Jezebel: Her Name is Not

by Joan M. Cahalan

Joan Cahalan (BSEE, Purdue University) is an MABS. in Old Testament student at ATS.

The Bible uses a simple litmus test to evaluate the reign of each Northern Israelite king: whether or not “he did evil in the eyes of the Lord, walking in the ways of Jeroboam, son of Nebat” (1 Kings 15:34). For some considered especially detestable, however, elaboration is given. Ahab receives a longer evaluation in 1 Kings 16, for he “did more evil in the eyes of the Lord than any of those before him. He not only considered it trivial to commit the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, but he also married Jezebel …” (1 Kings 16:31).

Jezebel is arguably the most reviled villain in the entire Bible. Such is her wicked influence that her husband is deemed the most evil Northern king to date by virtue of association. Her story is spread over a number of biblical chapters, spanning 1 Kings 16 to 2 Kings 9, and she is cast in an extremely negative light in each account. The writer’s aversion to Jezebel continues through her life and even past her death, which is recorded in 2 Kings 9:30–37. Her death scene is grisly and demeaning, fulfilling Elijah’s earlier prophecy of her downfall and celebrating her destruction as an enemy of YHWH and his people.

The scene of her demise is a well defined narrative unit. It begins as her killer rides towards Jezreel, where she has taken up residence, and ends as her body is reduced to “dung.” The passage follows a strict chronology from confrontation to killing to disposal of her remains. The only exception to this is when the narrator engages in analepsis in verse 36 when Jehu recalls both Elijah (1 Kings 21:23) and Elisha’s (2 Kings 9:10) past prophesies concerning Jezebel’s body being consumed by dogs.

Jehu is the first character mentioned in the pericope, as the biblical narrative continues with the vav conversive “and he went towards Jezreel” (2 Kings 9:30). Jehu has undergone an extensive life change since he was first introduced at the beginning of chapter 9. In 2 Kings 9:1–3, Elisha appoints one from his company of prophets to anoint Jehu king over Israel despite the fact the Jezebel’s son Joram is the sitting monarch. At his anointing, Jehu is directed to “destroy the house of Ahab your master” (2 Kings 9:7). He is told that YHWH will “cut off from Ahab every last male in Israel” (2 Kings 9:8) and he is given foresight into Jezebel’s fate: “As for Jezebel, dogs will devour her on the plot of ground at Jezreel, and no one will bury her” (2 Kings 9:10). Acting in the authority of his new commission, Jehu plots treachery against King Joram. He encounters him outside Jezreel in verse 21 “on the plot of ground that had belonged to Naboth the Jezreelite.” King Joram addresses Jehu in verse 22 with words that will resurface in like fashion on Jezebel’s lips later as he asks, “Is it peace, Jehu?”

Jehu’s response in 9:22 affords the narrator an opportunity to characterize Jezebel for the reader through the eyes of her assailant: “How can there be peace as long as all the idolatry and witchcraft of your mother Jezebel abound?” Jehu then kills King Joram and throws his body in Naboth’s field in an ironic fulfillment of an earlier prophecy of 1 Kings 21:19. Awakened to a lust for blood, he pursues and mortally wounds Ahaziah, king of Judah, going outside the bounds of what Elisha’s prophet has given him license to do. Setting his sights next on the queen, he speeds off in earnest for Jezreel in verse 30.

Jehu’s horseback ride towards Jezreel shifts the point of view to Jezebel as she hears him approaching. Who is this evil queen, and does she deserve the fatal confrontation that awaits her? She is named Jezebel in the biblical text, but Wray argues that this could be a Hebrew corruption of her Phoenician name, altered to mean “garbage pile.” “As we can safely assume that her parents did not choose to name their princess daughter ‘dung heap,’ this etymological sleight of hand … serves as a warning to the reader: Beware!”[1] Jerome Walsh agrees, proposing that Jezebel’s name reflects a deformation of “zabul,” meaning “prince” to “zebel,” resembling “garbage” in other Semitic languages.[2] Jezebel is first given biblical mention in 1 Kings 16:31, as “the daughter of King Ethbaal of the Sidonians.” Her father’s name means “Baal exists.” Significantly, “Baal will be YHWH’s chief rival for Israel’s worship throughout the centuries of the monarchy.”[3] Thus, through the names of both Jezebel and her father, Baal is introduced into the line of Israel’s kings, and battle lines are drawn in the theological crusade to determine whether YHWH or Baal will be Lord in Israel.

