1 Reis 16

1 Reis 16

Constable: Assyrian records refer to Israel as “the land of Omri.” His influence extended far. He defeated the Moabites, the record of which constitutes one of the inscriptions on the famous Moabite Stone. He also made a treaty with Ethbaal, king of Tyre and Sidon (887-856 B.C.), that involved the marriage of his son, Ahab, and Ethbaal’s daughter, Jezebel. A granddaughter of Ethbaal, Dido, founded Carthage. Still the writer of Kings did not mention these strengths, only the fact that he was the worst king Israel had had spiritually (v. 25). He was very bad because he personally followed Jeroboam’s cult and caused the people to sin by allowing it to flourish in Israel R. D. Patterson: Despite Omri’s forward-looking vision for restoring Israel’s strength and his many accomplishments, spiritually he was more destitute than all his predecessors (vv. 25-26). Not only did he perpetuate the spiritual sins of Jeroboam, but his ties with Phoenicia were to unleash on Israel the common pagan social and religious practices known to the ancient world. Therefore the scriptural record concerning Omri is both brief and condemnatory. (See The Expositor's Bible Commentary - Page 50) 1 Kings 16:26 For he walked in all the way of Jeroboam the son of Nebat and in his sins which he made Israel sin, provoking the LORD God of Israel with their idols. he walked: 1Ki 16:2,7,19 12:26-33 13:33,34 their idols: 1Ki 16:13 Ps 31:6 Jer 8:19 10:3,8 14:22 16:19 18:15 Ac 14:15 Ro 1:21-23 1 Kings 16 Resources - Multiple Sermons and Commentaries OMRI WALKED LIKE JEROBOAM For - Term of explanation. What is the writer explaining? He is explaining why Omri wins the title of "MOST EVIL KING TO DATE!" He walked in all the way of Jeroboam the son of Nebat and in his sins which he made Israel sin, provoking the LORD God of Israel with their idols Knapp says that Omri "seems to have formulated laws [see Micah 6:16], making Jeroboam’s calf-worship, or other forms of idolatry, obligatory throughout his realm, which remained in force till the end of the kingdom, more than two hundred years later.” 1 Kings 16:27 Now the rest of the acts of Omri which he did and his might which he showed, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel? the rest: 1Ki 16:5,14,20 15:31 1 Kings 16 Resources - Multiple Sermons and Commentaries Now the rest of the acts of Omri which he did and his might which he showed, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel Knapp - Omri's name “means heaping; by his iniquity he helped to heap up wrath against his dynasty. God executed His indignation thirty-six years later on his great-grandson Joram, to the total extinction of the guilty house.” (Knapp) 1 Kings 16:28 So Omri slept with his fathers and was buried in Samaria; and Ahab his son became king in his place. So Omri slept: 1Ki 16:6 1 Kings 16 Resources - Multiple Sermons and Commentaries AHAB SUCCEEDS HIS FATHER OMRI So Omri slept with his fathers and was buried in Samaria; and Ahab his son became king in his place - Ahab's name means "father's brother," "brother of the father" or "resembling the father," which is certainly apropos because Ahab's wickedness would resemble and even surpass the depth of depravity of his father Omri! I like David Guzik's comments - "It can be said of some sons, “He has his father’s eyes.” It could be said of Ahab, “He has his father’s lies.”" Jeroboam intended to serve the LORD through idolatrous images (such as the golden calf) and in disobedient ways (altars and high places other than Jerusalem). Ahab introduced the worship of completely new, pagan gods. In his disobedience Jeroboam said, “I will worship the LORD, but do it my way.” Ahab said, “I want to forget about the LORD completely and worship Baal.” iii. In his later years, Solomon tragically worshipped pagan gods. Yet Omri and Ahab were far worse in that they commanded the worship of idols. Dilday - Omri's fame as a monarch, while downplayed by the author of Kings, was widely recognized in other places. The Moabite stone, discovered in 1868, refers to him as