Zechariah ( Zəḵaryā, meaning "remembered by Yah"; also Zachariah, Zacharias; ) was the fourteenth king of the northern Israelite Kingdom of Israel, and son of Jeroboam II.
Zechariah became king of Israel in Samaria in the thirty-eighth year of Azariah, king of Judah. () William F. Albright has dated his reign to 746–745 BC, while E. R. Thiele offers the dates 753–752 BC.Edwin Thiele, The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings, (1st ed.; New York: Macmillan, 1951; 2d ed.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1965; 3rd ed.; Grand Rapids: Zondervan/Kregel, 1983). , 9780825438257
The account of his reign is briefly told in 2 Kings (). According to the Bible, Zechariah did what was evil in the Lord's sight, as the previous kings of Israel since Jeroboam I had done. Zechariah ruled Israel for only six months before Shallum, a captain from his own army, murdered him and took the throne. This ended the dynasty of Jehu after four generations of his descendants, fulfilling the prophecy in .
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