TEXT [Commentary]

5. Jehu kills the priests of Baal (10:18-31)

18 Then Jehu called a meeting of all the people of the city and said to them, “Ahab’s worship of Baal was nothing compared to the way I will worship him! 19 Therefore, summon all the prophets and worshipers of Baal, and call together all his priests. See to it that every one of them comes, for I am going to offer a great sacrifice to Baal. Anyone who fails to come will be put to death.” But Jehu’s cunning plan was to destroy all the worshipers of Baal.

20 Then Jehu ordered, “Prepare a solemn assembly to worship Baal!” So they did. 21 He sent messengers throughout all Israel summoning those who worshiped Baal. They all came—not a single one remained behind—and they filled the temple of Baal from one end to the other. 22 And Jehu instructed the keeper of the wardrobe, “Be sure that every worshiper of Baal wears one of these robes.” So robes were given to them.

23 Then Jehu went into the temple of Baal with Jehonadab son of Recab. Jehu said to the worshipers of Baal, “Make sure no one who worships the LORD is here—only those who worship Baal.” 24 So they were all inside the temple to offer sacrifices and burnt offerings. Now Jehu had stationed eighty of his men outside the building and had warned them, “If you let anyone escape, you will pay for it with your own life.”

25 As soon as Jehu had finished sacrificing the burnt offering, he commanded his guards and officers, “Go in and kill all of them. Don’t let a single one escape!” So they killed them all with their swords, and the guards and officers dragged their bodies outside.[*] Then Jehu’s men went into the innermost fortress[*] of the temple of Baal. 26 They dragged out the sacred pillar[*] used in the worship of Baal and burned it. 27 They smashed the sacred pillar and wrecked the temple of Baal, converting it into a public toilet, as it remains to this day.

28 In this way, Jehu destroyed every trace of Baal worship from Israel. 29 He did not, however, destroy the gold calves at Bethel and Dan, with which Jeroboam son of Nebat had caused Israel to sin.

30 Nonetheless the LORD said to Jehu, “You have done well in following my instructions to destroy the family of Ahab. Therefore, your descendants will be kings of Israel down to the fourth generation.” 31 But Jehu did not obey the Law of the LORD, the God of Israel, with all his heart. He refused to turn from the sins that Jeroboam had led Israel to commit.

NOTES

10:18 Ahab’s worship of Baal was nothing compared to the way I will worship him! Lit., “Ahab served/worshiped (‘abad [TH5647, ZH6268]) Baal a little; Jehu will serve/worship him a lot.”

10:19 prophets . . . worshipers . . . priests. There are textual irregularities here concerning these terms (the term “worshipers” is lacking altogether in two Hebrew mss, and it is placed after the term “priests” in the Lucianic version of the LXX); many surmise that the reference here in the MT to “worshipers” (or, perhaps better, “cult-personnel” or “ministrants”; see Cogan and Tadmor 1988:115; cf. NIV, “ministers”) may have come from its appearance in 10:21, 23. (For the implications of ‘obedim [TH5647, ZH6268] meaning “cult-personnel” and not “worshipers,” see the commentary.)

Jehu’s cunning plan. Lit., “but Jehu acted with insidiousness.” The root ‘-q-b [TH6117, ZH6810] found here is also famously attested in the name Jacob, which leads to Esau’s plaintive wordplay in Gen 27:36: “No wonder his name is Jacob, for now he has cheated me twice.”

10:22 keeper of the wardrobe. Heb., la’asher ‘al-hammeltakhah [TH4458, ZH4921]; the last term is a hapax legomenon (a word used only once) in the MT. The exact translation is therefore uncertain, but, largely due to context, most commentators concur with the rendering found in the NLT.

robes. Concern for proper clothing for approaching the deity is also attested in Gen 35:2; Exod 19:10 (and possibly Zeph 1:8; cf. KJV).

10:23 Jehonadab. See the first note on 10:15.

10:25 Don’t let a single one escape! This is nearly identical to Elijah’s words in 1 Kgs 18:40 (but with a different Hebrew verb).

dragged their bodies outside. This is a traditional rendering of the MT, but, as noted in the translation proffered by Cogan and Tadmor (1988:105, 116), “they left [them] lying [there],” this Hiphil of the verb shalak [TH7993, ZH8959] probably means “to expose, leave unburied” (cf. Cogan 1968:133-135). This explains the first alternative translation suggested in the NLT mg. The second alternative represents a possible emendation (substituted reading) for the admittedly difficult Hebrew text, akin to that found in Gray 1970:558 note d.

innermost fortress of the temple of Baal. Lit., “as far as the city (‘ir [TH5892, ZH6551]) of the house of Baal.” Inasmuch as it is now uncertain where the precise location of this notorious (cf. 10:27) Baal temple was, possibly the normal meaning of “city” should here be retained (i.e., denoting a municipal area next to the Baal temple); alternatively, the term ‘ir might here denote “fortress” (Hobbs 1985:130).

10:26 sacred pillar. The MT contains the plural matseboth [TH4676, ZH5167] (cf. NLT mg), but then has a singular reference in the next verbal form, “and they burned it”; hence, most (like NLT) emend the Hebrew to a singular form as found in the next verse.