the conqueror of Moab. Assyrian inscriptions make mention of him as a great warrior. For years the Assyrians referred to Israel as ‘the house of Omri’” (See The Preacher's Commentary - Vol. 09: 1 and 2 Kings - Page 25) QUESTION - Who was King Ahab in the Bible? | GotQuestions.org ANSWER - Ahab was one in a line of increasingly evil kings in Israel’s history, starting with the reign of Jeroboam. King Ahab “did more evil in the eyes of the LORD than any of those before him” (1 Kings 16:30). Among the events chronicled in Ahab’s life that led to his downfall was his marriage to an evil woman named Jezebel who had a particular hatred for God’s people (1 Kings 18:4). Because of his marriage to a pagan woman, Ahab devoted himself to the worship of the false gods Baal and Asherah in Israel (1 Kings 16:31–33). The evil of King Ahab was countered by the prophet Elijah who warned Ahab of coming judgment if he did not obey the Lord. Ahab blamed Elijah for bringing trouble on Israel (1 Kings 18:17), but it was Ahab’s promotion of idolatry that was the true cause of the three-and-a-half-year famine (verse 18). In a dramatic confrontation between Elijah and Ahab’s false prophets, God proved to Israel that He, not Baal, was the true God (1 Kings 18:16–39). All of Ahab’s men of Baal were killed that day (verse 40). King Ahab also disobeyed the Lord’s direct command to destroy Ben-Hadad, the king of Aram. God set it up so that Ahab would lead Israel to victory, but Ahab made a treaty with the king he was supposed to kill (1 Kings 20). “Therefore,” God told Ahab through an unnamed prophet, “it is your life for his life, your people for his people” (verse 42). The event that sealed Ahab’s doom was his murder of an innocent man (1 Kings 21). Ahab coveted a vineyard belonging to a man named Naboth. The king offered to buy the vineyard, but Naboth refused, because the Law forbade him to sell it (1 Kings 21:2–3; cf. Leviticus 25:23). While Ahab sulked about it in his palace, his wife arranged Naboth’s murder. Once the vineyard’s owner was out of the way, King Ahab took the vineyard for himself. Elijah came to Ahab and told him the Lord would deal with him by cutting off all his descendants. Also, Ahab himself would suffer an ignoble fate: “In the place where dogs licked up Naboth’s blood, dogs will lick up your blood—yes, yours!” (1 Kings 21:19). Upon hearing this, Ahab “tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and fasted. He lay in sackcloth and went around meekly” (verse 27). In response to Ahab’s repentance, God mercifully postponed the destruction of Ahab’s dynasty until after Ahab was dead (verse 29). The prophesied judgment against Ahab came true exactly as Elijah predicted. God used Ahab’s own false prophets to entice him into going to the battle at Ramoth-Gilead, where he was hit by a “random” arrow and slowly bled to death in his chariot. Later, “they washed the chariot at a pool in Samaria (where the prostitutes bathed), and the dogs licked up his blood, as the word of the Lord had declared” (1 Kings 22:38). After Ahab’s death, Jehu killed Jezebel (2 Kings 9) and all of Ahab’s descendants (2 Kings 10). King Ahab was justly judged by God because he disobeyed the Lord’s direct commands, he abused his responsibility as Israel’s king, and he led God’s people right into idolatry. In the end, “there was never anyone like Ahab, who sold himself to do evil in the eyes of the Lord, urged on by Jezebel his wife. He behaved in the vilest manner by going after idols” (1 Kings 21:25–26). QUESTION - What is the story of Ahab and Jezebel? | GotQuestions.org ANSWER - King Ahab and Queen Jezebel served as leaders of the northern kingdom of Israel during a time of much evil in the land. King Ahab was an Israelite king who married a Sidonian woman named Jezebel and became involved in worshiping Baal, the god of her people. Ahab built a house to Baal in the capital city of Samaria and made an Asherah pole as a tool of pagan worship. We are told, “Ahab did more to provoke the LORD, the God of Israel, to anger than all the kings of