The fall of Samaria: why the northern kingdom ended

Second Kings 17 records the end of the northern kingdom of Israel, which had split from Judah after Solomon's death in about 931 BC (1 Kings 12). The books of Kings are anonymous. Jewish tradition (Bava Batra 15a) names Jeremiah, while most modern scholars see them as the closing part of the Deuteronomistic History, put into final form during the exile after about 561 BC. This chapter is a clear example of that writer's method. The narrator stops the story to give a long theological explanation of why the kingdom fell (verses 7-23). Martin Noth is among the scholars who argued that such passages are the historian's own commentary on the whole history.

The historical setting is the rise of Assyria. In the eighth century BC, Assyria under kings such as Tiglath-pileser III expanded west and took tribute from Israel. Hoshea, son of Elah, became king of Israel by killing his predecessor (2 Kings 15:30), and he reigned nine years, in the twelfth year of Ahaz of Judah by the account of 17:1. He submitted to Shalmaneser V of Assyria and paid tribute. He then sent messengers to 'So,' king of Egypt, hoping for help, and stopped paying. The identity of this Egyptian ruler is debated among scholars. Shalmaneser seized Hoshea and imprisoned him, besieged Samaria for three years, and in Hoshea's ninth year the city fell. The date most often given is 722 or 721 BC.

The Assyrian records add detail that the Bible does not. They credit Sargon II, who succeeded Shalmaneser, with the capture of Samaria and the deportation of about 27,000 people. Many scholars reconcile the accounts by seeing the siege begun by Shalmaneser and the final capture, or at least the main deportation, completed under Sargon. The first readers of Kings, living after Judah's own fall, would read this chapter as a warning they had not heeded: verses 18-19 say that Judah too did not keep the commandments.

This chapter combines a short historical report (verses 1-6) with two long sections of commentary (verses 7-23 and 24-41). In Hebrew historical writing, such a pause is a signal. The narrator is telling the reader how to read what has just happened. The report says what Assyria did. The commentary says what the LORD did, and why. The reader is meant to hold both: Assyria is the instrument, the LORD is the judge, and the cause is Israel's covenant unfaithfulness.

Three principles help.

• First, read the chapter against the covenant. The judgment is not random. Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28-29 had warned that if Israel forsook the covenant, the land would vomit them out and they would be scattered among the nations. The narrator is showing that the warning has come true, and verse 23 says it happened as the LORD had spoken through all his servants the prophets.
• Second, notice the list of sins. It begins with the first commandment and the second: other gods, high places, pillars, Asherim, the two calves, the host of heaven, Baal, child sacrifice and divination. The root is that Israel walked in the practices of the nations the LORD drove out.
• Third, take verses 24-41 carefully. They describe a mixed population and their religion, and the account says that they worshiped the LORD while also serving their own gods. The passage is easy to read as a simple condemnation of the later Samaritans, but its subject is the settlers of the eighth century BC and a type of religion that tries to add the LORD to other gods.

Verses 1–6

Hoshea does evil in the sight of the LORD, but not as the kings of Israel before him. The text does not say how his reign differed. Shalmaneser king of Assyria came up against him, and Hoshea became his servant and paid tribute. Then the king of Assyria found conspiracy in Hoshea: he had sent to So, king of Egypt, and had not sent tribute as in earlier years. The king seized him and bound him in prison. Then he invaded the land, went against Samaria and besieged it three years. In the ninth year of Hoshea, the king of Assyria captured Samaria and carried Israel away to Assyria. He settled them in Halah, on the Habor, the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.

Verses 7–12

The narrator now explains. The narrator says this happened because the people of Israel had sinned against the LORD their God, who had brought them up out of Egypt. The first sin is described as fearing other gods, and walking in the statutes of the nations the LORD had driven out before Israel and in the practices that the kings of Israel had introduced. They did secretly things that were not right against the LORD, built high places in all their towns, from watchtower to fortified city, set up pillars and Asherim on every high hill and under every green tree, and burned incense at all the high places like the nations. They served idols, of which the LORD had said, You shall not do this.

Verses 13–18

The LORD warned Israel and Judah by every prophet and seer: turn from your evil ways, keep my commandments and statutes according to the law I commanded your fathers. They would not listen but were stubborn like their fathers who did not believe in the LORD. They despised his statutes and the covenant, and went after worthless idols and became worthless themselves. The Hebrew word for worthless (hebel) is the same word used for 'vanity' or 'breath.' They made two calves of metal, an Asherah, worshiped all the host of heaven, served Baal, made their sons and daughters pass through fire, practiced divination and omens, and sold themselves to do evil. Therefore the LORD was very angry with Israel and removed them from his sight. None was left but the tribe of Judah alone.

