Hoshea הושע בן אלה
the last king of Israel; nine years
Hoshea son of Elah killed Pekah and reigned nine years — the last nine years of the northern kingdom. Kings speaks of him more gently than of his predecessors: «he did evil in the eyes of the Lord, but not like the kings of Israel who were before him» (2 Kings 17:2).
He was Shalmaneser's vassal, but sent to So king of Egypt and brought no tribute. The Assyrian king put him under arrest, came up against the whole land and besieged Samaria. The siege lasted three years; in Hoshea's ninth year the city was taken, and its people carried away to Halah, to the Habor, to the cities of the Medes.
Chapter seventeen is the one place in Kings where the book stops and explains why this happened: a long reckoning that begins with Jeroboam's calves and ends with their having «forsaken all the commandments of the Lord». With this the northern kingdom ends, and from here the Tanakh speaks only of Judah.
On the timeline
Sources
Tanakh
- Melachim II (2 Kings) 17:1–6 — the nine years, the alliance with Egypt, the three-year siege, and the fall of Samaria
- Melachim II (2 Kings) 17:7–23 — the reckoning of causes: the one place where the book explains what happened
Basis: stated in the Tanakh.