10:27 public toilet. The MT’s Kethiv reads makhara’oth [TH4280, ZH4738], “places of dung,” hence probably “latrines, cesspools” or the like; the Qere reads motsa’oth [TH4163, ZH4606], “places of withdrawal,” probably a euphemism for toilets or latrines (see the note on 3:24 concerning the terms Kethiv and Qere). Possibly, however, the consonantal of the Kethiv merely indicated a public dump (Cogan and Tadmor 1988:116).

to this day. This is a good translation of ‘ad hayyom (“until today”; cf. the note on 2:22), which is found in the MT. The more expected, fuller phrase ‘ad hayyom hazzeh [TH2088, ZH2296] (until this day) is attested in the LXX, Targum, and Vulgate.

10:28 destroyed every trace of Baal worship from Israel. Lit., “wiped out, exterminated [Hiphil of the verb shamad [TH8045, ZH9012]] Baal from Israel.”

10:29 Jeroboam. Concerning the nature of these infamous “sins of Jeroboam,” see the commentary on 1 Kgs 12:25-33.

10:30 done well. See the commentary for a discussion of this disquieting note of high praise from Yahweh.

fourth generation. Jehu’s dynasty was the longest of any in the northern kingdom; it encompassed some 100 years.

10:31 did not obey the Law of the LORD. This is a variation on the negative Deuteronomistic evaluative refrain for the northern kings (see endnote 1 of the Introduction for details).

COMMENTARY [Text]

“Zeal for the LORD” indeed! If we have encountered extended “genealogical cleansing” in the previous sections, now we encounter rigorous “religious cleansing.” And surely both are as repugnant to modern minds as the “ethnic cleansings” of the late twentieth century. But that is our modern Christian perspective. What about the attitudes and expectations of the original hearers/readers of the present passage? Answering such queries is a major part of the task of exegesis. Yet in the present instance, answering such questions is hard to do, inasmuch as our narrator once again basically presents “just the facts,” and lets our own perspectives and prejudices take precedence over any overt theologizing (apart from the general commendation from Yahweh [10:30] that Jehu had “done well” to destroy Ahab’s family). Cunning, clever, effective, all-encompassing—these are proper characterizations of Jehu’s actions as he successfully exterminates every single prophet, priest, and minister of Baal he can find. (That this is the nearly exact counterpart of Jezebel’s original actions against the prophets of Yahweh [cf. 1 Kgs 18:4, 13] is surely meant to be noticed.) But as was the case with Jehonadab’s earlier compact with Jehu back in 10:15-16, we cannot be sure what the narrator thought about the horrific actions he or she recorded here with such storytelling fervor. A smile surely crossed the narrator’s face when the “public toilet” (see note on 10:27) reference was delivered and, as Sweeney (2007:339) has pointed out, this reference does provide “a focal point” for the prior references to the killing off of all the males from the house of Ahab—literally, “all who urinate against the wall” (9:8; 1 Kgs 21:21; cf. the first note on 1 Kgs 14:10 for details concerning this idiom).

So what are we to make of the present narrative? Jezebel had indeed been ruthless in her attempts to exterminate the Yahwistic prophets back in 1 Kings 18. That surely horrified the narrator as much as it does us. So, is turnabout fair play? I think, even for the ancient narrator, it was not quite that simple. First of all, the question arises over whether the “ministers” (i.e., cult-personnel) of Baal were wiped out (see the first note on 10:19), or if, indeed, all the worshipers of Baal were also wiped out (so NLT, NRSV, etc.). If the latter, as Hobbs (1985:132) notes, “the cost to the country in manpower must have been great.” (In any case, Jehu apparently had declared his allegiance as a vassal-king to Shalmaneser III; cf. the commentary on 9:1-13 for details.) Even if only the former was the case, it implies hundreds, possibly thousands of deaths—certainly comparable with Elijah’s own slaughter of the 450 prophets of Baal in 1 Kings 18:40 (cf. the parallel command not to let any escape [10:25]). Could this possibly be God’s will? Certainly not, if the traditional understanding of Hos 1:4-5 is followed: “I [Yahweh] am about to punish King Jehu’s dynasty to avenge the murders he committed at Jezreel [cf. 2 Kgs 9:16-37; 10:6-11]. . . . I will break [Israel’s] military power in the Jezreel Valley.”[38]

Recently, I had the privilege of talking with Greg Boyd, an eminent evangelical Christian author and pastor living in Minnesota. He proposed an idea for a new book he wanted to write, Crucifixion of the Warrior God, which would address the “incarnational nature” of God working through Old Testament society and culture. He would suggest that as in the New Testament incarnation of Jesus (God becoming truly human, with all the ramifications that situation entails—limited power and knowledge, frailty and fatigue, etc.), so also in the Old Testament, God worked in and through the very human culture of Israel, with, for example, its bloodthirsty conceptions of holy war (this would help explain the fierce delight found in the horrific war directives found in Deuteronomy and their fulfillment in Joshua). Yahweh, the true God, does not agree completely with such fierceness, but he has chosen to work incarnationally with that culture to bring about deliverance from idolatry. Perhaps such a concept is helpful here as well. For, with proper caveats (see the next commentary section), it appears that the present narrator generally approves of Jehu’s bloodthirsty ways here, certainly citing with approval Yahweh’s own attitude concerning those ways (or at least the end result of those ways; cf. the first note on 10:30). Thus, we are told that Jehu did (largely for his own political purposes, I suspect) bring about an abrupt end to Baalism in Israel, and that (1) this was clearly and unequivocally the will of God, and (2) it served to fulfill quite literally the words of Elijah, his prophet. That is the message of the present text. And that is the reason why Jehu was promised descendants on the throne down to the fourth generation.