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3. Jehoshaphat took for
his son Jehoram to wife the daughter of Ahab, the king of the ten tribes, whose
name was Athaliah. And when, after some time, he went to Samaria, Ahab received
him courteously, and treated the army that followed him in a splendid manner,
with great plenty of corn and wine, and of slain beasts; and desired that he
would join with him in his war against the king of Syria, that he might recover
from him the city Ramoth, in Gilead; for though it had belonged to his father,
yet had the king of Syria's father taken it away from him; and upon
Jehoshaphat's promise to afford him his assistance, (for indeed his army was
not inferior to the other,) and his sending for his army from Jerusalem to
Samaria, the two kings went out of the city, and each of them sat on his own
throne, and each gave their orders to their several armies. Now Jehoshaphat bid
them call some of the prophets, if there were any there, and inquire of them
concerning this expedition against the king of Syria, whether they would give
them counsel to make that expedition at this time, for there was peace at that
time between Ahab and the king of Syria, which had lasted three years, from the
time he had taken him captive till that day.
4. So Ahab called his
own prophets, being in number about four hundred, and bid them inquire of God
whether he would grant him the victory, if he made an expedition against
Benhadad, and enable him to overthrow that city, for whose sake it was that he
was going to war. Now these prophets gave their counsel for making this
expedition, and said that he would beat the king of Syria, and, as formerly,
would reduce him under his power. But Jehoshaphat, understanding by their words
that they were false prophets, asked Ahab whether there were not some other
prophet, and he belonging to the true God, that we may have surer information
concerning futurities. Hereupon Ahab said there was indeed such a one, but that
he hated him, as having prophesied evil to him, and having foretold that he
should be overcome and slain by the king of Syria, and that for this cause he
had him now in prison, and that his name was Micaiah, the son of Imlah.
But upon Jehoshaphat's desire
that he might be produced, Ahab sent a eunuch, who brought Micaiah to him. Now
the eunuch had informed him by the way, that all the other prophets had
foretold that the king should gain the victory; but he said, that it was not
lawful for him to lie against God, but that he must speak what he should say to
him about the king, whatsoever it were. When he came to Ahab, and he had
adjured him upon oath to speak the truth to him, he said that God had shown to
him the Israelites running away, and pursued by the Syrians, and dispersed upon
the mountains by them, as flocks of sheep are dispersed when their shepherd is
slain. He said further, that God signified to him, that those Israelites should
return :in peace to their own home, and that he only should fall in the battle.
When Micalab had thus spoken, Ahab said to Jehoshaphat,
"I told thee a little while ago the disposition of the
man with regard to me, and that he uses to prophesy evil to me."
Upon which Micaiah replied,
that he ought to hear all, whatsoever it be, that God foretells; and that in
particular, they were false prophets that encouraged him to make this war in
hope of victory, whereas he must fight and be killed. Whereupon the king was in
suspense with himself: but Zedekiah, one of those false prophets, came near,
and exhorted him not to hearken to Micaiah, for he did not at all speak truth;
as a demonstration of which he instanced in what Elijah had said, who was a
better prophet in foretelling futurities than Micaiah (43) for he foretold that the dogs should lick his blood in
the city of Jezreel, in the field of Naboth, as they licked the blood of
Naboth, who by his means was there stoned to death by the multitude; that
therefore it was plain that this Micalab was a liar, as contradicting a greater
prophet than himself, and saying that he should be slain at three days' journey
distance:
"and [said he] you
shall soon know whether he be a true prophet, and hath the power of the Divine
Spirit; for I will smite him, and let him then hurt my hand, as Jadon caused
the hand of Jeroboam the king to wither when he would have caught him; for I
suppose thou hast certainly heard of that accident."
So when, upon his smiting
Micaiah, no harm happened to him, Ahab took courage, and readily led his army
against the king of Syria; for, as I suppose, fate was too hard for him, and
made him believe that the false prophets spake truer than the true one, that it
might take an occasion of bringing him to his end. However, Zedekiah made horns
of iron, and said to Ahab, that God made those horns signals, that by them he
should overthrow all Syria. But Micaiah replied, that Zedekiah, in a few days,
should go from one secret chamber to another to hide himself, that he might
escape the punishment of his lying. Then did the king give orders that they
should take Micaiah away, and guard him to Amon, the governor of the city, and
to give him nothing but bread and water.
