1. I finished Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People last night. I liked his story about how Benjamin Disraeli married his wife because she had money, but he got to the point where he actually loved her. It wasn’t that she had looks or intelligence. As Carnegie said, she just knew how to handle men. Benjamin came home and told her about his day, and she made him feel comfortable.
2. Robert Heinlein, Sixth Column, pages 218-219:
“…part of the disorganization plan is to leave the Prince still alive and in command, but cut off from all his usual assistants. That will create a turmoil of inefficiency much greater than if we had simply killed him and let their command devolve to their number-two man…”
That reminds me of what Ann Coulter said to those who claimed that the Republicans wanted to impeach Bill Clinton to reverse the 1996 election: Bill Clinton would be replaced by Al Gore if he were removed from office! It’s not as if a Republican would succeed Bill Clinton were he thrown out of the Presidency.
3. For my weekly quiet time this week, I studied II Kings 3. King Ahab of Northern Israel has died, and Moab is exploiting this opportunity to launch a revolt against Northern Israel.
V 6 says that Jehoram of Northern Israel “in that day” went out of Samaria and numbered Israel for battle. This is odd because, technically-speaking, Jehoram didn’t decide to fight Moab right when Moab revolted. We first read of Moab’s revolt in II Kings 1:1, which is mentioned before a story about Ahab’s immediate successor, Ahaziah. Ahaziah reigns for two years and dies, and he is replaced by his brother, Jehoram. So Jehoram fought Moab two years after her revolt, unless I’m missing something, or being overly literal.
Jehoram decides to attack Moab from the south rather than the north. According to the IVP Bible Background Commentary, this was because Moab was heavily fortified to her north. Jehoram gets allies in Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, and also the king of Edom, which is to the south of Moab.
But they’re going through a desert of Edom, and they can’t find water. Jehoshaphat then gets the bright idea to inquire of the LORD, and one of Jehoram’s servants recommends Elisha. And so the three kings go to Elisha.
But where is Elisha? The last we heard of him, he was in Samaria, in Northern Israel (II Kings 2:25). Did these thirsty kings go all the way north to Samaria? I doubt it. In Antiquities 9:33, Josephus states that Elisha was in the king of Israel’s camp, so that’s probably where the three kings found him.
Elisha rebukes Jehoram, probably because he was a king who did evil in the sight of the LORD. Although Jehoram put away his parents’ image of Baal, he still upheld the sin that Jeroboam brought upon Israel, namely, the golden calves in Bethel and Dan. One preacher I heard said that this shows that incomplete obedience of God counts as no obedience. But this makes no sense, for Elisha in this chapter praises Jehoshaphat, who himself performed incomplete obedience: I Kings 22:43 narrates that Jehoshaphat did right in the eyes of the LORD, but he did not remove the high places.
Plus, plenty of preachers I heard today criticized Jehoshaphat for doing what he wanted before praying about it. Jehoshaphat joined Jehoram in battle, then he decided to consult the LORD for guidance when the three kings were thirsty on their way to Moab. “Righteous” doesn’t mean perfect. “Wicked” doesn’t always mean an absolute absence of righteousness. Still, there is a difference between the righteous and the wicked.
Jehoram says that the LORD brought the three kings together, only to deliver them into the hands of Moab. Walter Bruegemann makes a big deal about Jehoram putting a pious label on his war against Moab: Jehoram claims that the LORD sent him, even though there’s no indication up to this point that God approves of Jehoram’s crusade. And Jehoram sounds like the children of Israel in the wilderness, believing that God brought him to the desert to kill him. He doesn’t entirely trust God, but he consults the LORD rather than the false deities of Northern Israel. So he must trust in God somehow, but his faith is not deep enough within him to influence his behavior as king.
Elisha tells Jehoram (or, more accurately, sings to him) to dig ditches. Water will come into these ditches, but not as a result of rain. The alliance is then to go after Moab, cutting down all trees, stopping all wells, and ruining every piece of land with stones. They are to decapacitate Moab.
John Gill points out that this is contrary to Deuteronomy 20:19, which prohibits the Israelites to cut down the trees of Canaan in the Conquest. But, as Gill points out, Moab was not part of Canaan. The Canaanite trees were to be for the Israelites for food, whereas they were to cut down the trees of Moab to deprive the Moabites of their fruit. Rashi refers to Deuteronomy 23:6, where God forbids the Israelites to seek the well-being of Moab, which hired Balaam against them.
The water comes into the ditches, and the Moabites see that it’s red. They conclude that the armies of the alliance have killed one another, so they rush to the desert to take plunder. But the alliance is waiting for them. The Israelites fight the Moabites, cutting down all their trees and ruining their land. When the Moabites are backed into a corner, Mesha, the king of Moab, offers his firstborn son on a wall. According to Josephus, he does this on a wall so that his enemies will see it. There is then “wrath upon Israel”, and the alliance departs.
What is the “wrath upon Israel”? Some say that the god of Moab (Chemosh) was mad at Israel for picking on Moab, so he got into gear and helped his people. Some contend that Israel was disgusted at the human sacrifice, so they left the scene of battle. The problem with this view is the the Hebrew term for “wrath upon” usually means “mad at”, meaning that someone had to be angry at Israel. Some state that God was mad at Israel: when Mesha offered his son, God was reminded of Israel’s idolatry, so God decided not to help Israel, after all. John MacArthur says that the Moabites became even madder at Israel after Mesha offered his son, and that encouraged them to fight harder, which convinced the Israelites to leave.
I liked a comment by Ephrem of Syrian, who stated that God simply felt sorry for the king of Moab, who felt compelled to go to desperate measures to save his own nation.