Abijah

Abijam was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the fourth king of the House of David and the second of the Kingdom of Judah. He was the son of Rehoboam and the grandson of Solomon. The Books of Chronicles refer to him as Abijah. In the Hebrew Bible Family Abijam is reported in the books of Kings and Chronicles as being the son of Maacah or Micaiah, and father of King Asa of Judah. Some scholars believe the biblical accounts of Abijam's family to be contradictory; however, a study of Hebrew linguistics may remove any seeming contradictions. One of the alleged contradictions is that Maacah is sometimes described as the daughter of Absalom, and elsewhere the daughter of Uriel. Absalom is described as only having one daughter, Tamar. Apologists have countered by arguing that in Hebrew, "daughter" and "granddaughter" are the same word. Similarly, Maacah is initially described as Abijah's mother, but subsequently described as the mother of his son Asa. Apologists argue similarly for the ambiguity of the term "mother". Abijah married fourteen wives, and had 22 sons and 16 daughters. No attempted harmonization has found acceptance with scholars. Reign Following the death of Rehoboam, his son Abijah succeeded the throne as King of Judah. He began his three-year reign (2 Chr. 12:16; 13:1, 2) with a strenuous but unsuccessful effort to bring back the ten tribes of the northern Kingdom of Israel to their allegiance, a path which in his father had chosen not to follow.