In the twelfth year of Joram the son of Ahab, king of Israel, Ahaziah the son of Jehoram, king of Judah, began to reign.
This verse dates Judah's new king by Israel's king — a sign of how tangled the two thrones had become. Writers trace that tangle back to a marriage two generations earlier.
He was the last son left to Jehoram of Judah. One writer explains why Scripture gives two different dates for the start of his reign.
Ahaziah must have reigned as his father's deputy during the last year of his father's sickness. This is clear from comparing 2 Kings 8:25 with 9:29. He was the youngest and only remaining son of Jehoram (2 Chron. 21:17)... Somehow his mother escaped the fate of Jehoram's other wives, who were carried off captive during the Philistine-Arabian invasion. She "was his counsellor to do wickedly." 2 Chron. 22:4 seems to hint that his father Jehoram repented during his last sufferings, and had pulled away a little from the house of Ahab. This is because it says they "were his (Ahaziah's) counsellors after the death of his father, to his destruction." His father's death removed the check, and he at once joined himself to his mother's relatives in their sins and their wars.
Ahaziah did not invent the mixture he inherited. His grandfather Jehoshaphat had tied Judah's royal family to Ahab's house by marriage.
The record makes his connection with Ahab prominent. He too did evil in the sight of the Lord. He made an alliance with Ahab's son Joram (or Jehoram), who was still king in Israel... Jehoshaphat, King of Judah, made an unholy alliance with the wicked murderer Ahab, King of Israel (1 Kings 22). It had resulted in the marriage of his son with Athaliah, the wicked daughter of a wicked father. And Jehoram, Jehoshaphat's son, was dragged down by her and she became the ruination of her son Ahaziah. A dreadful harvest!
Another writer points to that same alliance, and to how long evil keeps bearing fruit:
The pious Jehoshaphat's alliance with Ahab was the origin of all this, for evil bears fruit which continues long to reproduce itself.
One writer draws a lesson from these two short reigns for believers today.
The short history of King Jehoram and King Ahaziah of Judah is woven in here to link the order of events together. It still presents serious and instructive features. The daughter of Ahab (the husband of Jezebel) was the wife of Jehoram of Judah. Ahaziah, Jehoram's son, was also "the son-in-law of the house of Ahab." These profane alliances led both of them into the ways of the kings of Israel. The same holds true at all times. A Christian yoked together with a child of the world is bound to lose his testimony and even the appearance of his Christianity. The world is never improved by the Christian's alliance with it.
Ahaziah's reign ended in the judgment that fell on Ahab's house. One writer links that end back to the first compromise, and shows why a good man's bad example does so much damage.
The first evil begun by a pious king continues. His son's practice is far from pious. This is because a good man's bad example has immense influence, above all with those who are not good. It hardens them, and so works deep and lasting mischief. We are told that "the destruction of Ahaziah was of God, by coming to Joram: for when he came, he went out with Jehoram against Jehu." And so he came under the same judgment.
Israel's royal line was wiped out. Judah's line survived — not because its kings were better, but because of a promise.
The royal house of Israel is destroyed, and not a single man is left. God begins the trial of His patience again with a new dynasty, that of Jehu. But it is not so with the house of Judah. The faithful God keeps His word, for He had said that He would give David "always a lamp for his sons" (2 Kings 8:19). In the person of Joash He keeps for Himself a feeble candle stub, and He does not put it out. Through Joash an era of blessing and of the fear of the Lord would begin for the kingdom of Judah.
- Seed — Jehoshaphat tied his family to Ahab's house by marriage. That alliance was the origin of all that follows, and the evil kept reproducing itself long after he died.
- Soil — Ahaziah had already ruled beside his sick father. His father's death removed the last check, and Athaliah and Ahab's relatives became his advisers.
- Fruit — The yoke that joined Judah to Israel cost Judah its distinctness. A believer tied to the world loses his testimony, and the world is never improved by the tie.
- Harvest — Ahaziah went to visit the wounded Joram, and went out with him against Jehu. He fell under the same judgment, through the friendship he inherited.
- Mercy — The line survived anyway, because God had promised David a lamp — a faint flame He refused to put out.
Ahaziah was twenty-two years old when he began to reign; and he reigned one year in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Athaliah, the daughter of Omri king of Israel.