Israel who were before him” (1 Kings 16:33). Jezebel was likewise known for her evil actions. She was the daughter of Ethbaal, king of the Sidonians. After her marriage to Ahab, her first recorded action was cutting off the prophets of the Lord (1 Kings 18:4). Obadiah, a God-fearing officer in Ahab’s court, noted that Jezebel killed many prophets, despite Obadiah’s efforts to save them: “Has it not been told my lord what I did when Jezebel killed the prophets of the LORD, how I hid a hundred men of the LORD’s prophets by fifties in a cave and fed them with bread and water?” (1 Kings 18:13–14). It was during the time of Ahab and Jezebel that Elijah was the prophet in Israel. Satan had his couple on the throne, but God had His man in the field, performing miracles and leading a revival against Baal-worship. The three-and-a-half-year drought that Elijah prayed for was part of God’s judgment on the wickedness of the nation and its leaders. When Elijah confronted Ahab near the end of the drought, the king said to him, “Is that you, you troubler of Israel?” (1 Kings 18:17). But Ahab had it wrong. Elijah was not the one bringing trouble on the land. The prophet corrected the king: “I have not made trouble for Israel . . . but you and your father’s family have. You have abandoned the Lord’s commands and have followed the Baals” (verse 18). After Elijah defeated the prophets of Baal and had them killed at Mt. Carmel (1 Kings 18), Jezebel issued a death threat against him (1 Kings 19:2). The queen went on to plot against Naboth, the innocent owner of a vineyard that Ahab coveted. Jezebel had Naboth killed so the king could confiscate his land (1 Kings 21), and she prodded her husband into many other wicked acts besides: “There was none who sold himself to do what was evil in the sight of the LORD like Ahab, whom Jezebel his wife incited” (1 Kings 21:25). Ahab’s death was predicted by the prophets Elijah and Micaiah (1 Kings 21:19; 22:28). Jezebel’s gruesome death was also predicted by Elijah (1 Kings 21:23). True to the prophecy, Ahab was killed in a battle with Syria. Later, Jezebel was thrown from a tower, “and some of her blood spattered on the wall and on the horses, and they trampled on her” (2 Kings 9:33). Then, “when they went to bury her, they found no more of her than the skull and the feet and the palms of her hands” (2 Kings 9:35). Just as Elijah had said, the dogs ate Jezebel. In Revelation 2:20 Jezebel’s reputation lives on as Jesus speaks against the church at Thyatira: “But I have this against you, that you tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess and is teaching and seducing my servants to practice sexual immorality and to eat food sacrificed to idols.” The woman’s name in Thyatira was probably not literally “Jezebel,” but her immorality and idolatry in preying upon God’s people was very Jezebel-like. Both Ahab and Jezebel were leaders of God’s people who forsook the Lord and served other gods. The royal couple earned a reputation for sin and violence, and they both suffered violent deaths as part of God’s judgment on their actions. 1 Kings 16:29 Now Ahab the son of Omri became king over Israel in the thirty-eighth year of Asa king of Judah, and Ahab the son of Omri reigned over Israel in Samaria twenty-two years. Samaria: 1Ki 16:24 1 Kings 16 Resources - Multiple Sermons and Commentaries AHAB REIGNS ISRAEL FOR 22 YEARS Now Ahab the son of Omri became king over Israel in the thirty-eighth year of Asa king of Judah, and Ahab the son of Omri reigned over Israel in Samaria twenty-two years - Asa reigned for 41 years in total (1 Kings 15:10) while there were 8 kings in the Northern Kingdom. One reason for this difference is of course the godlessness and idolatry of the northern kings and the general godliness of Asa who made no idols. The other reason of course is that God was preserving the line of David as part of His promise to keep the Davidic Covenant. Kings of Israel Whose Reign Overlapped with King Asa's 41 Years Jeroboam I (931–910 BC) - 1 year overlap with Asa (911–910 BC) Nadab (910–909 