1 88 The Legends of the Jews
use the very same words in prophesying a victory at Ramoth- gilead. This literal unanimity aroused Jehoshaphat's sus- picion, and caused him to ask for " a prophet of the Lord," for the rule is : " The same thought is revealed to many prophets, but no two prophets express it in the same words."** Jehoshaphat's mistrust was justified by the issue of the war. Ahab was slain in a miraculous way by Naaman, at that time only a common soldier of the rank and file. God permitted Naaman's missile to penetrate Ahab's armor, though the latter was harder than the former.4*
The mourning for Ahab was so great that the memory of it reached posterity.44 The funeral procession was unusually impressive ; no less than thirty-six thousand warriors, their shoulders bared, marched before his bier.45 Ahab is one of the few in Israel who have no portion in the world to come.** He dwells in the fifth division of the nether world, which is under the supervision of the angel Oniel. However, he is exempt from the tortures inflicted upon his heathen asso- ciates.**
Jezebel
Wicked as Ahab was, his wife Jezebel was incomparably worse. Indeed, she is in great part the cause of his suffer- ing, and Ahab realized it. Once Rabbi Levi expounded the Scriptural verse in which the iniquity of Ahab and the influence of his wife over him are discussed, dwelling upon the first half for two months. Ahab visited him in a dream, and reproached him with expatiating on the first half of the verse to the exclusion of the latter half. There- upon the Rabbi took the second half of the verse as the text
