In the fifteenth year of Amaziah the son of Joash, king of Judah, Jeroboam the son of Joash, king of Israel, began to reign in Samaria, for forty-one years.
Jeroboam II takes Israel's throne and holds it longer than any other king of the north. The record's verdict on him is short: he did evil. So why did God give him forty-one years and wide success?
This king stands in a line of rulers and follows his father Joash. His character and the length of his reign do not match.
Jeroboam, king of Israel, the third successor of Jehu, succeeds Joash, his father. "He did evil in the sight of Jehovah: he did not depart from any of the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin" (v. 24). Nonetheless his reign lasted forty-one years! You might think that God always cut off kings at once when their conduct dishonoured Him. This history gives several examples. Such is the case with Zechariah, the son of this same Jeroboam (2 Kings 15:8), but it is not so here. God has other ways, and He knows how to bring them in line with His longsuffering and His mercy.
The forty-one years were not a reward. Commentators trace the growth and success of this reign to a rescue God had already promised, and to a covenant made with Israel's forefathers.
The increase of Israel's territory under Jeroboam II was considerable; his prosperity in this way corresponding with his name — whose people is many… "The sea of the plain" was the Dead Sea, making the total distance of his kingdom, north and south, almost two hundred miles… He was, no doubt, the "savior" promised under the unfortunate reign of Jehoahaz (2 Kings 13:5)… This was not for any goodness that He saw in them or Jeroboam their king, but "because of His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob" (2 Kings 13:23).
Israel's suffering, not the king's merit, set the direction.
His pity for Israel's oppressed condition guides His ways in Jeroboam's reign… God raises up a saviour for this people in the person of this king who had brought God's displeasure on himself, just as He had done before with Joash his father (2 Kings 13:5).
Length and wealth are not the same as health. This was Israel's strongest stretch, and the trouble lay underneath.
The reign of this second Jeroboam was longer than that of any other king of Israel. Outwardly it was a time of prosperity, but there were deep-rooted problems.
Two prophets worked in these years, and one of them was ordered out of the country.
Israel was blessed with the ministries of both Hosea and Amos during Jeroboam's reign. Their writings make it clear: there was political revival under his rule, but no real moral or spiritual awakening among the people. People saw Amos as a troublemaker who disturbed the peace of the kingdom. Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, told him to flee away to the land of Judah, and "eat bread there, and prophesy there," as if God's prophet were only in it for the money, like himself.
Jonah served as a prophet in these same years. What he said to Israel matched neither their record nor their deserving.
Jonah prophesied about the time of Jeroboam II, king of Israel. He was the witness that "mercy triumphs over judgment." He foretold gracious things for Israel, though the people were still guilty and rebellious.
Amos, a prophet of the same years, read the prosperity differently. He pointed to the borders Jeroboam had won and said an invader would sweep along them.
The prophet Amos, who prophesied in the same period, announced to the house of Israel that Jeroboam's conquests would not last. The Assyrian would take them away. "I will raise up against you a nation, O house of Israel," declares the LORD, the God of hosts, "and they shall oppress you from Lebo-hamath to the Brook of the Arabah" (Amos 6:14)… Jeroboam had put far away "the day of disaster" (Amos 6:3) by taking back Israel's borders as far as Hamath the great and the sea of the plain. Look, says Amos, that day is near.
- Cause. God's longsuffering gave him forty-one years, not God's approval. The record that gives him the throne also says he never left the sins of the first Jeroboam.
- Covenant. The mercy behind the reign rested on God's promise to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. It rested on no goodness in the king or the nation.
- Reach. His name meant whose people is many, and his borders matched it. No king of the north ever reigned longer.
- Warning. Political revival is not spiritual revival. Hosea and Amos preached through these very years, and a priest ordered Amos out of the country.
- Result. The recovered border became the line of Israel's ruin. Amos warned that the Assyrian would take back everything Jeroboam had won.
