Pekah

Pekah (/ˈpɛkɑː, ˈpiː-/, Hebrew: פֶּקַח Peqaḥ; Akkadian: 𒉺𒅗𒄩 Paqaḫa [pa-qa-ḫa]; Latin: Phacee) was the eighteenth and penultimate king of Israel. He was a captain in the army of king Pekahiah of Israel, whom he killed to become king. Pekah was the son of Remaliah.

Pekah became king in the fifty-second and last year of Uzziah, king of Judah, and he reigned twenty years. In the second year of his reign, Jotham became king of Judah, and reigned for sixteen years. Jotham was succeeded by his son, Ahaz in the seventeenth year of Pekah's reign. William F. Albright has dated his reign to 737–732 BC, while E. R. Thiele, following H. J. Cook and Carl Lederer, held that Pekah set up in Gilead a rival reign to Menahem's Samaria-based kingdom in Nisan of 752 BC, becoming sole ruler on his assassination of Menahem's son Pekahiah in 740/739 BC and dying in 732/731 BC. This explanation is consistent with evidence of the Assyrian chronicles, which agree with Menahem being king in 743 BC or 742 BC and Hoshea being king from 732 BC.

When Pekah allied with Rezin, king of Aram, to attack Ahaz, the king of Judah, Ahaz appealed to Tiglath-Pileser III, the king of Assyria, for help. This the Assyrian king obliged, but Judah became a tributary of Assyria.