BC) – Son of Jeroboam I (1 Kings 15:25-28) - " - 2 year overlap with Asa (911–909 BC) Baasha (909–886 BC) – Usurper, 3rd King of Israel (1 Kings 15:27-34; 1 Kings 16:1-6) - - 23 year overlap with Asa (909–886 BC) Elah (886–885 BC) – Son of Baasha (1 Kings 16:8-10) - 1 year overlap with Asa (885 BC) Zimri (885 BC) – 7-Day King (1 Kings 16:9-20) - 7 days overlap with Asa (885 BC) Tibni (885–880 BC, Rival to Omri) (1 Kings 16:21-22) - 4 to 5 year overlap with Asa (885–880 BC) Omri (885–874 BC, Sole Ruler from 880 BC Onward) (1 Kings 16:23-28) - 6 year overlap with Asa (880–874 BC) Ahab (874-853 BC) (1 Kings 16:29-34; 1 Kings 17-22) - 4 year overlap with Asa (874–870 BC) The Dynasty of Omri (Fourth Dynasty, Most Powerful) 📆 Reigned: 885–841 BC Members: Omri (885–874 BC) – Established Samaria as Israel’s capital and made Israel a regional power. Note that Tibni was a rival king of Omri over the Northern Kingdom but was not a fully recognized ruler by all of Israel, never was uncontested and left no ruling descendants. Therefore technically for these reasons Tibni is not considered a true dynasty like the others who ruled undisputedly for a period. Ahab (874–853 BC) – Son of Omri, one of the most wicked kings. Married Jezebel, led Israel into Baal worship, opposed by Elijah (1 Kings 16:30-33). Ahaziah (853–852 BC) – Son of Ahab, fell through a window and died without an heir. Joram (Jehoram) of Israel (852–841 BC) – Brother of Ahaziah, killed by Jehu. 🔻 Ended when Jehu killed Joram (1 Kings 9:24). 1 Kings 16:30 Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the LORD more than all who were before him. above: 1Ki 16:25,31,33 14:9 21:25 2Ki 3:2 1 Kings 16 Resources - Multiple Sermons and Commentaries GOING FROM BAD TO WORSE! Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the LORD more than all who were before him - Omri was more evil than all before him and now his son Ahab even surpasses the evil of Omri! 1 Kings 16:31 It came about, as though it had been a trivial thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, that he married Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and went to serve Baal and worshiped him. as if it had been a light thing: Heb. was it a light thing, Ge 30:15 Nu 16:9 Isa 7:13 Eze 8:17 16:20,47 34:18 took to wife: Ge 6:2 De 7:3,4 Jos 23:12,13 Ne 13:23-29 Jezebel: 1Ki 18:4,19 19:1,2 21:5-14,25 2Ki 9:30-37 Rev 2:20 the Zidonians: 1Ki 11:1 Jdg 10:12 18:7 and went: 1Ki 11:4-8 served Baal: 1Ki 21:25,26 Jdg 2:11 3:7 10:6 2Ki 10:18 17:16 1 Kings 16 Resources - Multiple Sermons and Commentaries Related Passages: Exodus 34:16+ and you might take some of his daughters for your sons, and his daughters might play the harlot with their gods and cause your sons also to play the harlot with their gods. Deuteronomy 7:3-4+ “Furthermore, you shall not intermarry with them; you shall not give your daughters to their sons, nor shall you take their daughters for your sons. 4 “For they will turn your sons away from following Me to serve other gods; then the anger of the LORD will be kindled against you and He will quickly destroy you. 1 Kings 11:1-3+ Now King Solomon loved many foreign women along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian (LIKE AHAB'S WIFE JEZEBEL), and Hittite women, 2 from the nations concerning which the LORD had said to the sons of Israel, “You shall not associate with them, nor shall they associate with you, for they will surely turn your heart away after their gods.” Solomon held fast to these in love. 3 He had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines, and his wives turned his heart away. AHAB BECOMES UNEQUALLY YOKED TO BAAL WORSHIPING JEZEBEL It came about, as though it had been a trivial thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, that he married Jezebel the daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and went to serve (abad; Lxx - douleuo = enslaved to) Baal and worshiped (shachah; Lxx - proskuneo) him - Ahab clearly disobeys God's warning in Ex 34:16+ and Dt 7:3-4+ by marrying a Sidonian woman. As a result Ahab became