And he did evil in the sight of Jehovah he departed not from any of the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin.
Jeroboam II ruled Israel for forty-one years — the longest and richest reign the northern kingdom ever had. Yet this verse sums the whole of it up as evil, which raises the question of why God let it run so long.
The words here are not written fresh for Jeroboam II. They are a refrain, and one commentator sets it beside the matching refrain used of Judah's kings:
Apart from the two exceptions already mentioned, this phrase "Nevertheless, the high places were not taken away" runs like a refrain through the history of the faithful kings of Judah. Another refrain marks the kings of Israel: "He did not depart from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, which he made Israel to sin." These kings followed the head of their royal house in religious matters, and he was an idolater... But it is always very dangerous to settle into a system that does not seek the mind of God as its source. That stays true even when the system boasts of great antiquity.
The sins named here belong to an earlier king, Jeroboam the son of Nebat. One writer describes how he chose them, and how people still defend the choice:
Instead of asking God, we read that Jeroboam "took counsel" — clearly of men. The result was the setting up of the two golden calves. One stood at Dan, in the far north. The other stood at Bethel, as a challenge to the God of Jacob. Centuries before, Jacob had declared about that place: "This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven." ... Some have argued that Jeroboam was really worshipping the LORD, but with the help of visible images. People urge this today to excuse blatant idolatry. The Bible does not support it. It says plainly: "then this thing became a sin." God does not need an image to enable people to worship Him.
That choice outlived its maker. Another writer traces where it ended:
The idolatry of Jeroboam stayed with Israel until they were led into captivity. It was a leading cause of that captivity, as it is written: "And Jeroboam drove Israel from following the LORD and made them commit great sin... They did not depart from them, until the LORD removed Israel out of his sight, as he had spoken by all his servants the prophets. And Israel was exiled from their own land to Assyria until this day."
Why did a reign under such a verdict last so long? One commentator answers:
Nonetheless his reign lasted forty-one years! One might think that God always cut off, without delay, the kings whose conduct dishonoured Him. This history gives several examples of it. That is what happened with Zechariah, the son of this same Jeroboam, but it is not so here. God has different ways, which He knows how to reconcile with His longsuffering and His mercy. His pity for Israel in its oppressed state directs His ways concerning Jeroboam's reign. He raises up a saviour for this people in the person of this very king who had incurred His displeasure.
One writer describes what lay under the prosperity of these years:
Under the reign of Jeroboam II the northern kingdom of Israel flourished as never before or after. There was great outward prosperity. So we find the prophet mentioning the rich, their great wealth and luxury, their arrogant pride and false sense of security. He also mentions the oppression of the poor. Underneath it all was an awful moral corruption, the fruit of the false worship. In this state of prosperity, immorality and false worship they did not dream of any coming disaster.
The verse does not only say Jeroboam sinned. It says his sins made Israel sin, and one commentator weighs what that adds:
Let us note here what is repeated so often in the preceding chapters, that by the sins of their kings, Israel was made to sin. The sin of an individual becomes far more serious when it becomes a stumbling block to others. Its consequences are reckoned to those who carry away the ignorant and the poorly established into the path of their own disobedience.
- Inherited. Jeroboam II did not invent his sin. He kept the calf-worship of an earlier king, following his royal house instead of the mind of God.
- Excused. Some said the images only helped people worship the true God. Scripture calls the whole arrangement a sin.
- Tolerated. Forty-one years on the throne are not God's approval. They show His longsuffering and His pity for an oppressed people.
- Gilded. Wealth and victory sat on top of deep moral corruption. In all that prosperity, Israel never dreamed of the coming disaster.
- Contagious. His sin made others sin, so their guilt is reckoned to him. That same idolatry ended in Israel's exile.
He restored the border of Israel from the entrance of Hamath as far as the sea of the plain, according to the word of Jehovah the God of Israel, which he had spoken through his servant Jonah the prophet, the son of Amittai, who was of Gath-Hepher.
