Priests and people brought thank-offerings, and, together, sang
praises to God:

"God is my light and my salvation,
Whom shall I fear?
God is the strength of my life,
Of whom shall I be afraid?"

Truly, God was on the side of Israel, or else the Syrians could not
have been defeated. He was showing favor to the Northern Kingdom, and
was pleased with Israel, for was not Judah, the Southern Kingdom, too,
paying tribute to Jeroboam?

And so they recalled how Joash, the father of the great Jeroboam II,
defeated Amaziah, king of Judah, took him captive, partially
demolished the walls of Jerusalem, and looted the Temple in Jerusalem.


The older men of Samaria remembered the fine sarcasm with which Joash
treated Amaziah's challenge to war, in his reply:

"The thistle that was in Lebanon sent to the cedar that was in
Lebanon, saying, 'Give thy daughter to my son to wife,' and there
passed by a wild beast that was in Lebanon, and trod down the
thistle."

How young and old laughed at the repetition of this clever little
story that compared Israel to a cedar in its strength and to a wild
beast in its fighting power, and Judah to a poor, little thistle to be