In this enlightening episode, delve into the complexities of historical and biblical narratives that intertwine with modern experiences. The unexpected sound of a London bomb leads to a broader discussion about the motives and meanings behind sustained conflict. Journey back to the divided kingdoms of Israel and Judah and discover why old grievances between kindred nations persist.
The CEM Network is pleased to present Ronald L. Dart and Born to Win.
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I was standing looking at an open window in my hotel room at Victoria Station in London one night. My wife and I had been to the theater, just got back in and opened the window for a little fresh air. I heard a rumble. Now, thunder is uncharacteristic of London weather, and I turned around and remarked to my wife, I hope that’s thunder. It wasn’t. The IRA had set off a bomb two blocks from our hotel in a trash bin along the street. No one was hurt, but you’ll understand it was just a little bit disconcerting. And I can’t help wondering what the IRA realistically hoped to gain in all this. Are they really doing their thing with a goal in mind, or are they like a bunch of Ozark boys turning over outhouses on Halloween? Why do they do it? Because they can, and because they want to be bad. I’m increasingly persuaded that in all too many cases, people who are fighting in wars have long since forgotten what the war is all about. They don’t remember the grievance, or if there is one, they’ve heard about it from their great-great-grandfathers and never in all their lifetime experienced the grievous in question. Of course, one thing war is sometimes about for some people is surviving, and that’s understandable. Why on earth did the Republican Army, the Irish Republican Army, keep on bombing the British? Sure, the British did some bad things to the Irish in generations past, but Ireland is an independent nation now. Why can’t they kiss and make up? There are lives to be lived, jobs to be done, grandchildren to be loved and dandled on knees. And after all, the Irish and the British are brothers. They speak the same language, sort of. You know, when I reflect on this and I look back down through aeons of time to Israel, to the house of Israel and the house of Judah, and I can’t help marveling at the ongoing war between these two nations of brothers. Here we are 24 years after the death of Solomon, 24 years after God told everyone to stop fighting and go home. This division of the kingdom is from me. And the wars between Judah and Israel go on. In the third year of Asa, the king of Judah, began Baasha, the son of Ahijah, to reign over all Israel in Tirzah. He reigned for 24 years. We’re in 1 Kings, chapter 15. This man… Baasha did evil in the sight of the Lord. He walked in the way of Jeroboam and in his sin wherewith he made Israel to sin. And as you read your way through Kings, it becomes almost tiresome as King after King after King is condemned for walking in the way of Jeroboam and in his sin wherewith he made Israel to sin. I can almost hear those words in my sleep because I have read through this so many times in teaching a class in Old Testament survey. This man reigned until about year 48 of the divided kingdom. From the death of Solomon is what we’re looking at as our dividing point. The beginning of the divided kingdom. There was war the whole time. 48 years. Now God steps up and takes a hand. He comes to a prophet named Jehu, the son of Hanani, and he has a prophecy against Baasha, saying, “…forasmuch as I exalted you out of the dirt.” And I made you prince over my people Israel. And you have still walked in the way of Jeroboam and have made my people Israel to sin, to provoke me to anger with their sins. There it is again. Now, here’s my question. What actually was it that Baasha, Jeroboam, and Nadab before him made Israel do? Well, they caused them to worship two golden calves. They changed the holy days of God away from what they were before. They set up worship in different locations from the temple. They turned the hearts of the people away from God. I don’t know that they put up border guards to keep them from going to Jerusalem, but they did everything in their power to dissuade them. Why? Well, it started because Jeroboam was simply afraid that if the people kept going back down to Jerusalem to the temple the three times in a year for the annual holy days, that they would eventually, their hearts would turn back to the king of Judah, they’d kill him, and that would be that. Well, here we are at a long time later, and the people are still worshiping those golden calves. Behold, God says, I will take away the posterity of Baasha. I’ll take away the posterity of his house. I will make your house like the house of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat. Him that dies of Baasha in the city shall the dogs eat. Him that dies of his in the field shall the fowls of the air eat. Which is a reiteration of the curse originally pronounced on Jeroboam. And there is this thing where God says, I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation of them that hate me. Funny thing about this, and I’ll pause to just explain this to you. It isn’t that God will because your great-great-granddaddy