Under Jeroboam II, Israel won back land it had long lost. The verse credits that gain to a word God had spoken earlier through Jonah, and it raises two questions: why God blessed Israel under a king He called evil, and why Jonah's own book says nothing about this prophecy.
One writer sets out the puzzle directly. He finds the answer not in the king, but in God's pity for a suffering people.
Jeroboam did evil in the LORD's sight. He did not turn from any of the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel sin. Even so, his reign lasted forty-one years! One might think, and this history gives several examples, that God always cut off at once the kings whose conduct dishonoured Him. That is the case with Zechariah, the son of this same Jeroboam, but it is not so here. God has different ways which He knows how to reconcile with His longsuffering and His mercy. His pity for Israel's oppressed condition directs His ways concerning Jeroboam's reign… God raises up a saviour for this people in the person of this king who had incurred His displeasure.
If Jeroboam did not earn the rescue, neither did the nation. Another writer traces the reason back past Israel's behaviour altogether.
"The sea of the plain" was the Dead Sea. So his kingdom stretched almost two hundred miles from north to south. He was, no doubt, the "saviour" promised under the unfortunate reign of Jehoahaz… The Lord saw that Israel's affliction was very bitter, and that no one at all was left to help Israel. He had not said that He would blot out the name of Israel from under heaven. Instead He saved them by the hand of Jeroboam the son of Joash. This was not for any goodness that He saw in them or in Jeroboam their king, but "because of His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob."
(The ESV calls it "the Sea of the Arabah.")
The two place names mark a real military gain. It came at a cost to Judah, Israel's neighbour to the south.
The territory of Hamath, the principal city of upper Syria, had at one time belonged to Solomon. Jeroboam's victory restored to Israel "the entrance of Hamath," a very important strategic position. The city of Hamath itself does not appear to have been part of the conquest. But the borders of Israel now ran again from the entrance of Hamath to the Salt Sea, that is, the Dead Sea. Taking this land enlarged Israel's territory at the expense of Judah's, since part of Damascus and of Hamath had once belonged to Judah.
The book of Jonah contains nothing about Israel's borders. This verse is the only trace of that message. It raises a wider point about what Scripture keeps.
Moreover, it is a selected revelation. It does not record everything God has revealed to His people over these 4000 years. Jonah prophesied of the restoration of the coasts of Israel from the entering of Hamath to the sea of the plain. Scripture records that God's word came true, but it does not keep the words of the prophecy itself… It is a mistake to think that the Bible holds every inspired message the Spirit of God gave to man. We have everything we need to know and to have. We do not have everything the prophets told others at different times.
Jonah is better known for his failure. Here God gives him a different title, and one writer sees purpose in it.
But the Lord knew that Jonah was a true servant of His, despite his failure. He took care to leave on record a testimony that lets us recognise him as such. This verse calls Jonah Jehovah's servant, whose prophecy He had Himself fulfilled.
The town is not a stray detail. Where Jonah came from later became evidence in a dispute among Judah's leaders.
Jonah's name means dove. God set him apart for a mission to the Gentiles, and he disliked it so much that this is likely why the religious leaders of Judah forgot that a prophet had arisen out of Galilee (John 7:52). Jonah was born in Gath-hepher, in the northern part of Palestine. He probably lived at the same time as Elisha, or else came right after him. We learn this from 2 Kings 14:25-27, which tells us that Israel enlarged its coasts, taking land back from the Syrians, just as Jonah had predicted. His book is perhaps the earliest prophetic book we have.
- Bitter — God began with Israel's misery: bitter affliction, and no one left to help.
- Covenant — the rescue rested on His promise to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, not on any goodness in the nation or its king.
- Instrument — He saved through an evil king. His longsuffering and His mercy work in ways we would not choose.
- Reach — the gift came in miles of land, from the entrance of Hamath to the Dead Sea, ground once held under Solomon.
