Amon

Amon is the name of two men in the Hebrew Scriptures: a city official in the northern kingdom of Israel during the reign of Ahab, and the son of Manasseh who reigned as king of Judah and was the father of Josiah.

The first Amon appears only in the account of Micaiah's confrontation with Ahab. The text says that the king of Israel ordered, "Take Micaiah, and carry him back to Amon the governor of the city and to Joash the king's son" (1 Kings 22:26), and the parallel in Chronicles preserves the identical wording (2 Chronicles 18:25). Scripture gives nothing further about him; his title, "governor of the city," is an established administrative office, and the passage places him among the authorities responsible for holding a prophet in custody.

The second Amon is the more prominent figure. The text says that when Manasseh died and was buried in the garden of Uzza, "Amon his son reigned in his place" (2 Kings 21:18; compare 2 Chronicles 33:20). Chronicles records that he "did that which was evil in Yahweh's sight, as did Manasseh his father," sacrificing to and serving the engraved images Manasseh had made (2 Chronicles 33:22). It adds a pointed comparison: he "didn't humble himself before Yahweh, as Manasseh his father had humbled himself; but this same Amon trespassed more and more" (2 Chronicles 33:23). His reign ended not by foreign conquest but by palace conspiracy: "His servants conspired against him, and put him to death in his own house" (2 Chronicles 33:24). The text then says the people of the land executed all the conspirators and installed his son Josiah as king in his place (2 Chronicles 33:25).

Elsewhere Amon functions chiefly as a royal patronym, fixing the date of later prophecy: the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah "in the days of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah" (Jeremiah 1:2; see also Jeremiah 25:3 and Zephaniah 1:1). He also appears in the genealogy of Jesus: "Manasseh became the father of Amon. Amon became the father of Josiah" (Matthew 1:10). Historically, some Greek manuscripts and English translations render that name "Amos" at Matthew 1:10, which is why the two names are sometimes conflated; the Hebrew name is distinct from that of the prophet Amos, and also from the Egyptian deity of similar spelling. Christian traditions do not divide sharply over Amon. The main differences are ones of translation and emphasis: some versions retain "Amos" in Matthew's genealogy, and readers weigh Chronicles' theological framing — a son who failed to imitate even his father's late repentance — differently from the shorter account in Kings, which reports the same reign without that explicit contrast.

AI-generated reference entry, grounded in the passages where this term appears — history and Scripture stated as such, interpretation labeled as interpretation. Not a substitute for the text itself.