Amon | |
---|---|
King of Judah | |
Reign | 643/642 – 641/640 BC [1] [2] |
Predecessor | Manasseh |
Successor | Josiah |
Born | c. 664 BC Judah |
Died | c. 641 BC Jerusalem |
Burial | 641 BC Garden of Uzza [3] |
Consort | Jedidah [4] |
Issue | Josiah |
Hebrew | אָמוֹן |
House | House of David |
Father | Manasseh |
Mother | Meshullemeth [5] |
Amon of Judah [lower-alpha 1] was the fifteenth King of Judah who, according to the biblical account, succeeded his father Manasseh of Judah. Amon is most remembered for his idolatrous practices during his short two-year reign, which led to a revolt against him and eventually to his assassination in c. 641 BC.
Amon was the son of King Manasseh of Judah and Meshullemeth, a daughter of Haruz of Jotbah. [5] Although the date is unknown, the Hebrew Bible records that he married Jedidah, the daughter of Adaiah of Bozkath. [6] Following Manasseh's death, Amon began his reign of Judah at the age of 22, and reigned for two years. [7] Unlike many of his predecessors, who appear to have been made a co-regent at the age of 12, his reign does not allow for a period of co-regency, even though his father was at a very high age. This and the age of Manasseh at his birth (44) does suggest he may have been a younger son. The Jerusalem Bible describes Manasseh and Amon as "two wicked kings". [8] Biblical scholar and archeologist William F. Albright has dated his reign to 642–640, while professor E. R. Thiele offers the dates 643/642 – 641/640. [1] Thiele's dates are tied to the reign of Amon's son Josiah, whose death at the hands of Pharaoh Necho II occurred in the summer of 609. The battle in which Josiah is said to have died, which is independently confirmed in Egyptian history, [9] places the end of Amon's reign, 31 years earlier, in 641 or 640 and the beginning of his rule in 643 or 642. [1]
The Hebrew Bible records that Amon continued his father Manasseh's practice of idolatry and set up pagan images as his father had done. [3] II Kings states that Amon "did that which was evil in the sight of Yahweh, as did Manasseh his father. And he walked in all the way that his father walked in, and served the idols that his father served, and worshipped them." [7] Similarly, II Chronicles records that "…he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord, as did Manasseh his father; and Amon sacrificed unto all the graven images which Manasseh his father had made, and served them." [10] The Talmudic tradition recounts that "Amon burnt the Torah, and allowed spider webs to cover the altar [through complete disuse] ... Amon sinned very much." [11] [12] Like other textual sources, Flavius Josephus too criticizes the reign of Amon, describing his reign in similar terms to the biblical accounts. [13]
After reigning two years, Amon was assassinated by his servants or officials, [14] who conspired against him, and he was succeeded by his son Josiah, who at the time was eight years old. [6] After Amon's assassination, his murderers became unpopular with the "people of the land," and they were ultimately killed. [15] It was the people of the land who proclaimed Josiah as his successor; [16] it is not clear what succession would have been anticipated by the officials who assassinated Amon. Some scholars, such as Abraham Malamat, assert that Amon was assassinated because people disliked the heavy influence that Neo-Assyrian Empire, an age-old enemy of Judah responsible for the Assyrian destruction of the Kingdom of Israel, had upon him. [17]
Amon's reign was in the midst of a transitional time for the Levant and the entire Mesopotamian region. To the east of the Kingdom of Judah, the Neo-Assyrian Empire was beginning to disintegrate while the Neo-Babylonian Empire had not yet risen to replace it. To the west, the Saïte Egypt was still recovering under pharaoh Psamtik I from the Assyrian occupation of 673-63, [18] transforming from a vassal state to an autonomous ally. [19] In this power vacuum, many smaller states such as Judah were able to govern themselves without foreign intervention from larger empires. [20]