- Servant — God records this failing prophet as His servant, and his Galilee hometown answers the leaders who claimed no prophet came from there.
For Jehovah saw that the affliction of Israel was very bitter; and that there was not any shut up, nor any left, nor any helper for Israel.
God's eye falls on a kingdom at the end of its rope: nobody left to help, and a king on the throne who did evil. What comes next is not judgment but rescue, and the whole weight of the verse rests on why.
A king who dishonoured God kept his throne. One writer finds the reason not in the king but in the state of the people.
You might think — and this history gives several examples — that God always cut short kings whose conduct dishonoured Him... but it is not so here. God has other ways, and He knows how to fit them with His patience and His mercy. His pity for Israel under oppression directs His ways in Jeroboam's reign.
The verse leaves nobody out: bond or free, no one could help. One writer still finds God's kindness in that pitiful state.
How good that the Lord gives some measure of gracious encouragement to His people, though they are in a pathetic state.
The same words appear elsewhere in Scripture. One writer applies them far beyond Israel.
"For the Lord will judge [vindicate, defend or avenge] His people and have compassion on His servants, when He sees that their power is gone and there is none shut up or left." Precious grace for Israel in the days to come — and grace now, for each and for all who feel and own their need!
The verse gives the reason God acted: He saw. It says nothing about repentance, reform, or merit. One commentator states plainly what was and was not behind the rescue.
Jeroboam was, no doubt, the "savior" promised during the unhappy reign of Jehoahaz (2 Kings 13:5). "And the Lord did not say that He would blot out the name of Israel from under heaven. Instead He saved them by the hand of Jeroboam the son of Joash." He did not do this for any goodness He saw in them or in Jeroboam their king. He did it "because of His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob" (2 Kings 13:23).
The prophet Jonah announced this rescue in advance. He is better known for the warning he carried to Nineveh. One writer holds the two messages side by side.
Jonah's prophecy mentioned here was surely far more to his liking than the message of coming judgment God used him to bring to the people of Nineveh in the book named after him. Both messages came from God, and both show His loving heart. Whether He uses a wicked king to deliver His undeserving people or turns a wicked nation to repentance, He is God and sovereign.
Another writer marks how long this deliverance was meant to last.
In this passage Jonah appears as a prophet of grace and of a temporary deliverance for Israel.
This rescue was not a one-off. Another writer sees in it a pattern the prophets repeat.
The prophets are full of this blessed truth. God allowed, and even sent, nation after nation to overcome and discipline His rebellious people. Yet He never gave them up completely. He watched over them with endless tenderness and longing of heart, and He stepped in again and again to help them, for the sake of His own name.
The rescue was real. The prosperity it brought did the people harm.
The great prosperity and expansion under Jeroboam II seems to have corrupted the people and led them to give free rein to their evil desires and violence... Those in authority, instead of checking this spirit of lawlessness, found pleasure in it.
- Cause — He saw. The reason given for the rescue is God's own sight of bitter affliction; His "pity for Israel's state of being oppressed directs His ways."
- Condition — no helper. Israel had no helper left, bond or free. When power is gone and none is shut up or left, grace moves.
- Ground — the covenant. Not goodness in the people or their king, but God's covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
- Instrument — anyone He chooses. A wicked king and a prophet of grace both serve His purpose. He is God and sovereign either way.
- Result — a mercy misused. The prosperity that followed corrupted the people, and the deliverance proved temporary.
And Jehovah had not said that he would blot out the name of Israel from under the heavens; and he saved them by the hand of Jeroboam the son of Joash.
Jeroboam II did evil in God's sight, yet God gave him a long reign and used him to rescue Israel. The reason had nothing to do with Israel's goodness: God had never said He would erase Israel's name from under heaven.
