athaliah Summary and Overview

whom God afflicts. (1.) The daughter of Ahab and Jezebel, and the wife of Jehoram, king of Judah (2 Kings 8:18), who "walked in the ways of the house of Ahab" (2 Chr. 21:6), called "daughter" of Omri (2 Kings 8:26). On the death of her husband and of her son Ahaziah, she resolved to seat herself on the vacant throne. She slew all Ahaziah's children except Joash, the youngest (2 Kings 11:1,2). After a reign of six years she was put to death in an insurrection (2 Kings 11:20; 2 Chr. 21:6; 22:10-12; 23:15), stirred up among the people in connection with Josiah's being crowned as king. (2.) Ezra 8:7. (3.) 1 Chr. 8:26.

(afflicted of the Lord) daughter of Ahab and Jezebel, married Jehoram the son of Jehoshaphat king of Judah and introduced into that kingdom the worship of Baal. (B.C. 891.) After the great revolution by which Jehu seated himself on the throne of Samaria she killed all the members of the royal family of Judah who had escaped his sword. #2Ki 11:1| From the slaughter one infant, named Joash, the youngest son of Ahaziah, was rescued by his aunt Jehosheba wife of Jehoiada, #2Ch 23:11| the high priest. #2Ch 24:6| The child was brought up under Jehoiada's care, and concealed in the temple for six years, during which period Athaliah reigned over Judah. At length Jehoiada thought it time to produce the lawful king to the people, trusting to their zeal for the worship of God and their loyalty to the house of David. His plan was successful, and Athaliah was put to death.

ATHALI'AH (afflicted by Jehovah), granddaughter of Omri, daughter of Ahab and Jezebel, wife of Jehoram, king of Judah, and mother of Ahaziah. 2 Kgs 11:1 ff. She introduced Baal-worship into Judah. Her character was extremely bad. She advised her own son in his wickedness, and after Jehu had slain him (see Ahaziah) she resolved to destroy the children of her husband by his former wives, and then take the throne of Judah, But Jehosheba, a half-sister of Ahaziah, secured Joash, one of the children and heir, and secreted him and his nurse for six years. In the seventh year, everything being prepared for the purpose, Joash, the young prince, was brought out and placed on the throne. Attracted by the crowd of people who had assembled to witness the ceremony, and unsuspicious of the cause, Athaliah hastened to the temple. When the populace had assembled, and when she saw the young king on the throne, and heard the shouts of the people, and found that all her ambitious designs were likely to be defeated, she rent her clothes and cried out, "Treason! Treason!" hoping probably to rally a party in favor of her interests. But she was too late. The priest commanded her to be removed from the temple, and she was taken without the walls of the city and put to death. 2 Kgs 11:16. See Jehoiada and Joash. (2). A Benjamite. 1 Chr 8:26. (3). One whose son, Jeshaiah, returned with Ezra in the second caravan from Babylon. Ezr 8:7.

Daughter of Ahab and Jezebel, married Jehoshaphat's son Jehoram, king of Judah. It was a union (compare 1 Corinthians 15:33; 1 Corinthians 6:14-18) fatal to the cause of piety in Judah, a cause which the godly Jehoshaphat had so much at heart. She bore a hideous likeness to Jezebel her mother, as the history with such unstudied truthfulness brings out. By her influence Jehoram was led to walk in the way of the kings of Israel, like as did the house of Ahab (2 Chronicles 21:6). Baal worship through her was introduced into Judah, as it had been through her mother into Israel. Worldly policy, the hope of reuniting Israel to Judah, and concession to his son, whose reckless violence was afterward seen in the murder of his own brothers (2 Chronicles 21:3-4), infatuated Jehoshaphat to sanction the union. The same bloodthirstiness, lust of dominion over husband and over the state, and unscrupulous wickedness in killing all that stood in the way of ambition, appear in the daughter as in the mother. When her son Ahaziah was slain by Jehu, along with the brethren of Ahaziah and their sons (42 men), she arose and destroyed all the seed royal of the house of Judah (2 Chronicles 22:10). As queenmother she was determined to keep the regal power which she exercised during Ahaziah's absence in Jezreel (2 Kings 9:16). Ahaziah's youngest son Jonah alone escaped her murderous hand, secreted by Jehosheba, his aunt, daughter of Jehoram (probably not by Athaliah, but another wife) and wife of the priest Jehoiada (2 Chronicles 22:11-12). For six years he was hid, but in the seventh year Jehoiada took into covenant with him for restoring the rightful king "the captains of hundreds," two Azariahs, Ishmael, Maaseiah, and Elishaphat; they next enlisted the cooperation of the Levites, gathered out of Judah, and the chief fathers of Israel who came to Jerusalem. Then they made a covenant with the king in the temple. A third part of the soldiers of the guard usually guarded the palace, while two thirds restrained the crowds on the sabbath by guarding the gate Sur (1 Kings 11:6), or "the gate of the foundation" (2 Chronicles 23:5), and the gate "behind the guard," the N. and S. entrances to the temple. The two thirds in the temple were to guard the king with David's spears and shields, that the restoration of his descendant might be connected with his name. Any who should approach beyond the fixed limits were to be killed. Joash was duly anointed, crowned, and received the testimony or law, the statute book of his reign (Deuteronomy 17:18-20). Athaliah, roused by the acclamations of the people, hastened to the temple, and there saw the king "by a pillar" or "upon" it, i.e. on a throne raised upon it (for "pillar" Gesenius translates "stage" or "scaffold," such as in 2 Chronicles 6:18). In vain she (who herself was the embodiment, of treason) cried "Treason!" She was hurried out, and slain at the entering of the horse gate by the king's house. Mattan, Baal's priest, was the only other person slain. Her usurpation lasted 883-877 B.C. As she loved blood, blood was her own end; having lived as her mother, as her mother she died, slain at her own walls amidst the hoofs of the horses (compare Revelation 16:5-6).