Kings of Israel Bible Trivia Questions

Who was Israel’s first king?

ASaul.Correct
BDavid.
CSamuel.
DIshbosheth.

Answer: Saul.

1 Samuel 10:24 · ESV

Israel asked for a king so they could be like the nations, and Samuel warned them what a king would cost them before God told him to give them one. Saul was anointed privately, then chosen by lot at Mizpah and presented to the people, who shouted for him. His height and bearing were the first thing anyone noticed, and the first thing the account tells you.

1 Samuel 8:5-9; 10:1, 20-24

Why not this one. David is the first king of the enduring line, the one God swore a throne to forever, so he feels like the beginning of the monarchy. But he was anointed while Saul still reigned and served in Saul's court and army for years before the crown ever came to him.

What happened to Gehazi after he ran after Naaman and took silver and garments from him?

AHe was struck with leprosyCorrect
BHe was struck blind
CHe was struck dead at Elisha's feet
DHe was sold into slavery in Syria

Answer: He was struck with leprosy

2 Kings 5:20-27 · ESV

Elisha had refused any gift from Naaman, but Gehazi pursued him with a lie and collected silver and clothing, hiding them at home. Elisha told him his heart had gone with him, and declared that Naaman's disease would cling to Gehazi and his descendants.

2 Kings 5:20-27, closing the account of Naaman's cleansing in the Jordan. Naaman had pressed gifts on Elisha, who had refused them outright before his servant went after them.

Why not this one. Blindness in Elisha's ministry falls on the Syrian army he leads into Samaria, not on Gehazi. Gehazi still appears later, speaking with the king about Elisha's deeds.

In the covenant God announced to David through Nathan, what did God say he would not take from David's offspring, as he had taken it from Saul?

AHis steadfast loveCorrect
BHis Spirit
CThe ark of the covenant
DThe land of Israel

Answer: His steadfast love

2 Samuel 7:15 · ESV

God promised that when David's offspring committed iniquity he would discipline him with the rod of men, but his steadfast love would not be withdrawn as it had been from Saul. The covenant is secured by God's own commitment, not by the obedience of the king.

2 Samuel 7:12-16, repeated with the same emphasis in 1 Chronicles 17:13 and celebrated in Psalm 89:30-37.

Why not this one. The Spirit did depart from Saul, and David pleads in Psalm 51 that God not take his Spirit from him. But the promise of 2 Samuel 7 is worded in terms of God's steadfast love toward the line.

Into how many kingdoms did Israel split after Solomon?

ATwo: the northern kingdom (Israel) and the southern kingdom (Judah).Correct
BThree: Israel, Judah, and Samaria.
CTwo: the eastern kingdom (Israel) and the western kingdom (Judah).
DFour: Israel, Judah, Benjamin, and Ephraim.

Answer: Two: the northern kingdom (Israel) and the southern kingdom (Judah).

1 Kings 12:19–20 · ESV

Ten tribes followed Jeroboam into the northern kingdom, called Israel, and Judah with Benjamin stayed under the house of David in the south. The north never had a stable dynasty and fell to Assyria; the south kept David's line and Solomon's temple until Babylon. Nearly every prophet you read from here on is speaking into one or the other of these two courts.

1 Kings 12:19-24

Why not this one. Samaria sounds like a third kingdom because the name shows up so often, and by the Gospels the Samaritans are a distinct people. It was the northern capital, bought and built by Omri, and the name came to stand for the northern kingdom itself rather than for a separate one.

What was the name of Jonathan’s son to whom David showed kindness for Jonathan’s sake?

AIsh-bosheth
BMephiboshethCorrect
CShimei
DZiba

Answer: Mephibosheth

2 Samuel 9:6 · ESV

David asked whether anyone was left of Saul's house to whom he could show the kindness of God for Jonathan's sake, and Ziba named a son lame in both feet. Mephibosheth had been dropped by his nurse at five years old when the news came from Jezreel. David restored to him all of Saul's land and gave him a permanent place at the king's table.

2 Samuel 9:1-13; 4:4

Why not this one. The names rhyme and both carry the same ending, which is exactly why they get switched. Ish-bosheth was Saul's son and Jonathan's brother, the short-lived rival king in the north, and he was murdered on his bed years before David went looking for someone to show kindness to.

How old was Saul’s son Ishbosheth when he began to reign over Israel?

