d with rage and
fury, and sought the life of the prophet. He again escaped, and by divine
command went to the wilderness of Damascus and anointed Hazael to be king
over Syria, and Jehu to be king over Israel, and Elisha to be his
successor as prophet.

(M150) Soon after this, Benhadad, the king of Syria, came from Damascus
with a vast army and thirty-two allied kings, to besiege Samaria. Defeated
in a battle with Ahab, the king of Syria fled, but returned the following
year with a still larger army for the conquest of Samaria. But he was
again defeated, with the loss of one hundred thousand men in a single day,
and sought to make peace with the king of Israel. Ahab made a treaty with
him, instead of taking his life, for which the prophet of the Lord
predicted evil upon him and his people. But the anger of God was still
further increased by the slaughter of Naboth, through the wiles of
Jezebel, and the unjust possession of the vineyard which Ahab had coveted.
Elijah, after this outrage on all the fundamental laws of the Jews, met
the king for the last time, and pronounced a dreadful penalty--that his own
royal blood should be licked up by dogs in the very place where Naboth was
slain, and that his posterity should be cut off from reigning over Israel;
also, that his wicked queen should be eaten by dogs.

(M151) In three years after, while attempting to recover Ramoth, in
Gilead, from Benhadad, he lost his life, and was brought in his chariot to
Samaria to be buried. And the dogs came and licked the blood from the
chariot where it was washed. He was succeeded by Ahaziah, his son, B.C.
913, who renewed the worship of Baal, and died after a short and
inglorious reign, B.C. 896, without leaving any son, and Jehoram, his
brother, succeeded him. In reference to this king the Scripture accounts
are obscure, and he is sometimes confounded with Jehoram, the son of
Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, who married a daughter of Ahab. This accounts
for the alliance between Jehoshaphat and Ahab, and also between the two
Jehorams, since they were brothers-in-law, which brought to an end the
long wars of seventy years, which had wasted both Israel and Judah.

Jehoram did evil in the sight of the Lord, but was not disgraced by
idolatry. In his reign the Moabites, who paid a tribute of one hundred
thousand sheep and one hundred thousand lambs, revolted. Jehoram, assisted
by the kings of Judah, and of Edom, marched against them, and routed them,