Ahaziah takes Judah's throne at twenty-two and reigns a single year. Then the record pauses to name his mother — Athaliah, of the royal house of Israel. That one detail explains the rest. How did the line of David get tied to the house of Ahab?
The verse calls Athaliah the daughter of Omri, but earlier in the same chapter she is Ahab's daughter. One commentator resolves the wording and traces the family lines that put Ahaziah inside Ahab's circle from birth.
His mother was Athaliah, called the daughter of Omri. That was a common way of speaking among the Jews. She was in fact the granddaughter of Omri, the head of this royal line. She was also the daughter of Ahab and the wife of Jehoram of Judah (v. 18). So she was the sister of Jehoram of Israel. Ahaziah himself was the son-in-law of the house of Ahab.
Ahaziah did not choose his mother. A generation earlier his grandfather Jehoshaphat, a king known for his devotion, made an alliance with the house of Ahab.
The kings of Israel had set the deadly example of a path that led Judah and all Israel to ruin (see 2 Kings 16:3). The godly Jehoshaphat's alliance with Ahab was where all this began, for evil bears fruit that goes on reproducing itself for a long time.
Athaliah was more than a name in the record. She advised her son, and he took her advice. One writer sets her beside an earlier king of Judah who faced the same test and chose the opposite.
Sadly, the Lord's judgment on his father did not move him to turn to the Lord. Instead he followed the ways of the house of Ahab. His mother was Athaliah, the daughter of Ahab and Jezebel, and he accepted his mother's wicked advice (v. 3). How different from Asa! Asa removed his own mother from her place as queen mother, because she had made an idol, an image of Asherah (2 Chron. 15:16). Anyone who chooses to ignore the Lord leaves himself open to being led into every kind of evil.
The parallel record in 2 Chronicles 22:2 says Ahaziah was forty-two when he became king. One reference work shows why the number here is the right one, using the family's own dates.
2 Kings 8:26 says he was 22 years old when he began to reign, but 2 Chr. 22:2 says he was 42. The second figure is surely a copyist's mistake, since his father was only 40 years old when he died. 2 Chr. 21:5, 20. The Syriac and Arabic copies read 22 in both passages.
Ahaziah reached the throne because there was nobody else left.
Since all Jehoram's sons had been killed except Ahaziah, the youngest, the people made him king.
One writer traces how that single year ended.
He formed an alliance with Joram king of Israel and went with him against Hazael king of Syria. Joram was wounded and went to Jezreel to be healed. Ahaziah later went to visit Joram, and God brought about his death by Jehu, when Jehu cut off the house of Ahab.
One writer turns these two verses of family history into a question for parents today.
The wife of Jehoram of Judah was Athaliah, the daughter of Ahab (2 Kings 8:18); Ahaziah was the son of Athaliah (2 Kings 8:26). This should make Christian mothers realize their responsibility. It should stir them to bring up their children in the fear of the Lord. On the other hand, it shows that when the head of a Christian family marries a woman of the world, the result is morally disastrous for the children born from that marriage.
The line looks finished. Yet one writer points to the reason Judah survived.
His son Jehoram followed his father's bad example. He married Ahab's daughter and did evil before the LORD, just as his father-in-law Ahab did. But the LORD would not wipe out the house of David. His covenant with David held back His righteous anger from falling on Judah. That covenant was a powerful influence for mercy in dark days of unbelief and evil.
- Root — Jehoshaphat's alliance with Ahab started the whole disaster. Evil bears fruit, and that fruit keeps reproducing long after the man who planted it is dead.
- Marriage — the alliance brought Jehoram and Athaliah together. Through her, a king of David's line is called son-in-law of the house of Ahab.
- Counsel — a mother's voice shapes a reign. Athaliah advised Ahaziah into evil. Asa faced the same test and removed his mother from her position.
- Harvest — one year on the throne, then death at Jehu's hand. Writers read this as a warning to parents about who they marry and how they raise their children.
- Mercy — the house of David should have ended here. God's covenant with David kept the line alive through Judah's darkest generation.
And he walked in the way of the house of Ahab, and did evil in the sight of Jehovah, like the house of Ahab; for he was the son-in-law of the house of Ahab.