1 Kings 16:31 states that Ahab took Jezebel as his wife. She is likely given in marriage to Ahab to forge an alliance between the dynasty of Omri and the Phoenician state. “Both Israel and Tyre benefited from the new agreement: markets were gained for Israel’s produce, and the products of Phoenicia’s skilled artisans and imported wares found a welcome home in Samaria and beyond.”[4] Perhaps unbeknownst to Jezebel, however, her nation-via-marriage has reason to detest her. Was it not foreign women who seduced Israel into worshiping Baal of Peor in Numbers 25? Was it not Solomon’s foreign wives “who turned his heart after other gods” in 1 Kings 11:4? Indeed, by virtue of juxtaposition, the narrator attributes Ahab’s apostasy to Jezebel. “He also married Jezebel daughter of Ethbaal king of the Sidonians, and began to serve Baal and worship him. He set up an altar for Baal in the temple of Baal that he built in Samaria. Ahab also made an Asherah pole …” (1 Kings 16:31–33). Following the example set by Solomon in 1 Kings 11:7–8, Ahab sought to honor the religion of his foreign wife, adding the worship of her gods to the official religious practices of the state “in accord with the accepted norms of international diplomacy.”[5]

This action, of course, falls in direct opposition to the long-standing command of YHWH of Israel to have no other gods before him (Exodus 20:2). The worship of Baal and Asherah by the royal house of Ahab, at the instigation of his wife, is the chief conflict which exists at the heart of the Jezebel narrative. It undergirds the confrontations that take place between the monarchy and YHWH’s prophets, and is the biblical justification for her being put to death.

In 2 Kings 9:30, as Jezebel hears Jehu approaching, she begins a series of fast-paced, deliberate, detailed actions. She “put black powder (פוך) on her eyes, arranged her hair, and looked down through the window” of the royal residence in Jezreel. There is some debate concerning Jezebel’s actions, ranging from her intention to seduce Jehu[6] to her defiance in the face of impending death. Regardless of her motivation, her actions bring forth powerful allusions.

First, the narrator’s mention of black powder, פוך, to adorn her eyes is significant. In Jeremiah 4:30, the prophet speaks judgment upon his apostate nation, warning of its downfall. He paints an additional biblical portrait of one who uses the black powder: “And you, O desolate one, what do you mean that you dress in crimson, that you deck yourself with ornaments of gold, that you enlarge your eyes with פוך? In vain you beautify yourself. Your lovers despise you; they seek your life.” Both Jezebel and the idolatrous nation seek to enhance their appearance, but the effort is in vain. In their sin, their hearts are dark and their fate is doomed.

Perhaps more suggestive, though, is the narrator’s use of imagery in positioning Jezebel at her window. The Hebrew uses three words, שקף בעד חלון, (“look down”, “through”, and “window”) to express the action. This three word combination is found in five other instances in Scripture. In three of these, the subjects “looking through the window” are women, who are “victims of disruption that cannot be avoided.”[7]

The first reference is in Judges 5:28: “Through the window peered Sisera’s mother; behind the lattice she cried out, ‘Why is his chariot so long in coming? Why is the clatter of his chariots delayed?’ ” Sisera’s mother awaits the victorious return of her son, a Canaanite army commander, who has gone into battle against Deborah, Barak, and other Israelite tribes. Unbeknownst to her, however, he has been killed by Jael when “she drove a tent peg through his temple into the ground, and he died” (Judges 4:21). The image of Sisera’s mother at her window is cast towards the end of Deborah’s victory song, as a mockery of this Canaaninte mother’s assumption that her foreign son will achieve victory over YHWH’s people. By tying Jezebel’s story to Sisera’s mother through the window imagery, the narrator wishes to remind the reader that God’s anointed people will eventually celebrate victory over their foreign enemies. Jezebel’s Phoenician, Baal-worshiping family will grieve over her demise.

The second and third citations are in reference to David’s wife, Michal. 2 Samuel 6:16 reads, “As the ark of the LORD came into the city of David, Michal daughter of Saul looked out of the window, and saw King David leaping and dancing before the LORD; and she despised him in her heart.” 1 Chronicles 15:29, in reference to the same event, reads similarly. Michal is named as the daughter of Saul, as opposed to the wife of David, in order to highlight her connection to the fading dynasty of her father. Michal, like Sisera’s mother, “represents a supplanted regime or house at the moment of its dramatized downfall.”[8] Though not quite the foreign villain of Sisera’s mother, Michal is at cross purposes with David, her anointed husband. She escapes Jezebel’s death sentence, but will still bear the consequences of her attitude: “and Michal daughter of Saul had no children to the day of her death” (2 Sam 6:23). Jezebel, in her location at the window, is likewise cast in opposition to YHWH and will shortly pay for her position.