Jeroboam's reign raises a question: why did God let an evil king last so long? One writer answers it like this:
You might think God always cut off at once the kings whose conduct dishonoured Him, and this history gives several examples of it. That is what happened with Zechariah, the son of this same Jeroboam. But it is not what happened here. God has other ways, and He knows how to fit them together with His patience and His mercy. His pity for Israel in their oppression guides how He acts in Jeroboam's reign.
The reason for this rescue did not lie in Israel or in their king. One writer traces it to a rescuer God had promised in the days of an earlier king, Jehoahaz:
He was, no doubt, the "savior" promised under the unfortunate reign of Jehoahaz. … This was not for any goodness that He saw in them or Jeroboam their king, but "because of His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob."
The verse turns on a silence. God had never said He would erase Israel's name, and their survival hung on that unspoken word. One writer describes how God treated Israel through all their defeats:
God allowed, and even sent, nation after nation to defeat and discipline His rebellious people. Yet He never wholly gave them up. He watched over them with endless tenderness and longing of heart, and He stepped in again and again to rescue them for His own name's sake.
"By the hand of Jeroboam" is the striking phrase. God's instrument was the very king He had just condemned. The prophet who brought this good news, Jonah, also carried God's warning of judgment to the city of Nineveh:
The prophecy of Jonah mentioned here was surely far more to his liking than the message of coming judgment God gave him for the people of Nineveh. That message fills the book that carries his name. Both messages were equally of God and show His loving heart. Whether He uses a wicked king to deliver His undeserving people or turns a wicked nation to repentance, He is God and sovereign.
Prosperity returned, but God's prophets found no welcome. One writer describes how the nation treated Amos in those years:
Though there was political revival under his rule, there was no real moral or spiritual awakening among the people. People saw Amos as a troublemaker who disturbed the peace of the kingdom. Amaziah the priest of Bethel told him to run off to the land of Judah, "and there eat bread, and prophesy there" — as if God's prophet were nothing more than a hired hand like himself.
God's mercy delayed the end. It did not cancel it. One writer sets Amos's warning beside Jeroboam's victories:
Amos prophesied in the same period. He announced to the house of Israel that Jeroboam's conquests would not last long. The Assyrian would capture these from them. … By winning back Israel's borders as far as "Hamath the great" and the sea of the plain, Jeroboam had "put far away the evil day." Look, says Amos, the evil day is near at hand.
- Affliction — God saw Israel oppressed and helpless, and His pity for them shaped all that followed.
- Silence — God had never said He would erase Israel's name. That unspoken word kept them alive.
- Hand — God rescued them through a king who did evil. He is sovereign, and He can use anyone.
- Covenant — The reason lay outside Israel: God's promise to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and His own name.
- Limit — God won back the borders, but not the hearts. Amos warned that the evil day was only delayed.
And the rest of the acts of Jeroboam, and all that he did, and his might, how he warred, and how he recovered for Israel that [which had belonged] to Judah in Damascus and in Hamath, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel?
This closing note on Jeroboam II's reign sums up his wars and his recovery of Damascus and Hamath. The surprise is who God used for it — a king the same chapter calls evil. The question left open is how long such gains could last.
Damascus and Hamath were not border villages. They were the seats of two great powers, and David had taken them generations earlier.
Damascus and Hamath were both capitals of two once powerful kingdoms. David had conquered them long before (1 Chron. 18:3-6). Jeroboam won them back for Israel more than one hundred and fifty years after they broke away from Judah. That speaks strongly for the success and power of his armies against those hostile nations on his northern border. Hamath, called "the great" in Amos 6:2, was the chief city of upper Syria and an important strategic point. It commanded the whole valley of the Orontes, which leads to the countries to the south.
Part of this land had once belonged to Judah. Israel's gain came at the other kingdom's cost.
