Jezebel (
Hebrew אִיזֶבֶל /
אִיזָבֶל,
Modern&_160;
Izével / Izável Tiberian&_160;
ʾÎzéḇel /
ʾÎzāḇel) (fl. 9th century B.C.) was a Phoenician princess,
[1] identified in the Hebrew
Book of Kings as the daughter of Ethbaal, King of the Sidonians
[2] (Phoenicians) and the wife of
Ahab king of north Israel according to genealogies given in
Josephus and other classical sources she was the great aunt of
Dido, Queen of Carthage.
Jezebel is portrayed as an evil power behind the throne. Ahab and Jezebel allow temples of Baal to operate in Israel, and that religion receives royal patronage. After Ahab's death, his sons by Jezebel, Ahaziah and Jehoram, accede to the throne. The prophet Elisha has one of his servants anoint Jehu as king in order to overthrow the house of Ahab. Jehu kills Jehoram as he attempts to flee in his war chariot. He then confronts Jezebel in Jezreel and urges her eunuchs to kill the queen mother by throwing her out of a window and leaving her corpse in the street to be eaten by dogs. Only Jezebel's skull, feet, and hands remain. Jezebel's final act, equipping herself in all her finery before she is murdered, has led to her being represented as a kind of prostitute.
The name originally meant "The Lord (Baal) exists". "The Lord" probably referred to the "king of heaven" worshipped in the Syro-Palestinian world. In Biblical Hebrew Jezebel's name means "there is no nobility". According to the television show The Naked Archaeologist Jezebel was an altered name. Originally her name would have been translated as "Virgin of Baal", but a letter was added to the name so as to give it a negative meaning; "Whore of Baal".
Jezebel's story is told in 1st and 2nd Kings.[3] She is introduced as a Phoenician princess, the daughter of King Ethobaal, king of the Phoenician empire. Jezebel marries King Ahab of the Northern Kingdom (i.e. Israel during the time when ancient Israel was divided into Israel in the north and Judah in the south). She helps convert Ahab from worship of Yahweh to worship of the Phoenician god, Baal.[3] After Jezebel has many of the prophets of Yahweh killed, Elijah challenges 450 prophets of Baal to a competition (1 Kings 18), exposes the rival god as powerless, and goes on to have prophets of Baal slaughtered (1 Kings 1840), thereby incurring Jezebel's furious enmity.