A further example of the three word combination שקף בעד חלון, could also prove significant though the subject looking through the window is a man. Proverbs 7 contains the warning of a man to his son concerning an alluring and dangerous adulteress. In verse 6, he relates, “At the window of my house I looked out through the lattice” (בחלון ביתי בעד אשנבי נשקפתי). In looking, the man witnesses a “youth who lacked judgment” (Prov 7:7) who is met by a woman dressed like a prostitute and with “crafty intent. She is loud and defiant … with persuasive words she led him astray” (Prov 7:10–21). The advice of the father in Proverbs 7 is likely on the lips of the Jezebel narrator to all those hearing of her looking down from her window: “Do not let your heart turn to her ways or stray into her paths. Many are the victims she has brought down; her slain are a mighty throng. Her house is a highway to the grave, leading down to the chambers of death” (Prov 7:25–27). This allusion skillfully reminds the reader of the “mighty throng” that Jezebel has slain in 1 Kings 18:4, where “Jezebel was killing off the Lord’s prophets.” In addition, Jezebel’s house, specifically her window, will become her “highway” to her own grave within just a few short verses.

Jehu enters Jezreel through its gate in verse 31 and is immediately greeted with Jezebel’s inquiry “Is it peace, Zimri, killer of his lord?” This phrase, repeated from King Joram’s death scene in verse 22, drips with irony and accusation. Earlier, Joram asks, “Is it peace, Jehu?” Joram was uncertain of Jehu’s motives, not yet convinced of Jehu’s intent to kill him. Jezebel, in contrast, addresses Jehu as Zimri, which reveals the true magnitude of her question.

As described in 1 Kings 16, Zimri was a former Israelite king who plotted against Elah king of Israel, son of Baasha, and “struck him down and killed him in the twenty-seventh year of Asa king of Judah” (1 Kings 16:10). He then succeeded in eliminating the entire ruling family of Baasha. Zimri’s reign however, begun in assassination and bloodshed, lasted a fleeting seven days. Ironically, it was Ahab’s father Omri who was to next occupy Israel’s throne, founding the dynasty of which Jezebel was a key figure.

In addressing Jehu as Zimri in verse 31, Jezebel is implicitly deigning him a murderer of the true and rightful king, a label which she explicitly makes clear with the words that follow: “killer of his Lord.” Perhaps even more brazen, though, is that in using Zimri’s name, Jezebel is claiming that however effective today, Jehu’s coup will be short-lived and ultimately feeble. Though she will likely be dead by his hand shortly, he will never be on par with her coiffed, regal person. Depending on how this is read, the powerful disdain conveyed in the replacement of one name for another in her initial question speaks to either Jezebel’s strength of character or her complete self-delusion. In either case, her address casts serious doubt on the commentators who claim she is attempting to seduce her killer.

Next, in verse 32, Jehu addresses “two or three eunuchs” as they looked down towards him saying, “Who is on my side?” He commands them, using the single word imperative שמטוה, in verse 33, “let her fall” or “throw her down.” They comply, ושמטוה, “and they let her fall/threw her down.” Jehu demands a decision of allegiance, and the eunuchs respond with exact obedience, as indicated by the repeat of the verb used.

The choice of eunuchs (סריסים) as the instruments of Jezebel’s death is noteworthy. In many ways, they are recognized, legitimate boundary crossers. In “Jezebel: Framed by Eunuchs?” Janet Everhart argues that, “in the ancient world, the eunuchs traversed physical and social boundaries as part of their recognized role. The eunuchs of the Hebrew Bible function as an alternate gender; their flexibility results in access to multiple worlds … eunuchs have easy access to the king and queen and move between normally segregated spaces. Their status as non-procreators affords them access to a variety of positions of power at the imperial court.”[9]

Jezebel, herself, is also a boundary crosser. She is a foreigner who is brought into ethnic Israel via marriage. She does not worship YHWH, the native god. She is also a woman who exerts tremendous political power normally reserved for a man, as witnessed in her orders to slay the prophets of YHWH, (1 Kings 18:4), her ordering the death of Elijah (1 Kings 19:2), and her machinations to secure Naboth’s vineyard (1 Kings 21) in the face of the king’s inability to do so.