Jeroboam's victory restored to Israel "the entrance of Hamath," a very important strategic position. The city of Hamath itself does not seem to have been part of the conquest. But Israel's borders reached again from the entrance of Hamath to the Salt Sea, that is, the Dead Sea (cf. Joshua 3:16). Taking this land enlarged Israel's territory at Judah's expense, for part of Damascus and of Hamath had once belonged to Judah (v. 28).
Nothing in Jeroboam earned these victories. The reason lay in God's pity for a people with no one left to help them.
You might think God always cut off at once the kings whose conduct dishonoured Him, and this history gives us several examples... but it is not so here. God has other ways, and He knows how to fit them with His longsuffering and His mercy. His pity for Israel under oppression shapes His ways in Jeroboam's reign. "For the LORD saw that the affliction of Israel was very bitter... and there was none to help Israel. But the LORD had not said that He would blot out the name of Israel from under heaven, so He saved them by the hand of Jeroboam the son of Joash" (vv. 26-27).
Jonah is remembered for the warning he carried to the city of Nineveh. He also brought the prophecy mentioned in this chapter.
Jonah's prophecy mentioned here was surely far more to his liking than the message of coming judgment God gave him for the people of Nineveh, in the book named after him. Both messages came from God, and both show His loving heart. Whether He uses a wicked king to deliver His undeserving people or turns a wicked nation to repentance, He is God and sovereign.
The wide borders hid what was happening inside the nation.
Under the reign of Jeroboam II the northern kingdom of Israel flourished as never before or after. There was a great external prosperity. So the prophet mentions the rich, their great wealth and luxury, their arrogant pride and sense of security, and their oppression of the poor. Underneath it all was an awful moral corruption, the fruit of the false worship. In this state of prosperity, immorality and false worship they did not dream of any coming calamity whatever.
Political recovery is not spiritual recovery. The nation showed the difference by how it treated the prophet God sent.
Israel was blessed with the ministry of both Hosea and Amos during Jeroboam's reign. Their writings show plainly that there was political revival under his rule, but no real moral or spiritual awakening among the people. People saw Amos as a troubler of the kingdom's peace. Amaziah, the priest of Bethel, told him to flee away to the land of Judah, and "eat bread there, and prophesy there," as if God's prophet were nothing more than a hired man like himself.
The verse sends us to another record for the details — and that record is gone.
These books refer often to the chronicles of the kings of Israel or of the kings of Judah... They have nothing to do with the Word of God. Whatever the Lord did not choose to record or explain is written there. These chronicles are lost... The believer needs none of them; he has God's Word. In God's account he finds all he needs, and God's own assessment of people, events, and things.
Amos looked at the same borders and drew the opposite conclusion.
The prophet Amos... announced to the house of Israel that Jeroboam's conquests would not be long-lasting. The Assyrian would take them away... By winning back Israel's borders as far as "Hamath the great," Jeroboam had "put far away the evil day" (Amos 6:3)... But, says Amos, the evil day is near. On the eve of ruin, the prince was relaxing, thinking only of his ease (Amos 6:4).
- Cause — The victories came from God's pity for a people with no helper left, not from any good He saw in the king.
- Gift — Damascus and Hamath, capitals of two once powerful kingdoms, came back to Israel more than 150 years after they broke away.
- Reach — The borders stretched from the entrance of Hamath to the Dead Sea, gained partly at Judah's expense.
- Rot — Behind the wide borders lay great wealth, arrogant pride, oppression of the poor, and no spiritual awakening at all.
- Result — Jeroboam thought he had pushed the evil day far away; Amos said it was near, and the Assyrian would take it all back.
And Jeroboam slept with his fathers, with the kings of Israel; and Zechariah his son reigned in his stead.
Jeroboam II ruled the northern kingdom longer than any other king, and he died in peace, with the throne passing to his son Zechariah. Yet he did evil in the Lord's sight, which raises a hard question: why did God leave such a king untouched for forty-one years?
Commentators notice the length of this reign first. It breaks the pattern of swift judgment found elsewhere in these chapters.