Ahaziah reigned one year in Jerusalem, and the verse gives a family reason for his evil: he had married into Ahab's house. So how did a king from David's line come to copy Israel's worst family, and how far back did the damage start?
The verse calls Ahaziah a son-in-law of Ahab's house. One commentator untangles who was who, and why a king of Judah was fighting Israel's wars:
His mother was Athaliah, called the daughter of Omri. That was a common way of speaking among the Jews. She was in fact the granddaughter of Omri, the head of this dynasty. She was the daughter of Ahab and the wife of Jehoram of Judah. She was thus the sister of Jehoram of Israel. Ahaziah himself was the son-in-law of the house of Ahab. His grandfather Jehoshaphat had made an alliance with Ahab to retake Ramoth-Gilead, which had fallen under the power of the king of Syria. Ahaziah did the same. He made an alliance with Jehoram of Israel, son of Ahab, to make war against Hazael, the king of Syria, at Ramoth-Gilead.
The evil named here did not begin with Ahaziah. It began with his godly grandfather Jehoshaphat. He made friends with Ahab and sealed the friendship with a wedding.
Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, made an unholy alliance with Ahab, king of Israel, a wicked murderer. It led to the marriage of Jehoshaphat's son to Athaliah, the wicked daughter of a wicked father. She dragged Jehoram, Jehoshaphat's son, down with her, and she ruined her own son Ahaziah. A dreadful harvest!
Another writer names the same root, and what evil does over time:
The pious Jehoshaphat's alliance with Ahab was the origin of all this, for evil bears fruit which continues long to reproduce itself.
Ahaziah did not drift into Ahab's ways by accident. His own family advised him into them. Once his father died, nothing held him back.
His mother was his counselor in doing wickedly. 2 Chronicles 22:4 seems to hint that his father Jehoram repented during his last sufferings, and had pulled away a little from the house of Ahab: "For after the death of his father they were his [Ahaziah's] counselors, to his undoing." His father's death removed the check, and he at once united himself with his mother's relatives in their sins and warfare.
The verse gives the marriage tie as the reason Ahaziah turned out like Ahab. One writer takes that as a rule for every age:
These profane alliances led the one and the other into the ways of the kings of Israel. The same holds true at all times. A Christian tied to a child of the world is bound to lose his testimony, and even the appearance of his Christianity. The world is never improved by the Christian's alliance with it. Just the opposite: bad company corrupts good manners.
One commentator marks the moment the alliance turned deadly:
Ahaziah, king of Judah, went to his wounded ally to express his sympathy. By the world's standards this was an act of simple courtesy. But he had opposed Hazael, God's rod against Israel, and now he put himself under the blows of Jehu, the second of God's rods against his ally. These judgments on Israel did not move him or hold him back on his path — and now they would reach his very own person!
Ahaziah died with the house he had joined. The record of it carries a call that is still open:
He was the seventh from Solomon, and the first king of Judah to die a violent death. His name is the first of the royal line left out of the genealogy in Matthew 1... Jehu's commission did not include killing the king of Judah. But Ahaziah was among those doomed to destruction, so he shared their fate. In that system of wickedness the spiritual Jezebel teaches and seduces God's servants. And God's call to His own is this: "Come out of her, my people, lest you take part in her sins, lest you share in her plagues" (Revelation 18:4).
- Root. The evil here goes back to a good king's friendship with a bad one: "the pious Jehoshaphat's alliance with Ahab was the origin of all this."
- Marriage. A wedding sealed the tie. The verse names that tie as the reason for his evil — he was son-in-law to the house of Ahab.
- Counsel. Athaliah "was his counselor in doing wickedly"; once his father died, "his father's death removed the check."
- Course. He walked where his relatives walked. Association does not reform the world; "the world is never improved by the Christian's alliance with it."
- Cost. He died with the house he joined — first king of Judah to die violently, first name dropped from Matthew's royal list. So the call is: "Come out of her, my people."
And he went with Joram the son of Ahab to the war against Hazael the king of Syria at Ramoth-Gilead; and the Syrians wounded Joram.
Ahaziah of Judah marches out beside Israel's king, and the fighting leaves Joram wounded. The verse reads like a plain military note, but commentators see the moment when Judah's long friendship with Ahab's house comes due.
