Joash regained the towns taken from his father, Jehoahaz. At the same time Amaziah, king of Judah, beat the Edomites in the valley of Salt, and took from them the town of Sela, afterwards called Petra. Proud of this success he provoked the king of Israel. An encounter took place at Beth-shemesh; Amaziah was beaten and taken prisoner. Joash entered Jerusalem, destroyed the walls for four hundred cubits, pillaged the temple and the royal treasure, and took hostages back to Samaria. According to Josephus, Joash had given life and liberty to Amaziah on condition that he should open the gates of the city to him. Joash, who survived his victory only a short time, had as successor his son Jeroboam II. The kingdom of Judah remained under the dependence of the kingdom of Israel until the end of the reign of Amaziah, who died like his father, by an assassin’s hand, the result of conspiracy. The Book of Chronicles says he had turned away from the Lord, which might lead one to believe that this conspiracy was headed by the priests. [Sidenote: [_ca._ 780-740 B.C.]] The second Book of Chronicles entirely omits the name of Jeroboam, son of Joash, whose name is mentioned only once in the first book in connection with an enumeration. This is a curious omission, for in this reign the kingdom of Israel seems to have attained a certain amount of power and brilliancy. According to the Book of Kings: “He restored the coast of Israel from the entering of Hamath unto the sea of the plain, according to the word of the Lord God of Israel, which he spake by the hand of his servant Jonah, the son of Amittai the prophet, which was of Gath-hepher.” Jonah’s prophecy has not descended to us. The legend which says he was swallowed by a whale, was written at a much later date. A German theologist thought he could attribute to him the oracle against Moab, cited in the Book of Isaiah as belonging to a more ancient prophet, and concluded that Jeroboam had subjugated the Moabites, but Munk rejects this opinion. The conquest of Syria has also been attributed to Jeroboam by explaining, in an arbitrary manner, the very obscure sentence in the Book of Kings: “He recovered Damascus and Hamath, which belonged to Judah, to Israel.” To complete this scanty information concerning the long reign of Jeroboam, which lasted more than forty years, we are reduced to gathering details from prophetic writings.