Women with a Story to Tell. A Tale of Two Heroes.

 Among the lists of ‘righteous women’ in the Bible you will find a woman named Jehosheba. Not a household name, even in its shortened form Josheba. Nevertheless, she is a key figure in the history and hopes of Jews and Christians alike. She was the daughter of King Jehoram of Judah, and sister to King Ahaziah, his successor in Judah. However, when we come across this woman in the Biblical story, she is operating as part of the opposition to the ruling party. I’ll tell you why below. We should be thankful to have people who oppose rulers when things clearly go wrong. .

 Her antagonist was named Athaliah, also not a household name. But, let me tell you her lineage and you tell me where she fits into the story. She is the granddaughter of Omri who came to the throne in the northern kingdom of Israel by assassinating the previous king, Elah. Her father was King Ahab of Israel and her mother was the notorious Jezebel. If you have been reading this series, you already know that this is a family with an evil reputation. She did not reflect devotion to YHWH, the God of Israel, yet she gained the support of all those who would benefit from the political scam. Go figure.

 Here’s the opening paragraph to the story in the Bible.

Now when Athaliah, Ahaziah’s mother, saw that her son was dead, she set about to destroy all the royal family. But Jehosheba, King Joram’s daughter, Ahaziah’s sister, took Joash son of Ahaziah and stole him away from among the king’s children who were about to be killed; she put him and his nurse in a bedroom. Thus she hid him from Athaliah, so that he was not killed; he remained with her for six years, hidden in the house of the LORD, while Athaliah reigned over the land (II Kings 11: 1-3).

 Let's keep the story straight. After King Solomon, Israel and Judah separated. Solomon’s son became the king of Judah, and thus the line of David was preserved. In Israel, the first king was a leader from another tribe, not from Judah and not from the lineage of David. The kings of Israel were subject to frequent assassinations leading to a series of replacement dynasties. 

 At first, there was warfare between the two kingdoms as they tried to consolidate their power and establish boundaries. While Israel had a succession of bad kings who did not support the worship of YHWH, Judah was blessed with some, but not all, good kings. Two of those were Asa and his son Jehoshaphat who ruled during the 800s BC. Jehoshaphat especially tried to get along with the king of Israel, but the king of his time was Ahab. That relationship involved tricky diplomacy and did cause some problems for Judah. 

 One such problem came from the attempt to seal an alliance between the two kingdoms with a royal marriage. Ahab gave his daughter Athaliah to marry Jehoshaphat’s son Jehoram. This uneasy alliance and marriage came into question when Ahab and Jezebel were killed, as I have described in a previous section about Jezebel. Then later, during a period of one year, probably 841 BC, Jehoram of Judah and Joram of Israel were both killed, and Jehoram’s son Ahaziah was wounded. Then Ahaziah died also. Athaliah’s husband and son were both killed, and she saw her chance.

 Immediately, Athaliah tried to revive the worship of Ba’al in Judah. Remember that she was the daughter of Jezebel who tried the same trick in Israel. She began two pursue two strategies to take power. First, through skillful use of power and propaganda, she convinced the people of Judah that Ba’al was the same as YHWH, an improvement actually because one could negotiate with Ba’al. Second, she began a terror campaign against the remaining members of her husband’s line. Since neither her husband nor her son was king any more, she was in danger of losing her grip on power. She, like many politicians, would do anything to cling to power. 

 How does one stand against such corruption and violence? It’s a matter of priorities. God’s priorities are above national priorities. If your nation is pretending that sinful leaders are really godly, then it is time to call a false prophet a false prophet. If your nation is pretending that being a peacemaker means waging war, then don’t fall for that gimmick. War is war and genocide is genocide. Ba’al is Ba’al, an idol made with human hands, not the real God whose hands made the human beings that carved the idol. 

 In this case, Jehosheba, a king’s daughter, and sister to the last king before Athaliah, took matters into her own hands. Her name means “Yah (God) is my oath.”  Against the government’s attempt to bully the people into submission, she rescued her nephew, Ahaziah’s son Joash, and hid him from the police. 

 Another unnamed woman was also involved. She was the boy’s nurse. For six years these two were able to resist a government that was increasingly interfering in people’s lives. Does she succeed? What next?