5. Then did Ahab, and
Jehoshaphat the king of Jerusalem, take their forces, and marched to Ramoth a
city of Gilead; and when the king of Syria heard of this expedition, he brought
out his army to oppose them, and pitched his camp not far from Ramoth. Now
Ahalx and Jehoshaphat had agreed that Ahab should lay aside his royal robes,
but that the king of Jerusalem should put on his [Ahab's] proper habit, and
stand before the army, in order to disprove, by this artifice, what Micaiah had
foretold. (44)But Ahab's fate found
him out without his robes; for Benhadad, the king of Assyria, had charged his
army, by the means of their commanders, to kill nobody else but only the king
of Israel. So when the Syrians, upon their joining battle with the Israelites,
saw Jehoshaphat stand before the army, and conjectured that he was Ahab, they
fell violently upon him, and encompassed him round; but when they were near,
and knew that it was not he, they all returned back; and while the fight lasted
from the morning till late in the evening, and the Syrians were conquerors,
they killed nobody, as their king had commanded them. And when they sought to
kill Ahab alone, but could not find him, there was a young nobleman belonging
to king Benhadad, whose name was Naaman; he drew his bow against the enemy, and
wounded the king through his breastplate, in his lungs. Upon this Ahab resolved
not to make his mischance known to his army, lest they should run away; but he
bid the driver of his chariot to turn it back, and carry him out of the battle,
because he was sorely and mortally wounded. However, he sat in his chariot and
endured the pain till sunset, and then he fainted away and died.
6. And now the Syrian
army, upon the coming on of the night, retired to their camp; and when the
herald belonging to the camp gave notice that Ahab was dead, they returned
home; and they took the dead body of Ahab to Samaria, and buried it there; but
when they had washed his chariot in the fountain of Jezreel, which was bloody
with the dead body of the king, they acknowledged that the prophecy of Elijah
was true, for the dogs licked his blood, and the harlots continued afterwards
to wash themselves in that fountain; but still he died at Ramoth, as Micaiah
had foretold. And as what things were foretold should happen to Ahab by the two
prophets came to pass, we ought thence to have high notions of God, and every
where to honor and worship him, and never to suppose that what is pleasant and
agreeable is worthy of belief before what is true, and to esteem nothing more
advantageous than the gift of prophecy (45) and that foreknowledge of future events which is derived
from it, since God shows men thereby what we ought to avoid. We may also guess,
from what happened to this king, and have reason to consider the power of fate;
that there is no way of avoiding it, even when we know it. It creeps upon human
souls, and flatters them with pleasing hopes, till it leads them about to the
place where it will be too hard for them. Accordingly Ahab appears to have been
deceived thereby, till he disbelieved those that foretold his defeat; but, by
giving credit to such as foretold what was grateful to him, was slain; and his
son Ahaziah succeeded him.
Footnotes
(43) These reasonings of Zedekiah the false prophet, in order
to persuade Ahab not to believe Micaiah the true prophet, are plausible; but
being omitted in our other copies, we cannot now tell whence Josephus had them,
whether from his own temple copy, from some other original author, or from
certain ancient notes. That some such plausible objection was now raised
against Micaiah is very likely, otherwise Jehoshaphat, who used to disbelieve
all such false prophets, could never have been induced to accompany Ahab in
these desperate circumstances.
(44) This reading of Josephus, that Jehoshaphat put on not
his own, but Ahab's robes, in order to appear to be Ahab, while Ahab was
without any robes at all, and hoped thereby to escape his own evil fate, and
disprove Micaiah's prophecy against him, is exceeding probable. It gives great
light also to this whole history; and shows, that although Ahab hoped
Jehoshaphat would he mistaken for him, and run the only risk of being slain in
the battle, yet he was entirely disappointed, while still the escape of the
good man Jehoshaphat, and the slaughter of the bad man Ahab, demonstrated the
great distinction that Divine providence made betwixt them.
(45)We have here a very wise reflection of Josephus about
Divine Providence, and what is derived from it, prophecy, and the
inevitable certainty of its accomplishment; and that when wicked men think they
take proper methods to elude what is denounced against them, and to escape the
Divine judgments thereby threatened them, without repentance, they are ever by
Providence infatuated to bring about their own destruction, and thereby withal
to demonstrate the perfect veracity of that God whose predictions they in vain
endeavored to elude.
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