There was a king in Israel named Ahab, the son of Omri. Omri did not serve the Lord, and Ahab followed in his father’s footsteps. I Kings 16:30 says that Ahab “did evil in the sight of the Lord above all that were before him”.
Ahab married a woman named Jezebel, the daughter of a Zidonian king. Jezebel and Ahab worshipped a false god, Baal. Ahab erected an altar for Baal, and he made a grove or a place the people could go to make sacrifices to this false god.
Jezebel was as wicked as Ahab. Chapter 18 of I Kings tells how Jezebel killed the prophets of the Lord and how one of Ahab’s men hid 100 prophets of the Lord in a cave to keep them safe.
These acts of Ahab and Jezebel caused Elijah to challenge the prophets of Baal to a contest, and you probably remember that Elijah destroyed all 450 of those prophets.
When Jezebel found out what Elijah had done, she sent a messenger to Elijah and told him, “So let the gods do to me, and more also, if I make not thy life as the life of one of them by tomorrow about this time”. In other words, she planned to kill him in the same way he had killed the prophets of Baal.
Elijah ran! But God was with him and eventually convinced Elijah that he was not alone. God encouraged him by telling him that there were 7,000 that had not become worshippers of Baal.
Jezebel continued her evil deeds. Ahab wanted Naboth’s vineyard, but Naboth refused to give it or sell it to Ahab. So, Jezebel had Naboth killed. Whatever she or Ahab wanted, they took it.
God sent Elijah to visit with Ahab. He took him a message that didn’t make Ahab very happy. Elijah told him,
“Behold, I will bring calamity on you. I will take away your posterity, and will cut off from Ahab every male in Israel, both bond and free. And concerning Jezebel the Lord also spoke, saying, The dogs shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel. The dogs shall eat whoever belongs to Ahab and dies in the city, and the birds of the air shall eat whoever dies in the field”(I Kings 21:21, 23-24 NKJV).
Ahab was killed in battle, and the dogs did lick his blood. Time passed, and little is said of Jezebel. Elisha was now the prophet of God in Israel, and God gave him instructions to “smite the house of Ahab”.
If you look at II Kings 9:7-8, 10, you see the reason God destroyed Jezebel.
“You shall strike down the house of Ahab your master, that I may avenge the blood of My servants the prophets, and the blood of all the servants of the Lord, at the hand of Jezebel. For the whole house of Ahab shall perish; and I will cut off from Ahab all the males in Israel, both bond and free. The dogs shall eat Jezeel on the plot of ground at Jezreel, and there shall be none to bury her.”
In the remainder of chapter 9, we see how Jehu, the king, put together a destruction plan. He killed a number of people and ended it all with the death of Jezebel. In the end, the dogs left nothing of her but her skull, her feet, and the palms of her hands.
Jezebel died because she destroyed the prophets of God. It makes me wonder what will happen to those that are trying to destroy those that serve God today.
Sandra Oliver