2 Kings 17:1-4·~1 min

Hoshea the Last King of Israel

Hoshea becomes king in Samaria and rules nine years. His reign is marked as evil, though not with the same weight as the kings before him.

I¹n the twelfth year of the reign of Ahaz over Judah, Hoshea son of Elah became king of Israel, and he reigned in Samaria nine years. ²And he did evil in the sight of the LORD, but not like the kings of Israel who preceded him.

Assyria subdues Hoshea and receives tribute from him for a time. When he secretly looks to Egypt and withholds payment, the Assyrian king arrests him and puts him in prison.

³Shalmaneser king of Assyria attacked him, and Hoshea became his vassal and paid him tribute. ⁴But the king of Assyria discovered that Hoshea had conspired to send envoys to King So of Egypt, and that he had not paid tribute to the king of Assyria as in previous years. Therefore the king of Assyria arrested Hoshea and put him in prison.

Section summaryHoshea's reign is brief and compromised from the start. Assyria first reduces him to tribute, then imprisons him when his appeal to Egypt is uncovered, leaving Israel's last king as a small figure inside a larger collapse.

Role in the chapterThis opening names the final king and sets the political scene for Israel's end. It narrows the fall of Samaria to one last failed reign before the chapter widens into its deeper explanation.