Ahaziah did not choose this war alone. His mother Athaliah came from the northern royal line, and the men around him came with her.
His mother somehow escaped what happened to Jehoram's other wives, whom the Philistines and Arabians carried away captive when they invaded. She advised him to do evil. 2 Chronicles 22:4 seems to hint that his father Jehoram repented during his last sufferings, and had broken away a little from the house of Ahab, for it says that Ahab's family became Ahaziah's counsellors after his father's death, to his ruin. His father's death removed the check on him, and he at once joined his mother's relatives in their sins and their wars.
Ramoth-gilead was not a new battlefield for Judah's royal house. His grandfather had gone there before him, in the same kind of company.
His grandfather Jehoshaphat had made an alliance with Ahab to take back Ramoth-Gilead, which had fallen under the power of the king of Syria. In the same way Ahaziah made an alliance with Jehoram of Israel, Ahab's son, to fight Hazael, the king of Syria, at Ramoth-Gilead, a city of refuge (Deut. 4:43)... This alliance with the kings of Israel was detestable in the eyes of the Lord. Jehoram of Israel met the same fate at Ramoth as Ahab, whom the Syrians had wounded in that same place earlier (1 Kings 22:34).
One writer traces the ruin that followed back to where the pattern started.
The kings of Israel set the fatal example of a course that led Judah and all Israel to ruin. The godly Jehoshaphat's alliance with Ahab was the origin of it all, for evil bears fruit that goes on reproducing itself for a long time.
Hazael is named as the opponent in this battle, but the commentary reads him as more than a foreign threat. Earlier in the chapter he had been put on Syria's throne under God's hand.
Still, the judgments of God are being carried out. Elisha goes to Damascus, and Hazael, the rod of Jehovah to chastise His people, is placed on the throne of Syria.
Joram of Israel, also called Jehoram, had removed Baal. In that one respect he was better than his brother. Even so, the sword fell in his reign.
His brother Jehoram was not nearly so bad, for he removed Baal. But he did not remove Jeroboam's calves. No doubt he kept them for the same political reason that made Jeroboam set them up (1 Kings 12:26-30). In his day the sword of Hazael begins (2 Kings 8:28), and the sword of Jehu fulfils the prediction.
The wound Joram receives here is what draws Ahaziah to Jezreel in the next verses, and there Jehu finds them both. Writers see a principle of God's government in that outcome — Ahaziah is not spared because of the better line he came from.
King Joram was now returning to Jezreel to be healed of the wounds the Syrians had given him, and Jehu at once offered to pay a visit to his master... At that very time, sad to say, the king of Judah was there too. Here we find a very solemn fact about God's government. If a man who ought to be on the side of righteousness turns aside into a sinful alliance with evil, he suffers according to the evil he joins, and not according to the righteousness he may once have had... A sin is a sin whoever commits it, but whose sin is the greatest? Sin in a Christian is surely worse than sin in an ordinary man who has no Christianity. Sin is always measured by the privilege of the one who commits it.
The practical warning drawn from the Ramoth-gilead alliances is blunt: shared plans mean shared consequences.
If we join with the world in its schemes, we must expect to be identified with it in its convulsions.
Such a partnership only ever ran one way.
Each time Israel gained an advantage through the friendship of the king of Judah, what did it give in exchange? The loss was always on the side of those who, in some feeble measure, still bore the testimony of the true God.
- Counsel — Ahaziah's advisers came from his mother's family, the house of Ahab. With his father gone, nothing held him back.
- Alliance — He fought at the same city as his grandfather, in the same bad company. Evil sown in one generation keeps bearing fruit in the next.
- Rod — God had set Hazael on Syria's throne to chastise His people. Ahaziah marched out against God's own rod.
- Wound — The Syrians wounded Joram where they had wounded Ahab before. That wound drew Ahaziah to Jezreel, and to Jehu's sword.
- Reckoning — God judges a man by the evil he joins, not by the righteousness of the house he came from. Join the world's schemes, and you share its collapse.
And king Joram returned to be healed in Jizreel of the wounds that the Syrians had given him at Ramah, when he fought with Hazael king of Syria. And Ahaziah the son of Jehoram, king of Judah, went down to see Joram the son of Ahab at Jizreel, for he was sick.