The opinion that Amon was the most sinful of all the wicked kings of Judah (II Chron. xxxiii. 23) is brought out in the Talmud in tractate Sanhedrin 103b) as follows: Ahaz suspended the sacrificial worship and sealed the Torah scrolls, Manasseh burned the names of the Lord and tore down the altar, Amon made it a place of desolation [covered it with cobwebs] and burned the Torah scrolls. This is derived from the story of the finding of the Book of the Law, II Kings, xxii. 8]; Ahaz permitted incest, Manasseh committed it with his sister, Amon committed it with his mother, saying to her, I only did this to anger the Creator. And yet, out of respect for his son Josiah, Amon's name was not placed on the list of the kings excluded from the world to come. The sages also explain proverbs 24:30 as follows: I passed by the field of a lazy man, This is Ahaz. And the vineyard of a senseless man, this is Manashe. And behold, it was all overgrown with thorns, this is Amon. And its surface was covered with Nettle, this is Jehoiakim. And its stone wall was broken down, this is a reference to Zedekiah, in whose days the temple was destroyed. A midrashic fragment preserved in the Apostolic Constitutions , ii. 23, which appears to follow an account of the repentance of Manasseh according to a lost Jewish apocryphal writing, reads [21] :
"No sin is more grievous than idolatry, for it is treason against God. Yet even this has been forgiven upon sincere repentance; but he that sins from a mere spirit of opposition, to see whether God will punish the wicked, shall find no pardon, although he say in his heart, 'I shall have peace in the end (by repenting), though I walk in the stubbornness of my evil heart'" (Deut. xxix. 19). Such a one was Amon, the son of Manasseh, for the (Apocryphal) Scripture says: "And Amon reasoned an evil reasoning of transgression and said: 'My father from his childhood was a great transgressor, and he repented in his old age. So will I now walk after the lust of my soul and afterward return to the Lord.' And he committed more evil in the sight of the Lord than all that were before him; but the Lord God speedily cut him off from this good land. And his servants conspired against him and slew him in his own house, and he reigned two years only." It is noteworthy that this very midrashic fragment casts light upon the emphatic teaching of the Mishnah (Yoma, viii. 9): "Whosoever says, 'I will sin and repent thereafter,' will not be granted the time for repentance." [22]
The Book of Kings is a book in the Hebrew Bible, found as two books in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. It concludes the Deuteronomistic history, a history of ancient Israel also including the books of Joshua, Judges, and Samuel.
Hezekiah, or Ezekias, was the son of Ahaz and the thirteenth king of Judah according to the Hebrew Bible.
Isaiah was the 8th-century BC Israelite prophet after whom the Book of Isaiah is named.
Omri was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the sixth king of Israel. He was a successful military campaigner who extended the northern kingdom of Israel. Other monarchs from the House of Omri are Ahab, Ahaziah, Joram, and Athaliah. Like his predecessor, king Zimri, who ruled for only seven days, Omri is the second king mentioned in the Bible without a statement of his tribal origin. One possibility, though unproven, is that he was of the tribe of Issachar.
Ahaz an abbreviation of Jehoahaz II, "Yahweh has held" was the twelfth king of Judah, and the son and successor of Jotham. Ahaz was 20 when he became king of Judah and reigned for 16 years.
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Jehoiakim, also sometimes spelled Jehoikim was the eighteenth and antepenultimate King of Judah from 609 to 598 BC. He was the second son of King Josiah and Zebidah, the daughter of Pedaiah of Rumah. His birth name was Eliakim.
Jotham or Yotam was the eleventh king of Judah, and son of Uzziah and Jerusha, daughter of Zadok. Jotham was 25 years old when he began his reign, and he reigned for 16 years. Edwin R. Thiele concluded that his reign commenced as a coregency with his father, which lasted for 11 years. Because his father Uzziah was afflicted with tzaraath after he went into the Temple to burn incense, Jotham became governor of the palace and the land at that time, i.e. coregent, while his father lived in a separate house as a leper.
Manasseh was the fourteenth king of the Kingdom of Judah. He was the oldest of the sons of Hezekiah and Hephzibah. He became king at the age of 12 and reigned for 55 years.
