Jehoshaphat rules alongside Ahab’s house
Divided Kingdom · Draft · BSB
Content revision: 7aa511fb232fc1cc · No editorial review date recorded
Date: Judah · Jehoshaphat · Ahab’s contemporary
Jehoshaphat follows Asa’s ways, makes peace with Israel and removes remaining shrine prostitutes. Yet the high places continue. His ships for the gold trade are wrecked at Ezion-geber, and his reign eventually passes to his son Jehoram.
The summary is placed here because Jehoshaphat becomes king in Ahab’s fourth year, well before Ahab’s final battle. It spans later events too; the notice of his death does not mean he is absent from the following accounts in which he participates.
Primary Scripture
22:41 In the fourth year of Ahab’s reign over Israel, Jehoshaphat son of Asa became king of Judah.
22:42 Jehoshaphat was thirty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem twenty-five years. His mother’s name was Azubah daughter of Shilhi.
22:43 And Jehoshaphat walked in all the ways of his father Asa; he did not turn away from them, but did what was right in the eyes of the LORD. The high places, however, were not removed; the people still sacrificed and burned incense on the high places.
22:44 Jehoshaphat also made peace with the king of Israel.
22:45 As for the rest of the acts of Jehoshaphat, along with the might he exercised and how he waged war, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?
22:46 He banished from the land the male shrine prostitutes who remained from the days of his father Asa.
22:47 And there was no king in Edom; a deputy served as king.
22:48 Jehoshaphat built ships of Tarshish to go to Ophir for gold, but they never set sail, because they were wrecked at Ezion-geber.
22:49 At that time Ahaziah son of Ahab said to Jehoshaphat, “Let my servants sail with your servants,” but Jehoshaphat refused.
22:50 And Jehoshaphat rested with his fathers and was buried with them in the city of his father David. And his son Jehoram reigned in his place.
Related Scripture
2 Chronicles 17:1–10 · parallel
Chronicles expands the account of Jehoshaphat’s early reign and teaching of the law.
Location evidence
Jerusalem represents the royal seat, not the shipwreck location. No voyage to Ophir is drawn because the ships in this account never sail.
Event map marker: Identified site; [longitude, latitude] = [35.234167, 31.776667]. This is a teaching marker, not an exact event venue.
Jerusalem: Identified site. Coordinates [longitude, latitude]: [35.234167, 31.776667]. Classification source: editorial.
OpenBible.info: Jerusalem (CC BY 4.0)
OpenBible.info: Jerusalem (CC BY 4.0)
For the class
What opportunities and dangers come with making peace between the two kingdoms?
Interpretation and reuse
Narrative order is a reading arrangement, not a proven chronology. Dates retain their stated uncertainty. An identified locality does not establish the exact venue or prove an event. Region extents and routes are illustrative, not surveyed boundaries or ancient roads. Draft material has not completed editorial review.
Record source: editorial (content/authored/divided-kingdom.json)
Place coordinates from OpenBible.info Bible Geocoding Data, CC BY 4.0.
Teaching stops, summaries and regional extents are original editorial content of this atlas.
Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain. https://berean.bible/licensing.htm