Jehoahaz, King of Israel according to Josephus

Dans II Rois 13:1-9, le traitement biblique narratif accorde au roi d'Israel Joachaz pose quelques problemes textuels, chronologiques, redactionnels et compositionnels. L'A. propose une comparaison detaillee avec le recit de Flavius Josephe sur Joachaz dans les Antiquites juives 9. 173-176. Cette comparaison vise a comprendre ce qui peut etre determine concernant la forme textuelle de II Rois 13 a partir de l'utilisation qu'en fait Josephe. En outre, il est possible de voir comment Flavius Josephe apprehende les problemes bibliques et ce qu'il retient de l'histoire du roi Joachaz


JEHOAIIAZ. KING OF ISRAEL ACCORDING TO JOSEPHlJS
Josephus begins (9.173b) bis evaluation of the king with an attenuating remark: although he was no imitator (µtµrrnh;) 11 of his father. .. This qualification concerning Jehoahaz' cultic depravity has no basis in the Biblical account as such 1 2• lt likely has in view the subsequent portrayal, common to both the Bible (2 Kgs 13,4) and Josephus (9.175) of Jehoahaz' imploring divine assistance in the face of Syrian aggression-something which his father Jehu is not discribed as doing in like circumstances, see 2 Kgs 10,33-34 // Ant. 9.159-160a 1 3• Having thus mitigated the Biblical censure of Jehoahaz, Josephus next proceeds nonetheless to cite a generalized version of the charge of 2 Kgs 13,2b about the former's persistance in the sins of Jeroboam: ... he committed as many imp1ettes (<im�PfJcrm;) as did the first (kings) who held God in contempt (-roü 0Eoü Ka-raq>povrícrav-rE�)  18 This term is Josephus' precising substitute for the word «people» (MT OY, LXX )..aó�) of 2 Kgs 13,7.
19 2 Kgs 13,7 also speaks of the «ten chariots» left to Jehoahaz. By omitting this item, while conversely inserting a reference to the «very great» force Israel earlier possessed (see above in the text), Josephus accentuates the extent of Israelite losses at the hands of the Syrians. 20 This un-Biblical indication continues Josephus' accentuation of the damage inflicted by the Syrians (see previous note). He likely found inspiration for this insertion in the prophecy of Elisha to Hazael, the future king of Syria, as cited by him in AnJ. 9.91 (/ / 2 Kgs 8,12) «you will burn their strongest cities (1tÓA.E1�)» to which he introduces an explicit allusion in 9.175 (see below). Another inspiration for Josephus' mention of the Syrian conquest of lsraelite «cities» here would be 2 Kgs 13,25 (/ / Ant. 9.184) which states, without the reader having been previously informed of the matter, that Joash of Israel regained from Ben-Hadad «the cities» which the latter' father Hazael had seized from Jehoahaz. Unlike the Bible then Josephus sets up this later item via bis inserted reference to the Syrian seizure of Israelite cities during Jehoahaz' reign.
21 Josephus leaves aside the imagery with which 2 Kgs 13,7 concludes, i.e. «(the king of Syria had made the Israelite forces) like the dust at threshing».

233
Here again (see on 9.174 in relation to 2 Kgs 13,3.7) Josephus brings together (9.176) in a single sequence matter that in the source stands in separate contexts notwithstanding its contentual affinities. His version of 13,4b-5 // 13,23 thus runs: God accepted his repentance ( -rtív µE-rá.vomv ... anooexóµ&vo�) 34 as a virtue (apE-rtív) 35 and, because He saw fit to admonish the power ful and not completely destroy (a1toAAÚ&1v) 36 them, gave him (a.t r tcp, Jehoahaz) security (oifüomv ... cifü:uxv) from war and its dangers. And so when the country had obtained peace, it was restored to its former condition (tTJV 1tpoti:pav Ka-rácrtacr1v) n and began to flou rish 18• JH According to R. MARCUs, Josephus, VI, p. 95, n. d, Josephus' formulation in 9.176 (see above) represents an amplification of 2 Kgs 13,23 as opposed to 13,5. lt seems, however, that the wording of 9.176 has also -and even more-been influenced by that of l 3,4b-5. In particular its reference to God's «giving sccurity» (&ioromv ... lioetav) to Jehoahaz might be seen as Josephus' equivalent to the LXX reading in 13,5a, i.e. toroKEv ... arot11p{av. Note too that whereas 13,23 speaks only of God's solicitude for Israel as a whole, Josephus a la 13,4b («he hearkened to him [Jehoahaz]») has the Deity «give security to him», i.e. Jehoahaz. Similarly, the mention of the country's being «restored to its former condition» echoes the phrase «the people of Israel dwelt in their homes as formerly» (MT literally «as yesterday and the day before») of 13,5b. Thus while 9.176 can be seen as a conflation of 13,4b-5 and 13,23 (with which the paragraph shares a reference to God's «not destroying» the afflicted, see n. 36), its verbal contacts are, pace Marcus, more with the former than the latter. Following the above description of Israel's revival in 9.176 (2 Kgs 13,4b-5.23), Josephus proceeds directly to narrate the death of Jehoahaz and the accession of his son Joash (9.177 // 2 Kgs 13,9) .w. In so doing, he simply passes over 40 the source's intervening material. In particular, he leaves aside the statement of 13,6 that notwithstanding the Lord's intervention on their behalf «they (the Israelites) persisted in the sins of Jeroboam, just as the Asherah was allowed to remain in Samaria 41 • He likewise, in line with his inva riable practice, makes no use of the standard so urce notice f or Jehoahaz found in 13,8 42 •

