lord.” So they had him ride in Jehu’s chariot.
In Samaria, Jehu struck down all of Ahab’s people who were left there, until he had destroyed them, as the Lord had said to Elijah.
Then Jehu gathered all the people together. “Ahab served a little,” he told them. “Jehu will serve him far more. So call all the prophets of Baal to me, all his worshipers and all his priests. Don’t let anyone stay away, because I am making a great sacrifice to Baal. Anyone who stays away will not live.”
But Jehu was tricking them. He meant to destroy the worshipers of Baal.
“Call a holy gathering for Baal!” Jehu said. So they announced it.
Jehu sent the call all over Israel, and every worshiper of Baal came. Not a single one stayed away. They came into Baal’s temple, and it was full from one end to the other.
Jehu said to the man who kept the robes, “Bring out robes for all the worshipers of Baal!” So he brought robes out for them.
Jehu went into Baal’s temple with Jehonadab son of Rechab. “Look around,” he told the worshipers of Baal, “and make sure none of the Lord’s servants are here with you, only worshipers of Baal.”
So they went in to offer sacrifices and . Jehu had placed eighty of his own men outside, and he had told them, “I am handing these men over to you. If any of them escapes, the man who let him go will die in his place.”
The moment he finished the burnt offering, Jehu said to the guards and the captains, “Go in and kill them! Let no one escape.” So they struck them with their swords. The guards and the captains threw the bodies out, then went on into the inner shrine of Baal’s temple.
They brought out the pillars that were in the temple of Baal and burned them. They broke down Baal’s pillar and broke down Baal’s temple, and made it a latrine, a toilet. It is still a toilet to this day. In this way Jehu wiped Baal out of Israel.
But Jehu did not give up the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, the sins Jeroboam had led Israel into: the golden calves at and at .
The Lord said to Jehu, “You have done well. You did what is right in my eyes, and you did to Ahab’s family all that was in my heart. Because of that, your descendants will sit on Israel’s throne for four generations.”
But Jehu wasn’t careful to live by the law of the Lord, the God of Israel, with all his heart. He didn’t give up the sins Jeroboam had led Israel into.
In those days the Lord began to cut away pieces of Israel. Hazael struck the Israelites all through their land east of the Jordan. He struck the whole land of and the tribes of Gad, Reuben and Manasseh. He struck from Aroer, by the valley of the Arnon, through both Gilead and .
Everything else Jehu did, and all his power, is written in the records of the kings of Israel.
Jehu died and joined his ancestors. They buried him in Samaria, and his son became king after him. Jehu had reigned over Israel in Samaria for twenty-eight years.