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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadGreater Men and Women of the Bible by James Hastings: 333. Jezebel
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Literature
Barnard, P. M., Jezebel (1904).
Calthrop, G., Hints to my Younger Friends (1877), 179.
Ewing, A., Elijah and Ahab (1889), 98, 167, 237.
Horne, C. S., Christ and Conscience, 66.
Joseph, M., The Ideal in Judaism (1893), 163.
Lewis, H. E., in Women of the Bible: Rebekah to Priscilla (1904), 105.
Maclaren, A., Expositions: 2 Samuel, etc. (1906), 261, 280.
Miller, T. E., Portraits of Women of the Bible (1910), 174.
Orpen-Palmer, H. H., Septem Ecclesiœ (1894), Supplement.
Robinson, S., Discourses of Redemption (1869), 159, 179.
Stanley, A. P., Lectures on the History of the Jewish Church, ii. (1889) 244, 266, 286.
Taylor, W. M., Elijah the Prophet (1878), 6, 129, 168, 172.
Whitehead, H., Sermons (1871), 210.
Whitham, A. R., Old Testament History (1912), 287, 290, 308.
Williams, I., Female Characters of Holy Scripture (1890), 168.
Christian Age, xxxiii. (1888) 163 (T. de W. Talmage).
Church Pulpit Year Book, iv. (1907) 198.
Churchman's Pulpit: Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity, xii. 1 (E.Monro).
Clergyman's Magazine, 3rd Ser., vi. (1893) 165.
Dictionary of the Bible, ii. (1899) 656 (J. A. Selbie).
Ahab … whom Jezebel his wife stirred up.- 1Ki_21:25.
2. Jezebel was a heathen princess, daughter of Ethbaal, king of Phœnicia-that strip of country, stretching along the seashore in the north of Palestine, which included such well-known mercantile cities as Tyre and Sidon. Ethbaal and Omri the father of Ahab were comparatively near neighbours, and it was of some importance politically that there should be an alliance between the two kingdoms; they would be able to help each other when trouble came to either people; and it was of special advantage to the house of Israel, because it gave them not only a powerful ally but a convenient seaport for their trade. It was thus that Jezebel came into the stream of Israel's history. She became the wife of Ahab, the first of that proud, heathen Canaanite people to bear the title of Queen of Israel.
Jezebel inherited unusual ability and energy, a strong religious zeal and those Oriental despotic ideals which hesitated at no crime in attaining personal ends. As queen she had the right to establish at the Hebrew court a temple and priesthood for the worship of her native God, Baal Melkart. It was also easy for a woman of her ability gradually to increase the number of the priests and the splendour of the ritual at the Baal temple, until they overshadowed those of the older native sanctuaries. To an agricultural people, the worship of Baal, the native Canaanite god of fertility, also offered many strong attractions; and its licentious rites appealed powerfully to their baser instincts. It was almost inevitable, therefore, that in such an atmosphere and under royal patronage, this kindred worship should flourish and attract many followers.
3. Posterity, no doubt, has with one consent denounced Queen Jezebel. But Jezebel herself must have been thought a benefactor by many in Israel. The prophets who sat at her table would talk gratefully of her splendid hospitality. Many a lover of the fine arts would take pride in the Phœnician princess who encouraged Ahab in his building of cities and ivory palaces. Statesmen who valued an alliance with foreign powers would speak approvingly of the queen who secured for Israel the friendship of Tyre and Sidon. So-called patriots, who looked with jealousy upon any traces of their former connexion with Judah, would be glad to see the worship of Baal substituted for that of the calves in Bethel and Dan, which were supposed to represent the God of both Judah and Israel. Timid men, who remembered the intestine dissensions which resulted in the death of Elah and of Zimri, would rejoice at the spectacle of a strong government, and would be at no loss to detect the source and secret of its strength: for there was now a spirit in the councils of the throne which knew how to govern the kingdom of Israel. Jezebel was a woman of superior mind, uncommon astuteness, and great strength of will. Her father, Ethbaal, was the high priest of Baal. He was a man of singular power and attainments; he dictated the religious policy of Phœnicia. It matters not that the steps of his throne were slippery with his brother's blood; he was, according to his standards, an eminently religious man. And Jezebel was a true daughter of her father-steeped in the idolatrous spirit of the priest-king, and like him totally devoid of all sense of the rights of others; unscrupulous, asserting her own will at all costs, ruthlessly removing whatever stood between her and her goal.
In a kingdom which had no firm foundation, the alliance with a Tyrian princess might easily prove exceedingly dangerous. From the times of David and Solomon, it is true, many treaties had been concluded between Phœnicia and Israel, and close bonds of friendship formed; and Tyre gladly sought to promote its own safety by remaining allied with its more immediate and powerful neighbour, while it naturally became the more indifferent towards Judah. It was, however, at the same time the special business of the kingdom of the Ten Tribes to restore the ancient rigidness of the nationality of Israel; a Canaanitish princess was necessarily, therefore, regarded with suspicion. Jezebel, moreover, belonging to a line which gained its crown by violence, was full of self-will, thirst for power, and arrogance. With perverse pride, she looked down upon a people whose religion she neither understood nor respected. Her influence over the king became only too great.