CONCLUSIONS
By way of conclusion I shall now briefly sum up on my findings regarding the questions posed at the start of this essay. On the question of the textual affinities of Josephus' account of Jehoahaz, there is little, it seems, that can be said with any assurance. Josephus' reference to God's «giving security» to Jehoahaz in 9.176 might conceivably reflect the LXX «he gave salvation», as opposed to the MT reading «he gave a savior 43 » in 2 Kgs 13,5. We also noted that like L and against MT and B, Josephus does not have a second, displaced, notice (MT B 13,23) on the Lord's delivery of Israel in Jehoahaz' time, parallel in content to 13,4b-5, following his account of Jehoahaz' son and successor Joash. This latter observation is, however, hardly conclusive evidence of Josephus' utilization of a L like text of 2 Kings 13. Given the odd placement of 13,23 in MT and 39 In Josephus' presentation this notice functions, in contrast to its Biblical parallel, not as a conclusion to the account of Jehohaz, but rather as an introduction to his presentation of Joash, 9.177-185. 40 Recall that Josephus has already anticipated the content of 13,7 (the Syrian reduction of lsrael's army), see 9.174. 41 Josephus' non-utilization of this item is likely inspired by the consideration that to mention it would detract from Jehoahaz' repentance which he has just highlighted in 9.176 (just as it would point up the inefficacy of the divine admonition -the purpose for God's intervention on Israel's behalf according to Josephus, see n. 36).
42 Presumably, Josephus' reason for omitting the royal source notices of Kings and Chronicles is that his presentation is based directly on the Bible, rather than its earlier sources. 43 For speculations on the identity of this anonymous figure (e.g., Elisha), see the commentaries. B, 1t 1s, on the contrary, quite possible that Josephus, finding that notice in its MT /B position in his text of 2 Kings 13, shifted it, on his own initiative, to an earlier (and more obviously appropriate) point in his presentation, at the same conflating it with the related data of 13,4b-5 (see note 38) 44 • More definite conclusions are possible regarding Josephus' hand ling of the various problems presented by the Biblical story of Jehoahaz. He resolves the chronological discrepancy between 2 Kgs 13,1 and 10 by having Jehoahaz accede in the twenty-first (rather than twenty-third) year of Joash of Judah (9.173). Whereas the source account in its current, redacted form separates, and duplicates, items that contentually belong together, i.e. Israel's oppression by the Syrians (13,3 and 7) and the Lord's saving intervention (13,4b-5 and 23), Josephus, in both instances, reduces the Biblical data to a single statement (see 9.174 and 9.176, respectively). Thereby, he generates a tighter, more coherent presentation of Jehoahaz' reign, a characteristic still f urther accentuated by his omission of the material of 13,6 (Israel's persistence in apostasy) and 8 (source notice for Jehoahaz).
As to Josephus' personal contributions in his Jehoahaz story, we noted that he somewhat accentuates the magnitude of the losses inflicted on Israel by the Syrians (see 9.174; compare 2 Kgs 13, 3. 7). In so doing he introduces a notice about the Syrian seizure of Israelite cities which serves to set up the subsequent notice of 2 Kgs 13,25 (9.184) about Joash regaining cities lost by his father to Hazael. Conversely, Josephus also plays up the extent of Israel's divinely effected revival, see the concluding reference in 9.176 to the country's «beginning to flourish» once again which has no equivalent as such in either 2 Kgs l 3,4b-5 or 13,23. The «fulfillment notice» (9.175a) which Josephus appends to his account of Israel's subjuga tion by Syria (9.174 / / 2 Kgs 13,3. 7) underscores the status of 44 In addition, the following observations militate against taking the agreement between Josephus and L regarding the placement of the content of 2 Kgs 13,23 (MT. B) as solid evidence of his dependence on a (proto-) L text of 2 Kings 13: 1) In L the duplication between l 3,4b-5 and 13,23 (MT, B) is retained, the latter verse being cited after 13,7; Josephus, by contrast, seems to conflate both verses into a single statement