did something bad and you’ve lived your life just fine that God’s going to curse you for what he did. No, that’s not the way it works. It’s in the third or fourth generation of them that hate God that all this comes down on their head. Now the rest of the acts of Baasha and what he did and his might, they’re all written in the book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. So Baasha slept with his fathers and was buried in Tirzah. Eli, his son, reigned in his stead. In the 26th year of Asa, the king of Judah, began Elah, the son of Baasha, to reign over Israel and Tirzah. He reigned for two years. Not very long. His servant, Zimri, who was a captain of half his chariots. You know, if you have a standing army, you’ve got two major divisions. This is one of your major division commanders. His name is Zimri. He conspired against Elah. as he was in Tirzah, drinking himself drunk in the house of Arzah, steward of his house. And Zimri went in and smote him and killed him in the twenty-seventh year of Asa, king of Judah. And he reigned in his stead. We are now about year 47 to 48 of all the years since the divided kingdom. If you’re keeping track, you’re probably going to notice that things don’t add up. The reason is fairly simple. If a king reigned 18 months, it was sometimes counted as two years. Let’s say the king after him reigned five years, but not really. It was actually, say, four years and six months. That may have been counted as five years. And so over time, you have quite a bit of slack and taking up of slack in the reigns of kings. Fortunately, we do have landmarks, and since we know pretty closely when Asa’s long reign began, the account uses him as the benchmark to bring us back into line. It’s really only important to give us a rough idea of the passage of time. We’re only 47 to 48 years in the history of the house of Israel, and already kings are being assassinated by their servants. I bring the years in simply so that you can say, okay, I’ll take this year, I’ll subtract 48 from it. What year does that put me in? If you’re looking back from our own time. And the purpose of that is simply so you’ll get a feeling for the passage of time. Where was I 48 years ago? Well, I know for many of my listeners, they weren’t even born yet, but your grandfather was. And what was going on in his world at that time? And how short a period of time is 48 years in one way and how long in another way of all the things that could happen? I think Zimri was the first assassin of Israelite royalty. For me, he will become something of a proverb. I’ll explain later. But for now, be sure and remember Zimri, who killed his master. Will this power play work for him? Well, it came to pass, as soon as he sat on his throne, that he killed all the house of Baasha. Once again, a man is taking counsel of his fears. He figures if he leaves any man alive in the whole house of Baasha, That man will become a threat to him, even if he’s a child, as he grows up. And that’s the way it was in the ancient world. You read through the history of the kings of England, and you find a lot of this sort of thing as well. People worried about a possible accession to the throne, so they kill the heir. This is what Zimri did to destroy all the house of Baasha. And, of course, he fulfilled the word of God against Baasha that Jehu the prophet had brought. because of all the sins of Baasha, the sins of Elah his son, by which they sinned and by which they made Israel to sin in provoking the Lord God of Israel with their vanities, their stupid, vain gods that they did, and they just continually stuck the branch in the nose of God with it. Now the rest of the acts of Elah and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the Chronicles of the kings of Israel? In the twenty-seventh year of Asa king of Judah, Zimri reigned seven days in Tirzah. Seven days this man held the power of the throne. He found not one day of peace, this man who slew his master. The people were encamped against him in Gibbethon, which belongs to the Philistines. And all of them there heard say, Zimri has conspired. There’s a conspiracy. He has slain the king. So all Israel made Omri, who was the captain of the host, who would have been the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, as it were. They made him king over Israel that day in the camp. And Omri went up from Gibbethon and all Israel with him, and they besieged Tirzah. It came to pass when Zimri saw that the city was taken, he went into the palace of the king’s house and burnt the king’s house over him with fire and died for his sins, which he sinned in doing evil in the sight of the Lord and walking in the way of Jeroboam and in his sin, which he did to make Israel to sin. All of the iniquity of the house of Israel comes back to Jeroboam, comes on his head, and even now we are finding men dying who will not forsake that way. This poor guy, Zimri, who killed his master, burned his palace down around his own head. Now the rest of the acts of Zimri and his treason that he wrought Are they not written in the book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel? The story continues. Stay with me, but first grab a pencil and a piece of paper. I want to give you some information.
