Pekahiah

2 Kings 15:23‑26  •  2 min. read  •  grade level: 11
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Jah has observed
The righteousness of the upright shall deliver them: but transgressors shall be taken in their own naughtiness. Prov. 11:55The righteousness of the perfect shall direct his way: but the wicked shall fall by his own wickedness. (Proverbs 11:5)
“In the fiftieth year of Azariah king of Judah, Pekahiah the son of Menahem began to reign over Israel in Samaria, and reigned two years. And he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord: he departed not from the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, who made Israel to sin.” Azariah (Uzziah), King of Judah, during his long reign of more than half a century, saw the death of five of Israel’s kings, three of whom were assassinated, in addition to a period of anarchy lasting at least eleven years. This marked contrast between the two kingdoms is what the prophet probably referred to when he wrote, “Ephraim encompasseth me about with lies, and the house of Israel with deceit, but Judah yet walketh with God [El], and with the holy things of truth” (Hos. 11:1212Ephraim compasseth me about with lies, and the house of Israel with deceit: but Judah yet ruleth with God, and is faithful with the saints. (Hosea 11:12), N.TR.). This does not mean that all Judah’s ways pleased the Lord, but that unlike apostate Israel, Judah maintained the truth of Jehovah as revealed in the law and symbolized in the temple’s worship and service.
“But Pekah the son of Remaliah, a captain of his, conspired against him, and smote him in Samaria, in the palace of the king’s house, with Argob and Arieh, and with him fifty men of the Gileadites: and he killed him, and reigned in his room.” Pekahiah was assassinated by his captain (shalish, aide-de-camp, probably; “the general of his house,” Josephus says) Pekah, with two of his followers, and a company of fifty Gileadites. Gilead was a direct descendant of Manasseh, oldest son of Joseph, and head of a large, powerful family, to whom Moses gave the conquered territory east of Jordan called Gilead (see Num. 32:39-4139And the children of Machir the son of Manasseh went to Gilead, and took it, and dispossessed the Amorite which was in it. 40And Moses gave Gilead unto Machir the son of Manasseh; and he dwelt therein. 41And Jair the son of Manasseh went and took the small towns thereof, and called them Havoth-jair. (Numbers 32:39‑41); Deut. 3:1313And the rest of Gilead, and all Bashan, being the kingdom of Og, gave I unto the half tribe of Manasseh; all the region of Argob, with all Bashan, which was called the land of giants. (Deuteronomy 3:13); and Judg. 12:44Then Jephthah gathered together all the men of Gilead, and fought with Ephraim: and the men of Gilead smote Ephraim, because they said, Ye Gileadites are fugitives of Ephraim among the Ephraimites, and among the Manassites. (Judges 12:4)). These Gileadites appear to have been a rough, wild class, a kind of Hebrew highlanders, and ready in Pekahiah’s day for any and all manner of villainy. See Hos. 6:88Gilead is a city of them that work iniquity, and is polluted with blood. (Hosea 6:8). They slew the king in his very palace (“with his friends at a feast;” Josephus Antiquities 9.11.1), so bold were they. Pekahiah means “Jah has observed” and implies that God had witnessed the murder of Shallum by Pekahiah’s father Mena-hem, and had avenged that murder in the death of his son (2 Chron. 24:2222Thus Joash the king remembered not the kindness which Jehoiada his father had done to him, but slew his son. And when he died, he said, The Lord look upon it, and require it. (2 Chronicles 24:22)). His name, like his father’s and grandfather’s, does not occur anywhere else in Scripture.
“And the rest of the acts of Pekahiah, and all that he did, behold, they are written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel.” His death ended the seventh dynasty of the Israelitish kings.