"He did what was evil in the sight of the LORD. He did not depart from all the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, which he made Israel to sin" (v. 24). Even so, his reign lasted forty-one years! You might think God always cut off kings quickly when their conduct dishonoured Him. This history gives several examples of it. That is what happened with Zechariah, the son of this same Jeroboam (2 Kings 15:8), but it is not so here. God has different ways, which He knows how to reconcile with His longsuffering and His mercy. His pity for Israel's oppressed condition shaped His ways in Jeroboam's reign.
God rescued Israel through this same king, but the reason lay outside Israel altogether.
"He saved them by the hand of Jeroboam the son of Joash." This was not for any goodness that He saw in them or in Jeroboam their king, but "because of His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob" (2 Kings 13:23).
Two prophets spoke during these years, and their books show what the national success was hiding.
Israel was blessed with the ministries of both Hosea and Amos during Jeroboam's reign. Their writings make one thing clear. There was political revival under his rule, but no real moral or spiritual awakening among the people. People looked on Amos as a troubler of the kingdom's peace, and Amaziah the priest of Bethel told him to run away to the land of Judah, "and eat bread there, and prophesy there," as if God's prophet were nothing but a hired man like himself.
One writer sees the same pattern today.
Today too, in many countries believers face persecution. They are told what to preach and teach, and which topics they must avoid. In some places people are even trying to have the Bible classified as hate literature, because it presents God's holy standards without compromise.
Commentators differ about the prophecy of a violent death for this king. One reference work treats it as real:
Scripture records little of this king except that he won striking victories over the Syrians. "He did not depart from all the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat." Amos announced his death by the sword.
Another writer calls the report a lie:
Amaziah, priest of the calf at Bethel, warns the king that Amos is prophesying against Israel, adding — which was a lie — that he had foretold the violent death of the king. With this slander Amaziah tried to get rid of the prophet and have him sent away to Judah. Amos was competing with him at Bethel, "the king's sanctuary… a temple of the kingdom."
Zechariah taking the throne looks like more of the same. In fact it closes an account opened four generations earlier, and one prophet writes as though the line ends with the father.
Hosea prophesied under Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. Strikingly, he mentions only Jeroboam, king of Israel, and says nothing of his successors, though he prophesied under them too (Hosea 1:1). For him their history seems to stop with Jeroboam. Yet Zechariah, this man's son, was the fourth generation the Lord granted to the house of Jehu (2 Kings 10:30). But Zechariah, the last link in this chain, is in fact already rejected. He reigns only six months. God turns away from him and his successors, just as He said: "I will never again pass by them" (Amos 7:8; 8:2). Hosea says the same: "They made kings, but not through me" (Hosea 8:4).
From this death the kingdom's decline runs one way, and God's voice grows louder, not quieter.
God's eyes were on "the sinful kingdom" (Amos 9:8) and its sinful kings. From the time of Jeroboam's death, decline set in. Less than seventy years later it ended in the kingdom's final overthrow and dissolution. From this time on prophetic ministry greatly increased. "Such is the way of our gracious God," an unknown writer says, "that when judgment is near, testimony is multiplied."
- Borrowed time. Jeroboam's forty-one years were not a reward. God's pity for an oppressed people and His covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob kept a bad king on the throne.
- Borrowed prosperity. Jeroboam won back borders and land, but no moral or spiritual awakening followed — success on the outside, rot underneath.
- Borrowed patience. As judgment drew near, God gave more warning, not less. Testimony multiplied through Hosea and Amos.
- Borrowed silence. Amaziah told Amos to take his message elsewhere, and the same pressure to soften God's standards falls on believers today. Commentators differ on whether Amos really foretold a violent death for the king or the priest invented it.
- Borrowed throne. Zechariah inherits as the fourth generation promised to Jehu. He is the last link, already rejected, and he reigns just six months. From this quiet death the countdown to the kingdom's dissolution begins.