King James Version · The divided kingdom
2 Kings 10
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And had seventy sons in . And wrote letters, and sent to , unto the of , to the , and to them that brought up ’s children, saying, Now as soon as this letter cometh to you, seeing your master’s sons are with you, and there are with you chariots and horses, a fenced city also, and armour; Look even out the best and meetest of your master’s sons, and set him on his ’s , and fight for your master’s house. But they were exceedingly afraid, and said, Behold, two kings stood not before him: how then shall we stand? And he that was over the house, and he that was over the city, the also, and the bringers up of the children, sent to , saying, We are thy servants, and will do all that thou shalt bid us; we will not make any king: do thou that which is good in thine eyes. Then he wrote a letter the second time to them, saying, If ye be mine, and if ye will unto my voice, take ye the heads of the men your master’s sons, and come to me to by to morrow this time. Now the king’s sons, being seventy persons, were with the great men of the city, which brought them up. And it came to pass, when the letter came to them, that they took the king’s sons, and slew seventy persons, and put their heads in baskets, and sent him them to . And there came a , and told him, saying, They have brought the heads of the king’s sons. And he said, Lay ye them in two heaps at the entering in of the until the morning. And it came to pass in the morning, that he went out, and stood, and said to all the people, Ye be : behold, I conspired against my master, and slew him: but who slew all these? Know now that there shall fall unto the earth nothing of the word of , which spake concerning the house of : for hath done that which he spake by his servant . So slew all that remained of the house of in , and all his great men, and his kinsfolks, and his priests, until he left him none remaining. 12And he arose and departed, and came to . And as he was at the shearing house in , met with the brethren of king of Judah, and said, Who are ye? And they answered, We are the brethren of ; and we go down to salute the children of the king and the children of the queen. And he said, Take them alive. And they took them alive, and slew them at of the shearing house, even two and forty men; neither left he any of them. And when he was departed thence, he lighted on the son of coming to meet him: and he saluted him, and said to him, Is thine right, as is with thy ? And answered, It is. If it be, give me thine hand. And he gave him his hand; and he took him up to him into the chariot. And he said, Come with me, and see my for . So they made him ride in his chariot. And when he came to , he slew all that remained unto in , till he had destroyed him, according to the saying of , which he spake to . And gathered all the people together, and said unto them, a little; but shall him much. Now therefore call unto me all of , all his servants, and all his priests; let none be wanting: for I have a great to do to ; whosoever shall be wanting, he shall not live. But did it in subtilty, to the intent that he might destroy the worshippers of . And said, Proclaim a solemn for . And they proclaimed it. And sent through all Israel: and all the worshippers of came, so that there was not a man left that came not. And they came into the house of ; and the house of was full from one end to another. And he said unto him that was over the vestry, Bring forth vestments for all the worshippers of . And he brought them forth vestments. And went, and the son of , into the house of , and said unto the worshippers of , Search, and look that there be here with you none of the servants of , but the worshippers of only. And when they went in to offer and burnt offerings, appointed fourscore men without, and said, If any of the men whom I have brought into your hands escape, he that letteth him go, his life shall be for the life of him. And it came to pass, as soon as he had made an end of the burnt offering, that said to the guard and to the captains, Go in, and them; let none come forth. And they smote them with the edge of ; and the guard and the captains cast them out, and went to the city of the house of . And they brought forth the out of the house of , and burned them. And they brake down the of , and brake down the house of , and made it a draught house unto this day. 28Thus destroyed out of Israel. Howbeit from the of the son of , who made Israel to , departed not from after them, to wit, the golden calves that were in Beth–el, and that were in Dan. And said unto , Because thou hast done well in executing that which is right in mine eyes, and hast done unto the house of according to all that was in mine , thy children of the fourth generation shall sit on of Israel. But took no heed to walk in of of Israel with all : for he departed not from the of , which made Israel to . In those days began to cut Israel short: and smote them in all the coasts of Israel; From Jordan eastward, all the land of , the , and the , and the , from , which is by the river , even and . Now the rest of the acts of , and all that he did, and all his might, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel? And slept with his fathers: and they in . And his son reigned in his stead. 36And the time that reigned over Israel in was twenty and eight years.
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.