Thus, the question posed by Jehu in verse 32, “Who is on my side? Who?” can be framed in light of boundary traversal. Jehu, an anointed male clearly positioned at the center of the narrator’s acceptable structure at the time, asks of the eunuchs: “From your standpoint as a boundary crosser, a status that you share with Jezebel and that may make you more aligned with her position than mine, whom do you choose? Her or me?” Their unhesitant choice of Jehu validates established Israelite, male holders of power, declaring foreign females illegitimate and dangerous in those same roles. They are so dangerous, in fact, that they should be removed, thrown down from their positions of high power.

The fall of Jezebel to the ground is described in graphic detail in verse 33. Narrative time is slowed to confirm the fact that she is, without a doubt, dead. “Her blood splattered the wall and the horses. And he trampled her.” The narrator is somewhat ambiguous about who does the trampling, the verb being masculine singular, simply “he.” The horses were plural, so indication would be that Jehu (on a horse) would be trampling Jezebel upon her fall. Yet, various English translations treat the matter differently. The NRSV reads, “Some of her blood spattered on the wall and on the horses, which trampled on her.” The NIV reads, “Some of her blood spattered the wall and the horses as they trampled her underfoot.” The ambiguity allows the reader to avoid the image of Jehu, astride his horse, performing the grisly act.

At verse 34, the point of view shifts back exclusively to Jehu, and his next actions are immediate and rapid, matching Jezebel’s upon perceiving his approach in verse 30. The pace of his actions—he entered and he ate and he drank—is most disturbing. He is in no way sickened by the gruesome scene he has just crafted. On the contrary, his appetite is voracious. Something is not right with this man!

Perhaps he regains his senses after eating and drinking in verse 34, for he orders an undesignated “them” (the eunuchs?) to “attend this cursed one and bury her, for she is the daughter of a king.” The narrator refuses Jezebel two dignities here. Jehu calls her “this cursed one,” not mentioning her name, a foreshadowing of verse 37’s “they will not say, ‘This is Jezebel.” ’ Her unique identity is already beginning to disappear. Also, her title as a queen in Israel is taken, for she reverts back to being the king’s daughter, the one given by Ethbaal to forge a military and economic alliance.

Jehu’s statement, in addition, is somewhat against the reader’s expectation. When Elisha’s prophet commissions Jehu to destroy Ahab’s house and Jezebel back in 1 Kings 9:10, he states that “no one will bury her.” Why, then, is Jehu ordering her to be buried? The narrator, in relating Jehu’s order, reveals two points at once. First, he casts some doubt on the soundness of Jehu as God’s instrument, foreshadowing darkness ahead for the house of Jehu. He lacks complete obedience, in addition to other character flaws that have been shown. Indeed, Hosea 1:5 pronounces judgment on Jehu, speaking of Hosea’s son, “Call him Jezreel because I will soon punish the house of Jehu for the massacre at Jezreel … in that day I will break Israel’s bow in the Valley of Jezreel.” Jezreel is repeated three times in the Hosea passage (5:4–5) and three times in Jezebel’s death account (9:30, 36, 37) to solidify the link between Jehu and Hosea’s judgment. Second, the narrator makes the point that God’s plan will be fulfilled regardless of human cooperation, for Jezebel will, in fact, not be buried despite Jehu’s request. The ones sent to bury her will find only her skull, her feet, and the palms of her hands (יםידה).

When this fact is reported to Jehu in verse 36, he cites the previous oracle that YHWH spoke “in/by the hand (יד) of Elijah the Tishbite,” an enduring “hand” in contrast to Jezebel’s dismembered one lying in the dust outside. Via Jehu’s words, Elijah is masterfully re-introduced into Jezebel’s demise, shifting the narrative spotlight and giving the last word to Elijah, who has been Jezebel’s chief rival throughout her story. The prophet of YHWH, who flees her threat of death in 1 Kings 19, now resurfaces to ironically and triumphantly confirm his own proclamation of her death uttered in 1 Kings 21:23: “Dogs will devour Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel.” The narrator makes it quite clear that in the battle between YHWH and Baal, fought by their respective representatives Elijah and Jezebel, it is YHWH who is unmistakably victorious. Baal and his worshippers are destroyed so completely that there are no remains to bury.

The final verse of the scene is filled with wordplay concerning the name of the once powerful queen. Verse 37 states, “The corpse of Jezebel was like dung upon the face of the land,” harkening back to the original deformation of her name. The narrator is arguing that even if she was originally named for Baal, it is justified to see her as dung. In ending his account “so they will not say, ‘this is Jezebel,’ ” the narrator asserts that even her profane name is ultimately insignificant, for the only fitting end to this pagan, idolatrous woman is that she be forgotten, for her name to be “not.”

