The Campaign Against Moab

When Joram had taken over the kingdom, he decided to make an expedition against the king of Moab, whose name was Mesha. For, as we told you before, Mesha had broken away from his allegiance to Joram’s brother, though he used to pay Joram’s father Ahab two hundred thousand sheep with their fleeces. So when Joram had gathered his own army, he also sent to Jehoshaphat and begged him, since he had been a friend of his father’s from the beginning, to help him in the war he was entering on against the Moabites, who had broken away from their allegiance. Jehoshaphat not only promised to help him himself, but said he would also make the king of Edom, who was under his authority, join the expedition. When Joram had received these assurances of help from Jehoshaphat, he took his army and came to Jerusalem; and after he had been lavishly entertained by the king of Jerusalem, they resolved to march against their enemies through the wilderness of Edom, for the enemy would not expect them to attack from that side. So the three kings set out from Jerusalem: the king of Jerusalem himself, the king of Israel and the king of Edom. When they had made a roundabout march of seven days, they were in distress for lack of water for the animals and the army, because the guides who led them had mistaken the roads. They were all in agony, Joram most of all, and in his grief he cried out to God, asking what wrong he held against them, that he had brought three kings together to hand themselves over to the king of Moab without a fight. But Jehoshaphat, who was a righteous man, encouraged Joram and told him to send around the camp and find out whether any prophet of God had come along with them, so that through him they might learn from God what they should do. [a]

One of Joram’s servants said that he had seen Elisha son of Shaphat, the disciple of Elijah, there; so the three kings went to him at Jehoshaphat’s urging. When they came to the prophet’s tent, which was pitched outside the camp, they asked him what would become of the army, and Joram pressed him especially hard about it. Elisha told him not to trouble him, but to go to his father’s and mother’s prophets, for they were the true prophets. Joram still begged him to prophesy and save them. So Elisha swore by God that he would not answer him except for the sake of Jehoshaphat, who was a holy and righteous man. And when, at his request, they brought him a man who could play the harp, the divine Spirit came on him as the music played, and he commanded them to dig many trenches in the valley. “For though you see neither cloud nor wind nor storm of rain, you will see this riverbed full of water, so that the army and the animals will be saved by drinking from it. Nor will this be all the favor you receive from God: you will also overcome your enemies and take the best and strongest cities of the Moabites, and you will cut down their fruit trees, lay waste their country, and stop up their springs and rivers.”

After the prophet had said this, the next day before sunrise a great torrent came running strongly; for God had made it rain very heavily three days’ journey away, in Edom, so that the army and the animals found plenty of water to drink. Now when the Moabites heard that the three kings were coming against them and approaching through the wilderness, the king of Moab immediately gathered his army and ordered them to camp on the borders, so that when the enemy tried to enter their country, they would not be hidden from them. But when, at sunrise, they saw the water in the torrent — for it was not far from the land of Moab — and saw that it was the color of blood (for at that hour the water looks especially red, with the sun shining on it), they formed a false idea of the state of their enemies: that they had killed one another out of thirst, and that the river ran with their blood. Supposing this to be the case, they asked their king to send them out to plunder their enemies. So they all went in haste, as to an advantage already won, and came to the enemy camp, supposing them destroyed already. But their hope deceived them; for as their enemies stood all around them, some of them were cut to pieces, and others were scattered and fled to their own country. [d]

When the kings entered the land of Moab, they overthrew the cities in it and ruined their fields, spoiling them by filling them with stones from the brooks; they cut down the best of their trees, stopped up their springs of water, and threw down their walls to the foundations. But the king of Moab was hard pressed by the siege. Seeing his city in danger of being taken by force, he made a sortie and went out with seven hundred men, to break through the enemy camp with his horsemen on the side where the watch seemed to be kept most carelessly. When he tried and could not get away, because he came upon a place that was carefully watched, he went back into the city and did a thing that showed despair and the utmost distress. He took his eldest son, who was to reign after him, lifted him up on the wall so that he could be seen by all the enemy, and offered him as a whole burnt offering to God. When the kings saw this, they pitied the distress that had driven him to it, and were so moved by humanity and pity that they raised the siege, and each went back to his own home.

So Jehoshaphat came to Jerusalem and lived there in peace. He outlived this expedition only a little while, and then died, having lived sixty years in all and reigned twenty-five of them. He was buried magnificently in Jerusalem, for he had imitated the actions of David.