JEZEBEL [ISABEL] (אִיזֶ֗בֶל, LXX and NT ̓Ιεζαβήλ). The name prob. means chaste as does the common European name Agnes—quite inappropriate. Her story extends from 1 Kings 16 to 2 Kings 11.

1. Jezebel’s family origin. This remarkable evil woman was derived from a Phoen. clan which she truly represented. This family happens to constitute one of the earliest confluences of Biblical history with the written classical history of Greece—if one may suppose that such were Josephus’ sources. Though called “king of the Zidonians,” Ethbaal (1 Kings 16:31) her father was king of all Phoenicia. By assassination of his predecessor he had established his reign at the age of thirty-six. His reign lasted thirty-two years. His dynasty included a great-grandson, Pygmalion, who, at the time of his death ninety-four years after Ethbaal’s accession, brought the reign of the dynasty to an end. (See Ahab.)

2. Marriage (1 Kings 16:31). Although marriage of Hebrews with the Canaanite peoples of the Levant was strictly forbidden by Mosaic law it was precisely her unlawful conjugal union with Ahab (q.v.) which rescued her name from the oblivion of most other ancients and secured for her a perpetual infamy wherever the Holy Scriptures are known.

3. Her anti-Jehovah acts. Scripture traces her husband’s apostasy directly to her influence (1 Kings 6:30-34). His evils, said to be more than any of his predecessors’ in office, are laid at her door. These were chiefly giving himself to Baal worship, with all its vile accompaniments, establishing a Baal cult center at Samaria, the national capital, and thereby leading the whole nation into apostasy. At her instigation (Ahab consenting) a systematic pogram aimed at extermination of all leadership of Jehovah worship in Israel was begun. Evidently the Lord’s prophets were slaughtered by the hundreds (1 Kings 18:1-4). At the same time Baal prophets were given national prominence, a number even being housed and fed in precincts of the royal palace (1 Kings 18:17-19).

4. Contest with Elijah (1 Kings 18; 19). It was in this climate of national tension that the prophet Elijah (q.v.) appeared as single public advocate of the ancestral faith. The striking events of Elijah’s career—the prophesied drought (2 Kings 17:1ff.), his period of hiding and divine sustenance (17:2-24), the contest with the 850 prophets of Baal and his consort (18:1-40), breaking of the drought (18:41-46) and the flight to Sinai are all features of Elijah’s personal contest with Jezebel.

5. Murder of Naboth (1 Kings 21:5-15 cf. 2 Kings 9:26). This incident which displays the worst side of Ahab’s weak character shows his wife as a true daughter of a pagan court—intrigue, treason, deception, public display of legality and virtue to cover subvert unrighteousness. The scrupulosity of apparent observance of legal (Mosaic law, for it was still official constitution) details, while perpetrating murder and theft, is a lesson in betrayal of public trust by official persons.

6. Prophecy of her violent death and extinction of her family (1 Kings 21:17-24). For fulfillment of this horrible prognostication read 1 Kings 22:29-40 (Ahab’s end) and 2 Kings 9:1-37 (Jezebel and her posterity). [See also Jehoshaphat; Jehoram Joram; Ahaziah and Athaliah.]

7. Her permanent baleful influences. Immediately, the Scripture states, she corrupted her husband (1 Kings 21:25, 26) and through him the kingdom of Israel. Through her offspring, married to the leading scion of the house of David (viz. Jehoshaphat; Ahaziah; Athaliah), she came near to bringing the house of David to extinction (viz. also 2 Kings 8:25-27; 11:1-3; 2 Chron 21:5-7; 22:10-23:21).