King James Version · The divided kingdom
2 Chronicles 14
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So slept with his fathers, and they in : and his son reigned in his stead. In his days the land was quiet ten years. And did that which was good and right in the eyes of his : For he took away the of the strange gods, and the , and brake down the , and cut down the groves: And commanded Judah to seek of their fathers, and to do and the . Also he took away out of all the cities of Judah the and the : and was quiet before him. And he built fenced cities in Judah: for the land had rest, and he had no war in those years; because had given him rest. Therefore he said unto Judah, Let us build these cities, and make about them walls, and towers, , and bars, while the land is yet before us; because we have sought our , we have sought him, and he hath given us rest on every side. So they built and prospered. And had an army of men that targets and spears, out of Judah three hundred thousand; and out of , that shields and drew bows, two hundred and fourscore thousand: all these were of valour. And there came out against them Zerah the with an host of a thousand thousand, and three hundred chariots; and came unto . Then went out against him, and they set the battle in array in the valley of Zephathah at . And cried unto his , and said, , it is nothing with thee to help, whether with many, or with them that have no : help us, O our ; for we rest on thee, and in thy name we go against this multitude. O , thou art our ; let not man prevail against thee. So smote the before , and before Judah; and the fled. And and the people that were with him pursued them unto : and the were overthrown, that they could not recover themselves; for they were destroyed before , and before his host; and they very much spoil. And they smote all the cities round about ; for the came upon them: and they spoiled all the cities; for there was exceeding much spoil in them. They smote also the tents of cattle, and sheep and camels in abundance, and returned to .
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.