Rehoboam, Abijah 20 years. Asa 41 " Jehoshaphat, Jehoram} 40 " Ahaziah, Athaliah } Joash 40 " Amaziah, Uzziah 81 " Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah 38 " After the Fall of Samaria we have:-- Hezekiah, Manasseh, Amon 80 " and it can hardly be a mere accident that in these lists the number 40 is only modified by slight necessary details. The history of the Northern Kingdom seems to be roughly trisected into 80 years before Benhadad's first invasion, 80 years of Syrian war, 40 years of prosperity under Jeroboam II., and 40 years of decline.[33] This is probably a result of chronological system, not uninfluenced by mystical considerations. For 480 = 40 × 12. _Forty_ is repeatedly used as a sacred number in connexion with epochs of penitence and punishment. _Twelve_ (4 × 3) is, according to Bähr (the chief student of numerical and other symbolism), "the signature of the people of Israel"--as a whole (4), in the midst of which God (3) resides. Similarly Stade thinks that 16 is the basal number for the reigns of kings from Jehu to Hoshea, and 12 from Jeroboam to Jehu.[34] It is possible that the synchronistic data did not proceed from the compiler of the Book of Kings, but were added by the last redactor. Are these critical conclusions so formidable? Are they fraught with disastrous consequences? Which is really dangerous--truth laboriously sought for, or error accepted with unreasoning blindness and maintained with invincible prejudice? FOOTNOTES: [4] How closely these documents are transcribed is shown by the recurrence of "_unto this day_," though the phrase had long ceased to be true when the book appeared. [5] It is inferred from 1 Kings viii. 12, 13, which have a poetic tinge, and to which the LXX. add "Behold they are written in the Book of the Song," that in this section the "Book of Jashar" has been utilised, and that the reading הישר has been confused with שירה (Driver, p. 182). [6] 2 Chron. xx. 34, R.V., "The history of Jehu, the son of Hanani, which _is inserted in the Book of the Kings of Israel_" (not "who is mentioned," A.V., which, however, gives in the margin the literal meaning "was made to ascend"). [7] Movers, _Krit. Untersuch._, p. 185 (Bonn, 1836). The use of older documents explains the phrase "till this day," and the passages which speak of the Temple as still standing (1 Kings viii. 8, ix. 21, xii. 19; 2 Kings x. 27, xiii. 23). Sometimes the traces of earlier and later date are curiously juxtaposed, as in 2 Kings xvii. 18, 21 and 19, 20. [8] Difference of sources is marked by the different designations of the months, which are called sometimes by their numbers, as in the Priestly Codex (1 Kings xii. 32, 33), sometimes by the old Hebrew names Zif ("_blossom_," April, May, 1 Kings vi. 1), Ethanim ("_fruit_," Sept., Oct., 1 Kings viii. 2), and Bul ("_rain_," 1 Kings vi. 38).