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Now we are presented with a strange picture. First of all, we had the rebellion of Jeroboam originally that separated Israel into two kingdoms, north and south, the house of Israel, the house of Judah. And now, because of the assassination of Zimri’s master and Zimri’s being killed in this first battle seven days into his magnificent reign… Now we have Israel divided in Israel, the house of Israel, divided into two camps. Half the people followed Tibni, the son of Ginnath, to make him king, and half followed Omri. But the people that followed Omri won out against the others. Tibni died, and Omri reigned. In the 31st year of Asa, the king of Judah… 31st year, that’s add the 20 when he started, and you’re up to 51. So, in the 51st year of the divided kingdom, Omri began to reign over Israel. 12 years, 6 years reigned he in Tirzah. Now, this will be a matter of small importance to most readers. But why the 12 years and the 6 years? It’s a confusing thing, and it presents a chronological problem that we’re going to come to in a moment. You might just keep that in the back of your mind, and we’ll come back to it. Omri bought the hill in Samaria of Shemer for two talents of silver and built on the hill and called the name of the city he built after the name of Shemer, the owner of the hill, Samaria. Samaria plays very large in the history of the Bible, all the way down to the New Testament, even to some of the struggles that went on between the Jews and the Samaritans of Jesus’ day. Omri is the man who built that city. But, as time would have it, Omri wrought evil in the eyes of the Lord and did worse than everyone who came before him. He walked in all the way of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, and in his sin wherewith he made Israel to sin, to provoke the Lord of God of Israel to anger with their vanities. It just goes on and on, and we’re in a downhill slide, it seems, all the way, each one becoming worse than the one before him. Now the rest of the acts of Omri which he did and his might that he showed were Are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel? So Omri slept with his fathers and was buried in Samaria, and Ahab his son reigned in his stead. Old Asa The good king of Judah down south is still soldiering on. Now, miles to his north in the city of Samaria, comes the worst of the worst of the kings of Israel and Judah. His name is Ahab. In the 38th year of Asa, the king of Judah began Ahab, the son of Omri, to reign over Israel. Ahab reigned over Israel in Samaria twenty-two years. Now here we come back to the question of chronology, and if you happen to be making your own chart, you’ll stumble over this one. The 38th year of Asa, as the year of the death of Omri, presents a problem. This is only six years from the beginning of Omri’s reign, not twelve, as was mentioned earlier. Commentaries scratch their head over this and come up with various solutions. I’ll leave it to you to see if you can sort it out if it seems important to you. It’s just a footnote to the story, so we’ll go on. I’ll just say it may have something to do with the rival king that Omri had to contend with. But beyond that, it may be a problem of the text of the Bible. It may be a problem of the way we understand the history of the time. God really only knows. Continuing in 1 Kings 16, verse 30. Ahab, the son of Omri, did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him. It just keeps on going downhill. It came to pass as if all that wasn’t enough. If it was a light thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, he took two wives, Jezebel. Now, this really is enough to give anyone pause. How in the world anyone could be so bad? Any woman could be so bad that she coming on top of everything else makes it all that much worse. And I can’t for the life of me figure out why any woman would ever name her daughter Jezebel after this. But he took to wife Jezebel, the daughter of Ethbaal, king of the Zidonians, and went and served Baal and worshipped him. Now, I don’t think it was altogether that Jezebel was so bad, although she was bad enough. It was the fact that in marrying her, he charged off after the worship of Baal. He reared up an altar for Baal in the house of Baal that he had built in Samaria, and Ahab made a grove. Now, at that point, I’m reading in the King James Bible. By the way, for those of you who are planning on asking, what translation of the Bible are you working with? I work with the King James Version of the Bible. If it doesn’t sound quite right to you, it’s because I do my own paraphrase of the King James Bible as I go. But this word, grove, funny thing about this. The NIV renders it an Asherah pole. He went on and made an Asherah pole. Now, Asherah was the dominant female goddess of nearly the whole known world at that time. It’s an odd thing to think about, but consider this. All the nations around Israel had different male gods. Baal, the storm god, Dagon, the fish god, Moloch, to whom people burned their children in the fire. All these gods, every nation had their own gods. And they looked at Israel, and they considered that Jehovah was the god of Israel. But all these gods had consorts, or a consort, who was commonly called Asherah, Ashtaroth, or Astarteh. And it really is amazing in a way that while they all had the separate male god, they all had one thing in common, a goddess who had the same name as all the rest. I guess they figured even the gods need a wife. And for some reason, they all chose the same one. Any museum featuring