Elijah ascended to heaven before he had actually achieved much in the world.  The idea which his successors took from him was that it was necessary to make a thorough clearance from Samaria of the Baal worship and of the house of Ahab as well.  For this practical end Elisha made use of practical means.  When Elijah, after the murder of Naboth, had suddenly appeared before Ahab and threatened him with a violent end, an officer of high command had been present, Jehu ben Nimshi, and he had never forgotten the incident.  He now found himself at the head of the troops at Ramoth Gilead after the withdrawal to Jezreel of Joram ben Ahab from the field to be healed of his wound.  To Elisha the moment seemed a suitable one for giving to Jehu in Jehovah’s name the command now to carry out Elijah’s threat against the house of Ahab.  Jehu gained over the captains of the army, and carried out so well the task with which the prophet had commissioned him that not a single survivor of Ahab’s dynasty or of his court was left.  He next extirpated Baal and his worshippers in Samaria.  From that date no worship of foreign gods seems ever to have recurred in Israel.  Idolatry indeed continued to subsist, but the images, stones, and trees, even the seraphim apparently, belonged to the cultus of Jehovah, or were at least brought into relation with it.

Jehu founded the second and last dynasty of the kingdom of Samaria His inheritance from the house of Omri included the task of defending himself against the Syrians.  The forces at his disposal being insufficient for this, he resorted to the expedient of seeking to urge the Assyrians to renew their hostilities against the Arameeans.  For this end his ambassadors carried presents to Shalmaneser II.; these were not of a regular but only of an occasional character, but the vanity of the great king represents them as the tribute of a vassal.  In the years 842 and 839 Assyrian campaigns against Hazael of Damascus actually took place; then they were intermitted for a long time, and the kings of Samaria, Jehu and his two successors, were left to their own resources.  These were evil times for Israel.  With a barbarity never intermitted the frontier war went on in Gilead, where Ammon and Moab showed themselves friendly to the Syrian cause (Amos i.); occasionally great expeditions took place, one of which brought King Hazael to the very walls of Jerusalem.  It was only with the greatest difficulty that Israel’s independence was maintained.  Once more religion went hand in hand with the national cause; the prophet Elisha was the main stay of the kings in the struggle with the Syrians, “the chariot and horsemen of Israel.”  Joash ben Joahaz ben Jehu at last succeeded in inflicting upon Syria several blows which proved decisive.  Thenceforward Israel had nothing to fear from that quarter.  Under Joash’s son, Jeroboam II., the kingdom even reached a height of external power which recalled the times of David.  Moab was again subdued; southwards the frontier extended to the brook of the wilderness (Amos vi. 14), and northward to Hamath.