Verses 19–23

Judah also did not keep the commandments of the LORD but walked in the customs Israel had introduced. So the LORD rejected all the descendants of Israel, afflicted them and gave them into the hand of plunderers. Verses 21-23 go back to the beginning. When the LORD tore Israel from the house of David, they made Jeroboam son of Nebat king, and Jeroboam drove Israel from following the LORD and made them commit great sin. The people walked in all the sins of Jeroboam, did not depart from them, until the LORD removed Israel out of his sight, as he had spoken by all his servants the prophets. So Israel was exiled from their own land to Assyria, and the narrator adds that they are there to this day.

Verses 24–33

The king of Assyria brought people from Babylon, Cuthah, Avva, Hamath and Sepharvaim and settled them in the cities of Samaria. They did not fear the LORD at first, so the LORD sent lions among them, and some were killed. The king was told that the people did not know the law of the god of the land. He commanded that one of the priests who had been carried away be sent to teach them, and one came and lived at Bethel and taught them how to fear the LORD. Yet every nation still made gods of its own and put them in the shrines at the high places that the earlier people of Samaria had made. The list of the gods is given for each group. The narrator sums it up in verse 33: they worshiped the LORD, but also served their own gods.

Verses 34–41

The narrator comments: to this day they do as they did before. They do not fear the LORD, nor follow the statutes and commandments the LORD commanded the children of Jacob, whom he named Israel. The LORD made a covenant with them and charged them, You shall not fear other gods or bow to them, but fear the LORD who brought you out of Egypt with great power. They would not listen. So these nations feared the LORD and also served their carved images, and their children and grandchildren do the same to this day. The statement that they fear the LORD, followed by the statement that they do not fear the LORD, appears to be a tension, and it is resolved by seeing that outward worship of the LORD, mixed with other gods, was not the fear the covenant required.

The chapter is a theology of judgment. Its explanation of the exile makes the character of God clear. God is patient, since he warned by every prophet and seer, and God is just, since the judgment answers the covenant breaking of centuries and not a single act. It also teaches that the idols are empty and that those who follow them become like them (verse 15), a principle also found in Psalm 115:8.

The chapter also teaches the way judgment comes in history. Assyria is a great power, and yet the narrator says the LORD removed Israel. Isaiah 10:5-7 says the same about Assyria: it is the rod of the LORD's anger, though it does not know it.

The account of the settlers adds a teaching about worship. The LORD alone is to be worshiped, and mixing him with other gods is not a milder form of devotion but a failure to fear him. This is the same demand as in Elijah's question on Carmel and in the first commandment.

Finally, the chapter looks beyond itself. The ten tribes of the north are not simply lost. Hezekiah invited northerners to Jerusalem for the Passover, and some came (2 Chronicles 30:10-11). The prophets promised the reunion of Ephraim and Judah (Ezekiel 37:15-22; Hosea 1:11). The idea of ten 'lost tribes' is not found in Scripture. In the New Testament, Anna is of the tribe of Asher (Luke 2:36), and James writes to the twelve tribes in the dispersion (James 1:1).

The chapter itself has no promise of Christ, and the New Testament does not quote it. The connection is through the Samaritans and the promise of one people. In the north, the people who lived in Samaria in the first century were the heirs of the mixed population described here, and the Samaritans themselves claim descent from Israelite tribes who remained, together with their own priesthood and Torah. Jews and Samaritans were divided over where to worship (John 4:20).

In John 4, Jesus meets a Samaritan woman at a well and tells her that salvation is from the Jews and that her people worship what they do not know. He then says the hour is coming, and now is, when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. That answers the situation in 2 Kings 17:33, where the settlers feared the LORD and also served their own gods. Some interpreters see an echo of the five nations of 2 Kings 17:24 in the five husbands of the woman (John 4:18). That reading is possible but tentative, and the text of John does not say so.

The fulfillment is in the spread of the gospel. In Acts 8:5-25 Philip preaches Christ in Samaria, and Peter and John come to see the Samaritans receive the Holy Spirit, as Jesus had said they would be his witnesses in Samaria (Acts 1:8). The prophets had promised that Ephraim and Judah would be one, under one king (Ezekiel 37:22). John 10:16 and 11:52 speak of other sheep, one flock under one shepherd, and the gathering of God's scattered children into one. These are echoes of the prophetic promise, and the New Testament sees them realized in Christ's one people.