King James Version · The divided kingdom
1 Kings 21
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And it came to pass after these things, that the Jezreelite had a , which was in , hard by the palace of king of . And spake unto , saying, Give me thy , that I may have it for a garden of herbs, because it is near unto my house: and I will give thee for it a better than it; or, if it seem good to thee, I will give thee the worth of it in money. And said to , forbid it me, that I should give the of my fathers unto thee. And came into his house heavy and displeased because of the word which the Jezreelite had spoken to him: for he had said, I will not give thee the of my fathers. And he laid him down upon his bed, and turned away , and would eat . But his wife came to him, and said unto him, Why is thy so sad, that thou eatest ? And he said unto her, Because I spake unto the Jezreelite, and said unto him, Give me thy for money; or else, if it please thee, I will give thee another for it: and he answered, I will not give thee my . And his wife said unto him, Dost thou now govern of Israel? arise, and eat bread, and let thine be merry: I will give thee the of the Jezreelite. So she wrote letters in ’s name, and sealed them with his seal, and sent the letters unto the and to the nobles that were in his city, dwelling with . And she wrote in the letters, saying, Proclaim a , and set on high among the people: And set two men, sons of Belial, before him, to bear against him, saying, Thou didst blaspheme and the king. And then carry him out, and stone him, that he may . And the men of his city, even the and the nobles who were the inhabitants in his city, did as had sent unto them, and as it was written in the letters which she had sent unto them. They proclaimed a , and set on high among the people. And there came in two men, children of Belial, and sat before him: and the men of Belial witnessed against him, even against , in the of the people, saying, did blaspheme and the king. Then they carried him forth out of the city, and stoned him with stones, that he . Then they sent to , saying, is stoned, and is . And it came to pass, when heard that was stoned, and was , that said to , Arise, take possession of the of the Jezreelite, which he refused to give thee for money: for is not alive, but . And it came to pass, when heard that was , that rose up to go down to the of the Jezreelite, to take possession of it. And to the Tishbite, saying, Arise, go down to meet king of Israel, which is in : behold, he is in the of , whither he is gone down to possess it. And thou shalt speak unto him, saying, Thus saith , Hast thou killed, and also taken possession? And thou shalt speak unto him, saying, Thus saith , In the place where dogs licked of shall dogs lick thy , even thine. And said to , Hast thou found me, O mine enemy? And he answered, I have found thee: because thou hast sold thyself to work evil in the sight of . Behold, I will bring evil upon thee, and will take away thy posterity, and will him that pisseth against the wall, and him that is shut up and left in Israel, And will make thine house like the house of the son of , and like the house of the son of , for the provocation wherewith thou hast provoked me to , and made Israel to . And of also spake , saying, The dogs shall eat by the wall of . Him that dieth of in the city the dogs shall eat; and him that dieth in the field shall the fowls of the air eat. But there was none like unto , which did sell himself to work wickedness in the sight of , whom his wife stirred up. And he did very abominably in following idols, according to all things as did the , whom cast out before the . And it came to pass, when heard those words, that he rent his clothes, and put upon his , and , and lay in , and went softly. 28And to the Tishbite, saying, Seest thou how humbleth himself before me? because he humbleth himself before me, I will not bring the evil in his days: but in his son’s days will I bring the evil upon his house.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · The divided kingdom, 931 BC to 745 BC ›
Israel in the north and Judah in the south, often at odds, with Aram of Damascus as the immediate threat and Assyria growing in the distance.
- Aram of Damascus
- The immediate enemy for most of two centuries, close enough to raid every campaigning season and strong enough to take territory. Most of the wars in Kings that read like national emergencies are border wars with Damascus.
- Assyria
- Growing steadily in the distance. Shalmaneser III fights a coalition at Qarqar in 853 BC and his own inscription lists King Ahab of Israel among his opponents with two thousand chariots, the earliest Assyrian mention of an Israelite king. A later monument shows Jehu bowing and paying tribute. Assyria is not yet the destroyer, but it is already taking notes.
- Egypt
- Divided and unreliable, capable of the occasional raid, such as Shishak stripping the temple in Rehoboam's fifth year, but no longer an empire that governs the Levant.
- Further afield
- The Greeks adopt the alphabet, hold the first Olympiad by tradition in 776 BC, and begin to compose the Homeric poems. Rome is founded by tradition in 753 BC, a village of huts at this point. This is the century in which the classical world begins.