Two kings meet at Jezreel: one wounded in battle, the other coming to visit him. The visit looks like ordinary kindness. The commentators read it as the moment a king of Judah walked into a judgment God had already prepared.
Ahaziah of Judah was not a neutral visitor. He had joined the same war as the wounded king he came to see — the fight at Ramoth-Gilead, the Ramah of this verse. In doing so he was repeating his grandfather's choice.
His grandfather Jehoshaphat had made an alliance with Ahab to retake Ramoth-Gilead, which had fallen under the power of the king of Syria. In the same way Ahaziah the son of Jehoram of Judah made an alliance with Jehoram of Israel, son of Ahab. Together they went to war against Hazael, the king of Syria, at Ramoth-Gilead, a city of refuge (Deut. 4:43)… This alliance with the kings of Israel was an abomination in the eyes of the Lord. Jehoram of Israel suffered the same fate at Ramoth as Ahab. The Syrians had wounded Ahab earlier at that same place (1 Kings 22:34). He retired to Jezreel to be healed of his wounds. It was there that his ally Ahaziah, king of Judah, came to him to express his sympathy.
The Syrians who struck Joram fought for a king God Himself had put on the throne. The wound in this verse comes from a hand already appointed for the work.
Still, God's judgments are being carried out. Elisha goes to Damascus, and Hazael, the rod of Jehovah to discipline His people, is placed on the throne of Syria.
Scripture pauses here to record Judah's involvement, and Darby reads that as deliberate.
The Spirit of God takes notice of the consequences of Judah's alliance with Israel; but with this exception, Judah for the time is out of sight.
On the surface this is one ruler calling on a wounded ally. One writer reads it inside a longer story of warnings Israel ignored.
All these signs of patience and grace, these loud calls to repentance, met with no response from Israel, and God prepares His instruments of vengeance. Hazael, now the king of Syria, begins to carry out the sentence of God. The king of Israel is wounded in battle, and the king of Judah visits him. What is this but the professing world going to comfort the profane world? Judgment does not delay, and the next instrument of God is anointed. Jehu is called to the throne, and draws the sword of God.
Ahaziah did not invent this closeness with Ahab's house. He inherited it. The commentators trace it back to a king they call pious.
The pious Jehoshaphat's alliance with Ahab was the origin of all this, for evil bears fruit which continues long to reproduce itself. Alas, alas! What is man when he turns aside from Jehovah's ways? He leaves the narrow, straight path of God's word and will. He leaves the path of faith — the true path of an obedient spirit.
Kelly weighs what a good man's bad example does to those around him.
That is, the first evil begun by a pious king continues. The practice of his son is far from pious, for the bad example of a good man has immense influence, especially with those who are not good. It hardens them, and so works deep harm that cannot be rooted out.
Ahaziah made the trip to Jezreel himself. Scripture's own comment turns that friendly visit into the cause of his death.
Ahaziah's association and close friendship with the king of Israel proved his undoing. He visited the wounded king of Israel just as Jehu, at God's bidding, carried out His vengeance on the idolatrous and wicked house of Ahab. Jehu killed the king in Samaria, along with the princes of Judah and the sons of Ahaziah's brothers. The divine commentary on this is, "And the destruction of Ahaziah was of God by coming to Joram."
Leslie Grant notes the same turn in a single sentence: the warmth of the friendship, then the interruption.
Ahaziah was so friendly with him that he went down to visit him. But Chapter 9 shows us that God was intervening with some serious results for these two kings.
- Root. A good king's alliance with Ahab began it; evil, as Darby puts it, "bears fruit which continues long to reproduce itself."
- Fruit. The grandson inherits the friendship. Kelly warns that a good man's bad example hardens those who are not good.
- Battlefield. Hazael's men wound Joram at the very place Ahab was wounded. Hazael is the rod Jehovah had set on Syria's throne.
- Sickbed. The visit looks like courtesy. One writer calls it the professing world going to comfort the profane world.
- Reckoning. The writers point to Scripture's own verdict on the trip: Ahaziah's ruin came from God through his going to Joram. The friendship, not the battle, cost him his life.