The theological thrust of this passage is clear: YHWH will prevail. He will punish the wicked for their deeds, and his word, as delivered through his prophets, will come to pass. Those in earthly positions of power are not exempt from his hand, and those who lead others away from him in opposition to his word will meet their demise.

For the contemporary Christian, the final fate of Jezebel seems justified. She lived her life in opposition to the one, true God. She fostered and promoted the worship of Baal and Asherah to the detriment of the kingdom of Israel. She acted immorally on a large scale by slaughtering the Lord’s prophets, as well as on a personal level by orchestrating the murder of the faithful Naboth just to take possession of his land. She deserved to die a horrible death.

Yet, is there nothing redeemable in Jezebel? Was there never any hope that she would see that YHWH is “the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion, and sin” (Exodus 34:6–7)? Who might have shown her this God? It could have been her husband, Ahab, who was a YHWH worshipper to some degree as evidenced by how he named his sons Ahaziah and Joram. Yet, his faith was so compromised that it surely was not respectable in her eyes. It could have been the mighty prophet of God, Elijah. He learned first hand that God’s nature can be found in the still, small voice outside a cave and not just the powerful blast of lightning on Mt. Carmel. Yet, his faith was so confrontational that he required her utter defeat, a complete annihilation of her pride and identity, in order to join his God.

The Jezebel narrative teaches the contemporary Christian that sometimes, in order to actually reach the “pagan” world, a different way must be found. For a character so fully “other” than the people amongst whom she was living, Jezebel needed to be shown a God that was both worthy and one that would not destroy her unique identity. She needed to experience YHWH through receiving the חסד “grace” of the people of God around her. Only then could her defenses have softened, and she could have lived into a new name, as a daughter of God. Jezebel’s story teaches that Christians truly need to follow the example of Jesus, who did not compromise his faith, but shared his faith in love.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

• Aschkenasy, Nehama. Woman at the Window: Biblical Tales of Oppression and Escape. Detroit, MI: Wayne State University Press, 1998.
• Cogan, Mordechai, ed. 1 Kings. The Anchor Bible, edited by William F. Albright and David Noel Freedman. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 2000.
• Dutcher-Walls, Patricia. Jezebel: Portraits of a Queen. Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 2004.
• Everhart, Janet S. “Jezebel: Framed by Eunuchs?” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 72 (2010): 688–698.
• Frost, Stanley Brice. “Judgment on Jezebel, or a Woman Wronged.” Theology Today 20 (1964): 503–517.
• Gaines, Janet Howe. “How Bad Was Jezebel.” Bible Review 16/5 (October 2000): 12–23.
• McKinlay, Judith E. “Negotiating the Frame for Viewing the Death of Jezebel.” Biblical Interpretation 10 (2002): 305–323.
• Olyan, Saul M. “1 Kings 9:31-Jehu as Zimri.” Harvard Theological Review 78 (1985): 203–207.
• Pippin, Tara. “Jezebel Re-Vamped.” Semeia 69–70 (1995): 221–223.
• Seeman, Don. “Watcher at the Window: Cultural Poetics of a Biblical Motif.” Prooftexts 24 (2004): 1–50.
• Trible, Phyllis. “Exegesis for Storytellers and Other Strangers.” Journal of Biblical Literature, 114 (1995): 3–19.
• Walsh, Jerome T., ed. 1 Kings. Berit Olam: Studies in Hebrew Narrative & Poetry, edited by David W. Cotter. Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1996.
• Wray T. J. Good Girls, Bad Girls: The Enduring Lessons of Twelve Women of the Old Testament. Plymouth, UK: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2008.

Notes

1. T. J. Wray, Good Girls, Bad Girls: The Enduring Lessons of Twelve Women of the Old Testament (Plymouth, UK: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2008), 91.
2. Jerome T. Walsh, 1 Kings, Berit Olam: Studies in Hebrew Narrative & Poetry, ed. David W. Cotter. (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press, 1996), 218.
3. Walsh, 1 Kings, 218–219.
4. Mordechai Cogan, 1 Kings, Anchor Bible, ed. William F. Albright (Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, 2000), 418–419.
5. Ibid., 423.
6. Judith McKinley, “Negotiating the Frame for Viewing the Death of Jezebel,” Biblical Interpretation 10 (2002): 306.
7. Don Seeman, “Watcher at the Window: Cultural Poetics of a Biblical Motif,” Prooftexts 24 (2004): 15.
8. Ibid., 24.
9. Janet Everhart, “Jezebel: Framed by Eunuchs?,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 72 (2010): 697.