Josiah or Yoshiyahu was the 16th King of Judah. According to the Hebrew Bible, he instituted major religious reforms by removing official worship of gods other than Yahweh. Until the 1990s, the biblical description of Josiah’s reforms were usually considered to be more or less accurate, but that is now heavily debated. According to the Bible, Josiah became king of the Kingdom of Judah at the age of eight, after the assassination of his father, King Amon and reigned for 31 years, from 641/640 to 610/609 BCE.
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The Kings of Judah were the monarchs who ruled over the ancient Kingdom of Judah, which was formed in about 930 BC, according to the Hebrew Bible, when the United Kingdom of Israel split, with the people of the northern Kingdom of Israel rejecting Rehoboam as their monarch, leaving him as solely the King of Judah.
Matthew 1:10 is the tenth verse of the first chapter in the Gospel of Matthew in the Bible. The verse is part of the section where the genealogy of Joseph, the father of Jesus, is listed.
2 Kings 18 is the eighteenth chapter of the second part of the Books of Kings in the Hebrew Bible or the Second Book of Kings in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. The book is a compilation of various annals recording the acts of the kings of Israel and Judah by a Deuteronomic compiler in the seventh century BCE, with a supplement added in the sixth century BCE. This chapter records the events during the reign of Hezekiah, the king of Judah, a part of the section comprising 2 Kings 18:1 to 20:21, with a parallel version in Isaiah 36–39.
2 Kings 19 is the nineteenth chapter of the second part of the Books of Kings in the Hebrew Bible or the Second Book of Kings in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. The book is a compilation of various annals recording the acts of the kings of Israel and Judah by a Deuteronomic compiler in the seventh century BC, with a supplement added in the sixth century BC. This chapter records the invasion of Assyrian to Judah during the reign of Hezekiah, the king of Judah, a part of the section comprising 2 Kings 18:1 to 20:21, with a parallel version in Isaiah 36–39.
2 Kings 20 is the twentieth chapter of the second part of the Books of Kings in the Hebrew Bible or the Second Book of Kings in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. The book is a compilation of various annals recording the acts of the kings of Israel and Judah by a Deuteronomic compiler in the seventh century BCE, with a supplement added in the sixth century BCE. This chapter records the events during the reign of Hezekiah and Manasseh, the kings of Judah.
2 Kings 15 is the fifteenth chapter of the second part of the Books of Kings in the Hebrew Bible or the Second Book of Kings in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. The book is a compilation of various annals recording the acts of the kings of Israel and Judah by a Deuteronomic compiler in the seventh century BCE, with a supplement added in the sixth century BCE. This chapter records the events during the reigns of Azariah (Uzziah) and his son, Jotham, the kings of Judah, as well as of Zechariah, Shallum, Menahem, Pekahiah and Pekah, the kings of Israel. Twelve first verses of the narrative belong to a major section 2 Kings 9:1–15:12 covering the period of Jehu's dynasty.
2 Kings 21 is the twenty-first chapter of the second part of the Books of Kings in the Hebrew Bible or the Second Book of Kings in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. The book is a compilation of various annals recording the acts of the kings of Israel and Judah by a Deuteronomic compiler in the seventh century BCE, with a supplement added in the sixth century BCE. This chapter records the events during the reign of Manasseh and Amon, the kings of Judah.
2 Chronicles 33 is the thirty-third chapter of the Second Book of Chronicles the Old Testament of the Christian Bible or of the second part of the Books of Chronicles in the Hebrew Bible. The book is compiled from older sources by an unknown person or group, designated by modern scholars as "the Chronicler", and had the final shape established in late fifth or fourth century BCE. This chapter belongs to the section focusing on the kingdom of Judah until its destruction by the Babylonians under Nebuchadnezzar and the beginning of restoration under Cyrus the Great of Persia. It contains the regnal accounts of Manasseh and Amon, the kings of Judah.
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain : Singer, Isidore; et al., eds. (1901–1906). "Amon, King of Judah". The Jewish Encyclopedia . New York: Funk & Wagnalls.