Kings of Israel & Judah

Solomon's son and heir, who threw the kingdom away in a sentence. Asked to ease his father's heavy taxes, he spurned the elders and told Israel he would scourge them with scorpions where Solomon used whips, so ten tribes tore away under Jeroboam. In his fifth year Shishak of Egypt stripped the temple of Solomon's gold.

Rehoboam's son, who reigned only three years. He committed the same sins as his father, yet when he faced Jeroboam's larger army he called on the LORD and won a great victory for Judah.

A reformer whose heart was fully the LORD's all his days. Asa smashed the foreign altars and sacred pillars, and would not spare even his grandmother Maacah: he deposed her as queen mother and burned her obscene idol. His one late failure was buying Aram's help instead of trusting God, and jailing the seer who rebuked him.

A God-seeking king who sent Levites through the towns to teach the Law. Facing a vast coalition, he set singers ahead of his army to praise the LORD, and the enemies turned on each other before a sword was drawn. His weakness was alliance: he bound Judah to wicked Ahab by marriage and nearly died in Ahab's war.

Jehoshaphat's son, who married Athaliah of Ahab's house and walked in the ways of Israel. He killed all his brothers to secure the throne; Elijah sent him a letter of doom, and he died in agony of an incurable disease, unmourned.

A son of Jehoram and Athaliah who reigned a single year, taking his counsel from Ahab's house. Visiting the wounded king of Israel, he was caught in Jehu's purge and killed.

A daughter of Ahab and Jezebel married into Judah, and the one queen ever to rule it. When her son the king died, she massacred the royal heirs and took the throne for six years, never knowing that the infant Joash had been hidden in the temple by his aunt. When he was revealed and crowned, she was dragged out and killed.

Hidden from Athaliah's massacre as a baby and crowned at seven by the priest Jehoiada, Joash did right and restored the temple, as long as Jehoiada lived. After the old priest died he fell to idols and even had Jehoiada's son stoned, and was assassinated by his own officials.

He did right, but not wholeheartedly. After defeating Edom he bafflingly carried home its idols to worship, then picked a fight with Israel and was captured as Jerusalem's wall was broken down. He too died by conspiracy.

Also called Azariah, fifty-two years of building, farming, and a formidable army, as long as he sought God. But strength bred pride: he forced his way into the temple to burn incense, a priest's task alone, and leprosy broke out on his forehead at the altar. He lived apart until he died, the year Isaiah saw the LORD high and lifted up.

Uzziah's son, who did what was right and grew strong because he ordered his ways before God. He built the upper gate of the temple and fortified Judah, though the people continued corruptly.

As faithless as any king of Judah. Ahaz burned his own son as an offering, sacrificed on every high hill, and when he saw a pagan altar in Damascus he had one built to match and pushed the LORD's altar aside. Told by Isaiah to ask God for a sign, he refused, and was given the sign of Immanuel anyway. At last he shut the temple doors.

One of Judah's finest, none trusted the LORD like him. He reopened and cleansed the temple, kept a great Passover, and smashed even the bronze serpent of Moses when it became an idol. When Assyria's Sennacherib besieged Jerusalem, Hezekiah spread the enemy's letter before God, and the angel of the LORD struck down the Assyrian camp. Granted fifteen more years, he unwisely paraded his treasure before Babylon's envoys.

The longest reign in Judah and the darkest. Hezekiah's son rebuilt every high place his father had torn down, set altars to Baal and the stars inside the temple, passed his sons through the fire, practiced sorcery, and filled Jerusalem with innocent blood. Hauled to Babylon in hooks, he humbled himself and God restored him, but the guilt of his reign is what finally sealed Judah's exile.

Manasseh's son, who revived his father's idolatry without his father's late repentance. After two years his own officials assassinated him in the palace, and the people made his young son Josiah king.

Crowned at eight, and the great reformer. When the lost Book of the Law was found during temple repairs, the young king tore his robes and set about tearing down idols across Judah and even Bethel in the north, fulfilling a prophecy three centuries old. He kept the largest Passover since the judges. No king turned to the LORD so wholly, yet he fell at Megiddo, fighting Pharaoh Neco.

Chosen by the people after Josiah fell at Megiddo, he reigned only three months before Pharaoh Neco deposed him, fined Judah heavily, and took him captive to Egypt, where he died.

Set on the throne by Egypt and renamed, Jehoiakim taxed the land heavily and did evil. When Jeremiah's warnings were read to him he cut the scroll to pieces and burned it. He submitted to Babylon, then rebelled, and died as Nebuchadnezzar closed in.

He reigned three months before surrendering Jerusalem to Nebuchadnezzar in the first great deportation, carried to Babylon with the craftsmen and treasures. Decades later a new Babylonian king released him from prison and gave him a seat at his table.

The last king of Judah, installed by Babylon and forever wavering. He ignored Jeremiah and rebelled; after a long siege Jerusalem fell, the temple was burned, and Zedekiah was captured. His sons were killed before his eyes, which were then put out, and he was led to Babylon in chains.