Hello, I'm Gary Stevens, and welcome to the History in the Bible podcast.

All the history, in all the books, in all the Bibles.

Thank you. Episode 1.44. The House of Omri. Pinnacle of power.

King Asar of Judah died of athletes' foot, somewhere between 878 and 870 BC. He lived to see the extinction of the Israelite House of Bayeshire and its replacement by the House of Omri. Omri's house

reigned for 40 years under four kings, Omri, Ahab, a Haziah and Jehoram.

Omri's house was the first of Israel to last beyond the second generation.

In my history of the Omrids, I am going to follow the views of modernist historians and archaeologists.

As I said way back in my first episode,

I don't claim to be objective.

I am pushing one particular point of view.

But I always try to show how modernist ideas

differ from older scholarly frameworks.

In my defence, I can only say that the past 40 years

of scholarship vindicates modernist theories more than it rebuts them. The Omrid Kingdom was the

zenith of Israel's power and prosperity. The Omrids were the first to extend Israelite rule out of the northern highlands into the lush lowlands

of Galilee and the Jordan Valley.

They were the first to employ literate scribes, people who could keep enduring records.

Recent archaeology seems to indicate the Galilee had a remnant Canaanite population.

If that is so, then the Ombrids ruled a state, not just of Hebrews, but a variety of others.

People who worshipped other gods.

The archaeological evidence is that Israel reached a level of economic strength

unprecedented in its history and would make of its southern neighbour Judah a vassal.

...