a Baal worshiper because his wife Jezebel a devout Baal worshiper. She was obviously influenced by her father Ethbaal (see below). Recall that Solomon also married a Sidonian woman (1Ki 11:1) and look what happened to his heart. Notice that Ahab goes "all in" for Baal, not just worshiping this false god but also becoming a servant of this non-entity! His heart was completely deceived and enraptured by this pagan so-called deity! It is interesting to note that Baal means something like "master," "owner," or "husband." That is fitting for in Ahab's case, Baal became his master and he served and worshiped him! THOUGHT - Watch out for idols! They are not neutral playthings, but they will steal your heart from your first love of Jesus (Rev 2:4-5) and you will end up in bondage to them. And remember idols come in many shapes, sizes and forms. I recently realized watching youtube videos (all the amazing, even shocking political hoopla occurring in Jan-March, 2025) and I began to find myself waking early in the morning (I mean sometimes at 3AM) to grab my Ipad and check the latest youtube news while my Bible sadly lay at my side unopened. I cannot explain how I came to my senses (I didn't, God did). I firmly believe the Spirit of God mercifully convicted me that morning showing me that I was serving and worshiping the news videos on youtube! For almost 2 months I had bowed down to that idol! You may think I am exaggerating but I can attest that over the first few days of youtube fasting I had to fight the temptation to take just a quick peek at the latest news (I call that bondage). On the other hand, I can also affirm that the morning I said it is time to repent and jettison youtube news videos, God's Spirit spoke to me, in of all places, in the book of Leviticus, chapter 1, showing me some beautiful truths I had never seen before! I was ecstatically grateful to Him. All this to say I am beginning to understand the apostle John's last command in First John "Little children, guard (phulasso in the present imperative see our need to depend on the Holy Spirit to obey) yourselves from idols." (1Jn 5:21+) Gotquestions - The king of Israel at the time was Ahab, a weak, self-pitying man who abdicated his authority to his bride, the princess Jezebel. In spite of God’s laws forbidding idolatry and the worship of any god but the Lord, Ahab married this princess who brought to Israel with her hundreds of priests of lewd Baal worship, a cult that tended to destroy manhood and drag womanhood into shame. Jezebel was such a domineering person that she soon became master over her weak husband. One of her first acts was to order the extermination of the prophets of the Lord (1 Kings 18:4, 13) and set up altars to Baal. So pervasive was her idolatrous influence in Israel that Jesus later used her name to refer to a woman who led the church at Thyatira into immorality and the worship of false gods (Revelation 2:20). THOUGHT - Single men out there, be very, very careful about who you choose as a life-partner in the solemn covenant of marriage! (Read 2Co 6:14-18+) Ethbaal means "with Baal" or "Baal is with him." He apparently was both a king and a priest of Baal, reinforcing Baal worship as the state religion in Phoenicia. Josephus (quoting Menander of Ephesus) states that Ethbaal usurped the throne of Tyre around 887 BC by murdering King Pheles. He ruled for about 32 years and expanded Phoenician influence through political alliances, including his daughter's marriage to Ahab. Dilday - “Jezebel’s name may come from a cultic cry used in the worship of Baal meaning ‘Where is Baal?’ Translated into Hebrew the name was also a verbal pun that the Israelites must have relished. Zebel in Hebrew means dung!....Had a secular historian been recording these events, the marriage of Ahab and Jezebel would likely have been applauded as a prudent political move. Both Phoenicia and Israel were being threatened by Syria, and the marriage gave Ahab a powerful military ally at a crucial time (The Preacher's Commentary - Vol. 09: 1 and 2 Kings - Page 14) David