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The second tale: Ahab and Naboth’s Vineyard
As earthy and flawed and even corrupt as David may have been as king,
he is the closest any of the Bible’s kings come to being truly just. In this
fact we are reminded that such a government never was God’s best, but was only
allowed by God because the people themselves demanded it. Even when the prophet
told the people on God’s behalf that a king would be corrupt and violent and
oppressive, they still demanded it to satisfy their need to be like the
powerful nations around them (1 Samuel 8). But during David’s reign the
children of Abraham were given a promise of a better king to come. This new and
better king, their Messiah, would be entirely just, serving the people and
setting them free. The story of David and Araunah the Jebusite is one of many
in scripture that show a type and shadow of the ministry of Jesus, the Messiah
to come. Though David the king is incredibly flawed, of all the kings he is
held up as the best ideal of a human king, foreshadowing his descendant, Jesus,
the King of kings.
The Corruption of the Kings: From David to Ahab
David’s story is mostly told in the second book of Samuel in the Bible.
But if David is as good a king as it gets in the story of scripture, we can
imagine that things only get worse after him. This is exactly so. The Book of
First Kings (right after Second Samuel) begins with the death of King David.
After describing more than six generations, civil war, and a division of Israel
into two nations, it ends with the death of King Ahab. The book vividly
compares the corruption of the governments of the world with the justice of the
Kingdom of God. The governments of the world apart from God are always
corrupted. God is worthy to be the King of kings. But God’s rule has been
rejected by the kings of this world. In First Kings, God is the true king of
Israel. But God’s just authority is not reflected in the government.
In 1 Chronicles, David’s purchase of Araunah’s threshing floor (1
Chronicles 21) is followed immediately by preparations for the building of
Israel’s first temple on that very land (1 Chronicles 22). David’s son,
Solomon, becomes king after David, rules in a time of peace and prosperity and
builds the temple on Mount Moriah, on the hill in the land of the Jebusites.
After this high point in the history of the kings, everything goes downhill.
Solomon’s success and wealth leads to pride and power, and from there a violent
and corrupt dictatorship (1 Kings 12:4). Israel is turned into an empire like
Egypt, the empire from which they were rescued. The people are treated as
slaves, as they had been before they were an empire, while under the burden of
Egypt. All of this is just as God had warned the people when they first
demanded a king in 1 Samuel 8.
After Solomon, it goes from bad to worse. The nation splits in two, with
David’s line ruling Judah in the south, and a new line of kings ruling Israel
in the north. They are both a line of violent dictators. Some make reforms that
temporarily appear to heal the nation, but they are always patchwork attempts
and temporary. By the time of Ahab, Israel is entirely apostate, nothing at all
like they were before the time of the kings, living under a feudalistic system,
controlled by a king married to Jezebel, representing an unholy alliance with
the worshippers of the Ba’als.
For Each Greedy and Violent King,
a Righteous and Peaceful Prophet
Though God’s just rule has been abandoned by the government and the
mainstream culture in the nation, it is still kept alive and communicated
through the prophets. Each story of a corrupted king has a parallel of a
righteous prophet, strange men often living on the margins of society,
counter-cultural to whatever degree the government and the culture following it
has abandoned justice and righteousness. These lights in the darkness speak
Truth to power, boldly revealing the wickedness of the government to itself and
to the people, calling the government and the nation to repent, to turn around,
to go back to being the just people they once were. In the time of Ahab, this
prophet is Elijah (1 Kings 17-21).
Elijah vs. Ahab
Like a single loud activist ever-present at a corrupt premiere’s every
press conference, so was Elijah an offense to the selfish and greedy King Ahab.
The two men had several confrontations in 1 Kings, often with Elijah presenting
some piece of performance art or witty message that would expose Ahab for a
fool (activists take note). The most well-known of these confrontations is
probably when Elijah predicts a drought (1 Kings 17:1), punishment by God
wrought upon the king for “doing more to provoke the LORD, the God of Israel,
to anger than all the kings of Israel that were before him.” (1 Kings 16:32,
ESV). After nearly three years of drought, Elijah confronts Ahab again.
Irritated, Ahab calls Elijah “the troubler of Israel”, for which Elijah
exchanges the zinger “I have not troubled Israel, but you have … because you
have abandoned the commandments of the LORD and followed the Ba’als.” (1 Kings
18: 17-18, ESV – activists take note again: good mirror-messaging*). After this
witty exchange is the oft-told account of Elijah and the prophets of Ba’al on
Mount Carmel. They each make an offering on an altar, and ask their god to burn
it up. Elijah’s burns. The prophets are killed (1 Kings 18:20-40).
