ABIJAH Sept. 'A(3ed, 2 Chron.
xiii. I., Pater Yehomn, e., vir divimus, tit vidttur, q. ?ri'px CPN,' Gesenius in Thesaur.; [7ehovah ist Versorger, Furst; whose father is AL]; Sept. 'Aped). 1. One of the sons of Samuel,whose misconduct afforded the ostensible ground on which the Israelites demanded that their government should be changed into a monarchy (i Sam. viii. 1-5), A. V. Abiah.
2. The son and successor of Rehoboam. He is also called Abijam Sept. 'AgtoO, 1 Kings xv. 1). Lightfoot (Hann. 0. T in loc.) thinks that the writer in Chronicles, not describing his reign as wicked, admits the sacred JAH in his name; whilst the book of Kings, charging him with following the evil ways of his father, changes this into JAm. This is not fanciful; for such changes of name were not unusual [but it is pro bably unnecessary, as it is doubtful whether Abijam be the correct reading, and not a merely clerical mistake, some MSS. (12 of Kenn.) giving Abijah; and this being the reading followed by the LXX. and Syr. versions]. Abijah began to reign B. C. 958 (Hales, 13. C. 973), in the eighteenth year of Jeroboam, king of Israel, and he reigned three years. At the commencement of his reign, looking on the well-founded separation of the ten tribes from the house of David as rebellion, Abijah made a vigorous attempt to bring them back to their allegiance. In this he failed, although a signal victory over Jeroboam, who had double his force and much greater experience, enabled him to take several cities which had been held by Israel. The speech which Abijah addressed to the opposing army before the battle has been much admired. It was well suited to its object, and exhibits correct notions of the theocratical institutions. His view of the political position of the ten tribes with respect to the house of David is, however, obviously erro neous, although such as a king of Judah was likely to take. The numbers reputed to have been pre sent in this action are 8o0,000 on the side of Jeroboam, 400,000 on the side of Abijah, and soo,000 left dead on the field. Hales and others regard these extraordinary numbers as corruptions, and propose to reduce them to 80,000, 40,000, and 50,00o respectively, as in the Latin Vulgate of Sixtus Quintus, and many earlier editions, and in the old Latin translation of Josephus; and probably also in his original Greek text, as is collected by De Vignoles from Abarbanel's charge against the historian of having made Jeroboam's loss no more than 50,00o men, contrary to the Hebrew text (Kennicott's Dissertations, i. 533; ii. 201, etc. 564). The book of Chronicles mentions nothing con cerning Abijah adverse to the impressions which we receive from his conduct on this occasion; but in Kings we are told that `he walked in all the sins of his father' (1 Kings xv. 3). He had fourteen wives, by whom he had twenty-two sons and six teen daughters. Asa succeeded him.
There is a difficulty connected with the maternity of Abijah. In r Kings xv. 2, we read, ' His mother's name was Maachah, the daughter of Abishalom; but in 2 Chron. xiii. 2, ' His mother's
name was Michaiah, the daughter of Uriel of Gibeah.' Maachah and Michaiah are variations of the same name; and Abishalom is in all likelihood Absalom, the son of David. The word (111) ren dered ' daughter ' is applied in the Bible not only to a man's child, but to his niece, grand-daughter, or great-grand-daughter. It is therefore probable that Uriel of Gibeah married Tamar, the beautiful daughter of Absalom (2 Sam. xiv. 27), and by her had Maachah, who was thus the daughter of Uriel and grand-daughter of Absalom. [But, as it ap pears from I Kings xv. to, that Abijah's wife was also Maachah, the daughter of Absalom, and as he could not marry his mother, and the supposition that this Maachah was the daughter of his mother by a former husband (Brentano) is burdened with the difficulty, not only that in this case daughter must mean great-grand-daughter, but that Abijah must have married his step-sister, some have supposed there were two Maachahs, the one the descendant of Absalom and the wife of Rehoboam, the other the descendant of Uriel and the wife of Abijah. In this case there is in 2 Chron. a mistake of the one Maachah for the other. See Bertheau, Die Filcher d. Chronik, and Thenius, Die Bilcher d. Konige, on the places. Some, however, take mother in I Kings xv. to to mean grandmother [MAACIIAH], but this is improbable.] 3. Son of Jeroboam I., king of Israel. His severe and threatening illness induced Jeroboam to send his wife with a present,* suited to the disguise in which she went, to consult the prophet Ahijah respecting his recovery. This prophet was the same who had, in the days of Solomon, foretold to Jeroboam his elevation to the throne of Israel. Though blind with age, he knew the disguised wife of Jeroboam, and was authorized, by the prophetic impulse that came upon him, to reveal to her that, because there was found in Abijah only, of all the house of Jeroboam, 'some good thing towards the Lord,' he only, of all that house, should come to his grave in peace, and be mourned in Israel. Accordingly, when the mother returned home, the youth died as she crossed the threshold of the door. ' And they buried him, and all Israel mourned for him' (s Kings xiv.
4. One of the descendants of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, and chief of one of the twenty-four courses or orders into which the whole body of the priest hood was divided by David (1 Chron. xxiv. so). Of these, the course of Abijah was the eighth. Only four of the courses returned from the captivity, of which that of Abijah was not one (Ezra ii. 36-39; Neh. vii. 39-42; xii. s). But the four were divided into the original number of twenty-four, with the original names; and it hence happens that Zecha rias, the father of John the Baptist, is described as belonging to the course of Abijah or Abia' (Luke K Other persons of this name are mentioned, Chron. ii. 24; r Chron. vii. 8; 2 Chron. xxix. [Ant] ; Nch. x. 7.