things from the Middle East will have at least one of these Asherah images, usually made of clay. It will be a nude female form, cupping her breasts in her hands as if she is providing milk for the whole world. And one of the most common finds in archaeological sites. And apparently they were found in most homes as a fertility symbol. There was an article in Biblical Archaeology Review some time ago titled, Yahweh and His Consort. You’ll be surprised if you look on the Internet the number of references to Yahweh and his consort you’re going to find. It appears to me that since the common belief was that since all the gods around Israel had Astarte for a consort, then the Israelites assumed, well, their god must have had one as well. God is not amused by the Asherah all over the landscape in Israel, and they come up again and again and again in the prophets. One word, though, about God’s name. It is spoken of often as Yahweh by scholars these days, and of course you see it in the King James Bible as Jehovah on the very rare occasion when it’s used. Actually, in the Hebrew, it is a combination of consonants only. They are roughly Y-H-W-H, with no intervening vowels. The vowels must be supplied. What has been done in some cases, I think in the case of the King James Version, is they take the vowel points of the word Adonai, or Lord, insert them into the four letters, Yahweh or Yehovah, and they come up with Yehovah, because the J that we see in our Bibles is pronounced Y in all of the ancient languages like this. So it would have not been Jehovah, it would have been Yehovah. Now, you’ll just have to keep that in the back of your mind. It’s important also to know as you read through your Bible, anytime you see that uppercase Lord in the Bible, it is the divine name. You can pronounce it Yahweh, you can pronounce it Jehovah, if you prefer. But it does, in some cases… bring up additional understanding of what it is you’re reading because it focuses on the fact that God has an identity. He is personal. 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I’m constantly fascinated by the importance of leadership to a people. I keep thinking about this poor guy out there with his wife and his six children, plowing the ground, raising his animals, taking the wool from his sheep and his wife weaving thread and yarn and making clothes for the kids. And I think, what was his life like and how much worse did it get because of these stupid people who were leading his country? Ahab, we’re told, did more to provoke Jehovah, the God of Israel, to anger than all the kings of Israel that were before him. Now, it’s interesting to me, and this is a small point. I wouldn’t want to make too much of it, but it doesn’t say than any of the kings. It says than all of the kings, and the impression you get… As you read through this account, it’s almost as though he took the whole bag of all the bad stuff everybody did before, put it all in one place, and then added at least that much again to it. This was a singularly evil man. There’s a parenthetical note at this time. It’s just tossed in here for whatever reason. In the days of Ahab, a man named Hiel… built Jericho. He laid the foundation thereof in Abiram his firstborn, and set up the gates thereof in his youngest son Segub, according to the word of the Lord that he spoke by Joshua the son of Nun. Some commentators say that what this meant was he actually sealed up his firstborn son in the foundation, and even then sealed up his youngest son in the gates. It’s a horrible thing to consider, but that sort of thing was done in the ancient world. We’re entering a very bad time in history, a very bad time in Israel’s history and even the stuff going on around them, as is witnessed from Jericho. They have proceeded downhill from the beginning, every king seeming to get worse and worse. Why? How come there was never a time when some of these people turned around and went the other way for a while? They did in Judah. Well, because they forsook the God who gave them the kingdom in the first place. They turned away from his worship. They substituted their own worship, their own gods, and they ruled their God out of their lives. If Ahab was the worst of a bad lot of kings, that may explain why it was in his reign that that the archetype of all prophets arrives on the scene. You know this fellow. His name is Elijah. Elijah is no windbag. He’s a man of few words. We will learn that he was a hairy man, that he wore leather. I can see him riding into town on a Harley Davidson motorcycle. But he wouldn’t have been in a gang. He would have been by himself. I have a theory about prophets. I call them God’s toolbox. When God has a job to be done, he reaches down into his box of tools and picks one that fits the job. Sometimes it’s important that the appearance, the style, the manner of the prophet fits the message he came to bring. Elijah, he didn’t say very much, but I gather he looked intimidating. He was austere. He was plainly, you read in his words, abrasive. No smooth man, this, and no smooth words. Only the words that were needed. In 1 Kings 17, it begins by telling us this. Elijah the Tishbite, who was of the inhabitants of Gilead, said to Ahab, As Jehovah God of Israel lives, before whom I stand, there shall not be dew nor rain these years, but according to my word. He spoke one sentence, and then he disappeared for three and a half years. And I’ll tell you what spoke even louder than his words. It was the fact that for three and a half years, it never rained.
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