THISTLE AND CEDAR

Flush from his victory over the Edomites in the south, v. 10, Amaziah, king of Judah, turns his attention northwards to his counterpart in Israel, Jehoash. ‘Let us look one another in the face’, v. 8, is a statement with confrontational overtones. Did Amaziah see himself as the new David, conquering the Edomites and uniting the nation? If so, he was ignoring the promise to Jehoash’s father, Jehu, ‘Thy children of the fourth generation shall sit on the throne of Israel’, 10. 30.

Amaziah was not suggesting a duel, but rather the pitting of their armies against each other, which prompted M. Henry’s apt description of him as, not only ‘proud, presumptuous’, but also ‘prodigal of blood’. Jehoash mockingly dismisses the challenge in a brief, pithy parabolic fable, v. 9. The words of the thistle, ‘Give thy daughter to my son’, v. 9, probably refer to Judah’s designs on some of Israel’s territory. The wild beast treads the thistle down and this depicts Jehoash’s strong and powerful army crushing the insignificant nuisance, Amaziah, whilst he, a stately cedar, looks on in disdainful aloofness.

Amaziah rejects the advice and ignores the warning of Jehoash. More importantly, he does the same with scripture, as, for example, ‘He that is of a proud heart stirreth up strife’, Prov. 28. 25, where the verb ‘stirreth up’ is the same in Hebrew as that used by Jehoash here, ‘meddle’, v. 10. Other examples in Prov­erbs are chapter 17 verse 19 and chapter 20 verse 3. He does not seek guidance from the Lord. The result: part of the wall of Jeru­salem is broken down, its treasures appropriated and he does look Jehoash in the face, but as his prisoner, literally, vv. 13, 14. The Lord’s words about a king assessing the relative strengths of his own and his enemy’s forces before going to battle, Luke 14. 31, 32, 35, may bring Amaziah to mind. ‘He that hath ears to hear, let him hear’. Amaziah did not hear.

The parallel account in 2 Chronicles adds the incident before Amaziah’s challenge, when he is shown rejecting a message from the Lord through an unnamed prophet, 2 Chron. 25. 15, 16, and subsequently taking advice from men, v. 17. God is not mocked; retribution, a theme of the book, will follow, v. 16.