Stories of the Prophets (Before the Exile) | Page 3

the first Jeroboam led the rebellion of the ten
tribes against King Solomon's weak son, Rehoboam, and established
the independent kingdom of the Ten Tribes, with Samaria as the capital,
was there such rejoicing in that city.
We can picture the celebration in our mind's eye; we cannot describe it
in words.
Parents who had sent their sons to the war now laughed happily
through their tears, because there would be an end to war.
Sisters whose brothers doubtless lay dead in and about the walls of the
doomed city, now sang songs of joy in the midst of their weeping,
because there would be an end to war.

The strongest and finest men of Israel had given their lives for their
country, but now, thank God! there would be an end to war.
The fall of Damascus meant the end of a hundred and fifty years' war,
commenced by Ben-hadad I, of Syria, against Israel, long before
Jeroboam's great-grandfather established the dynasty of Jehu on the
throne of Israel.
It meant even more than that; it meant the end of Syrian oppression,
and, perhaps, a period of peace to the long-troubled and war-ridden
kingdom of Israel.
No wonder, then, that there were feasts of rejoicing and full-throated
cries:
"Damascus has fallen! Long live King Jeroboam!" "Damascus has
fallen! Long life to the house of Jehu!"
All day and all night Samaria swarmed with people. The streets were
thronged with shouting men and women who had come from Geba and
Dothan, and even from Jezreel on the north, and from Schechem and
Shiloh and Bethel on the south, to help celebrate the great victory.
Sacrifices were brought at all the sanctuaries of Israel--in Bethel, in
Dan, in Gilgal, in Beersheba.
Priests and people brought thank-offerings, and, together, sang praises
to God:
"God is my light and my salvation, Whom shall I fear? God is the
strength of my life, Of whom shall I be afraid?"
Truly, God was on the side of Israel, or else the Syrians could not have
been defeated. He was showing favor to the Northern Kingdom, and
was pleased with Israel, for was not Judah, the Southern Kingdom, too,
paying tribute to Jeroboam?
And so they recalled how Joash, the father of the great Jeroboam II,

defeated Amaziah, king of Judah, took him captive, partially
demolished the walls of Jerusalem, and looted the Temple in Jerusalem.
The older men of Samaria remembered the fine sarcasm with which
Joash treated Amaziah's challenge to war, in his reply:
"The thistle that was in Lebanon sent to the cedar that was in Lebanon,
saying, 'Give thy daughter to my son to wife,' and there passed by a
wild beast that was in Lebanon, and trod down the thistle."
How young and old laughed at the repetition of this clever little story
that compared Israel to a cedar in its strength and to a wild beast in its
fighting power, and Judah to a poor, little thistle to be tramped upon!
Jeroboam II was indeed a son of his father. Joash humbled Judah,
Israel's enemy on the south; Jeroboam humbled Syria, Israel's enemy
on the north.
Not satisfied with the fall of Damascus, however, Jeroboam pushed
right ahead and captured Lodebar and Karnaim, which he turned over
to Assur-dan, king of Assyria.
The fact is that Jeroboam had to do this. It was his end of a bargain
made with Assur-dan. It was agreed between the two that the Assyrians
would keep their hands off during the war between Israel and Syria.
As a reward for Assur-dan's non-interference, Jeroboam undertook to
capture these two cities and turn them over to the Syrians to become
part of his empire.
Having fulfilled his agreement, Jeroboam continued his victorious
march further north, and never stopped until he had laid low the pride
of Hamath, the prosperous city on the river Orontes.
Jeroboam II, thus had the great distinction of restoring the boundaries
of the Kingdom of Israel to the proportions of the empire of David and
Solomon, "from the entrance of Hamath unto the sea of Arabah," which
is the Dead Sea.

Wonderful was the reception prepared for the king and his victorious
army on their return to Samaria. More people had come to the city to
join in the welcoming demonstration than had pilgrimed to Jerusalem
on the Passover, in the days before the division of the kingdom.
The northern walls were massed with people, and the gates were
decorated with flowers. Priests and elders, dressed in spotless white and
led by the high priest, Amaziah, himself, awaited Jeroboam and his
generals just outside of the city and preceded them to the gates. Such an
acclamation of joy as greeted the king upon his entrance through the
gates had never been heard in Samaria.
Passing