Ahab, the King of Israel and Naboth
Ahab’s rule in Israel is a lifetime of selfish, violent corruption,
addiction to power, greed, and occasionally embarrassing self-pity. Along the
way, God’s prophet Elijah is there to reveal to the king his own injustice, and
to call him to repent and turn the nation back to righteousness. Nowhere is
Ahab’s cruelty and selfishness more clearly seen than in his treatment of his
subject, Naboth of Jezreel (1 Kings 21). Ahab kept his capital in Samaria
(today’s Palestinian territory), but also maintained a palace in the land of
Jezreel (33 kilometres to the north**). Ahab notices a vineyard near his palace,
and approaches Naboth to buy it from him. Naboth tells Ahab that he cannot sell
the land by conviction. It is his family’s traditional land, and he believes
that to sell it would be wrong. We do not fault Ahab for offering to buy the
land, but when Naboth refuses to sell it, Ahab’s privilege as king is offended.
Ahab’s wife, Jezebel, finds her sulking husband lying curled up in bed
with his face to the wall, refusing to eat. After he whines his story of
rejection to her (leaving out the part about Naboth’s conviction not to sell
because it was traditional family land), Jezebel promises to get the land for
him. Her appeal for justification is that Ahab is king of Israel. In Jezebel
and Ahab’s world, a king may do whatever he pleases.
Jezebel did exactly as she promised. With Ahab’s blessing, she sets up
a mock trial in which Naboth is accused of treason and stoned to death. Once he
is dead, Jezebel returns to Ahab with the news, and Ahab takes over Naboth’s
vineyard for himself. Right away, Elijah arrives with God’s accusation of the
king. Elijah calls Ahab twice condemned for his actions, for murder and for
theft. He pronounces God’s judgment on Ahab and Jezebel both for their sin,
predicting that they will both die dishonourably, and that in their deaths
Naboth would be vindicated.
Two Kings, Two Pieces of Land
Ahab’s story is a near mirror image of David’s. While David could have
easily justified taking possession of a threshing floor by the power of his
position, he does not. Ahab has no justification whatsoever for claiming the
vineyard as his, yet he takes it. David possesses the threshing floor to build
an altar of sacrifice to God. At best, Ahab’s only intention for Naboth’s
vineyard is to increase the beauty of his home. At worst, the text suggests
that his intention to plant a “garden of herbs (literal)” may have been for the
purpose of Ba’al worship (which uses garden herbs). While David finds himself
commanded to possess the land while lying prostrate, repentant and humble
before God, Ahab responds to Naboth’s rejection by curling up on his bed and
sulking selfishly. David responds to Araunah’s generous offer of free land by nobly insisting to pay him well for it. Ahab
responds to Naboth’s rejection of an offer to sell the land by manipulating his
wife to murder.
From these two parallel stories are revealed much about the nature of
greed, of injustice, violence and war, of humility, of peace, and of just and
righteous community.
Of all these things, James tells us this:
James 3:16-4:6For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice. But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”? But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
Because any one of us can be an Ahab, kings in our own little world.
Or, submitted to the justice and righteousness of God, we can live for
the glory of God alone, our lives a sacrifice for the eternal kingdom.
PART 2 OF 3
*(On Mirror Messaging)
A good technique for
activists to use when engaging the media. When faced with an accusation, or
accusatory leading question (usually a yes or no question), follow the ABCs:
Acknowledge the
question
Bridge through a
common term/notion if possible
Communicate your
message
Q: Isn't it criminal
to be occupying private property?
A: Well, I don’t know
about that, but what I do know is that it is criminal for the 1% to continue to
benefit from a system that oppresses the 99% of us.
** (On Jezreel)
Joshua 15:56 – Jezreel
is part of a long list of lands in the inheritance of the tribe of Judah from
the hill country.
Judges 6:33 - One example of many times that Jezreel is
mentioned as a strategic place of war.
1 Samuel 25:43 – King David
married a woman from Jezreel.
1 Kings 18:45-46 –
Elijah runs past Ahab to escape the rain until they reach Jezreel, possibly indicating
that Ahab already lived there by this point.
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