ATwenty years old
BThirty years old
CForty years oldCorrect
DFifty years old

Answer: Forty years old

2 Samuel 2:10 · ESV

The accession notice for Ishbosheth gives his age as forty and his reign as two years over Israel, set against David's seven years and six months over Judah in Hebron. The two-year figure against David's seven is a hint of how much of that period Abner really ran, and how quickly Ishbosheth's grip failed once Abner turned.

2 Samuel 2:10-11

Why not this one. Thirty is the accession age given a few chapters later, but it belongs to David, who was thirty when he began to reign and reigned forty years. The two summaries sit close enough together that the numbers migrate from one king to the other.

Which king of Judah is praised for destroying the bronze serpent Moses had made because the people were burning incense to it?

AJosiah
BAsa
CHezekiahCorrect
DJehoshaphat

Answer: Hezekiah

2 Kings 18:4 · ESV

Hezekiah removed the high places, broke the pillars, cut down the Asherah, and broke in pieces the bronze serpent Moses had made in the wilderness, because Israel had been burning incense to it. He gave it a dismissive name meaning a piece of bronze. The object had once been the means of healing at God's own command, and it had become an idol, so it was destroyed.

2 Kings 18:3-4; Numbers 21:8-9

Why not this one. Josiah is the reformer whose purge is the most sweeping in the books, tearing down altars and burning the bones from the tombs, so almost any act of temple cleansing sounds like his. He came a century later, and by then the serpent had already been gone for generations.

What boy did Elisha raise from the dead?

AThe Shunammite woman’s son.Correct
BThe widow of Zarephath's son.
CThe son of the woman of Shunem's neighbor.
DNaaman's son.

Answer: The Shunammite woman’s son.

2 Kings 4:35 · ESV

A wealthy woman of Shunem had built a room on her roof for Elisha, and he promised her a son though her husband was old. Years later the boy collapsed in the field with a pain in his head and died on her lap. She rode to Carmel and would not leave Elisha; his staff sent ahead with Gehazi did nothing, but when Elisha lay on the child himself the boy warmed, sneezed seven times, and opened his eyes.

2 Kings 4:8-17, 32-37

Why not this one. That boy really was raised from the dead, and the two accounts run close enough to blur together, down to the prophet stretching himself over the child. But Zarephath belongs to Elijah, during the famine, and the woman there was a Sidonian widow rather than a well-off Israelite hostess.

Who was the mother of Absalom?

AMaacahCorrect
BAhinoam
CAbigail
DHaggith

Answer: Maacah

2 Samuel 3:3 · ESV

The list of sons born to David at Hebron names Absalom as the son of Maacah, daughter of Talmai king of Geshur. That royal Geshurite connection explains where Absalom fled for three years after he killed Amnon.

2 Samuel 3:2-5 lists the six sons born at Hebron with their mothers; Absalom's three-year flight to Geshur is recorded in 2 Samuel 13:37-38.

Why not this one. Haggith was the mother of Adonijah, the son who tried to seize the throne at the end of David's life. Scripture describes both Absalom and Adonijah as strikingly handsome and both as sons David never disciplined, which makes their mothers easy to confuse.

Who was the high priest in Shiloh who raised Samuel?

APhinehas
BAhijah
CEliCorrect
DAbiathar

Answer: Eli

1 Samuel 3:1 · ESV

Eli was the priest at Shiloh when Samuel was left there as a boy, and it was Eli who realized the voice waking the child in the night was the LORD and told him how to answer. The word Samuel then received was judgment on Eli's own house, because his sons treated the offerings with contempt and he did not restrain them. Eli made him tell it anyway.

1 Samuel 3:1-18; 2:22-25

Why not this one. Phinehas was a priest at Shiloh in exactly this period, which is what makes him plausible, but he was Eli's son and one of the two whose corruption brought the house down. He died with his brother Hophni on the day the ark was captured, and Eli fell backward at the news.

After the kingdom split, who became the first king of the northern kingdom of Israel?

ARehoboam
BJeroboamCorrect
COmri
DBaasha

Answer: Jeroboam

1 Kings 12:20 · ESV

Jeroboam had been one of Solomon's officials over forced labor when Ahijah the Shilonite met him on the road and tore a new garment into twelve pieces, giving him ten. He fled to Egypt until Solomon died, came back for the assembly at Shechem, and was made king when the northern tribes walked out on Rehoboam. Only Judah stayed with the house of David.

1 Kings 11:26-40; 12:20

Why not this one. Rehoboam is standing in the same scene and is the reason the tribes revolted, having promised to add to their yoke rather than lighten it. He is the first king of the divided south, not the north, and the answer turns on which half of the split each man ended up ruling.