Alliances
An alliance in the biblical record is a binding agreement between persons, houses, or nations, ordinarily ratified by oath. Scripture treats some such bonds as legitimate and others as forbidden. The line is drawn not by the form of the agreement but by the partner: alliances that draw Israel into idolatry, or that substitute foreign protection for trust in Yahweh, fall under prophetic indictment, while honorable covenants between neighbors and friends are recorded with approval. The vocabulary runs from the patriarchs at Mamre through the kings of Israel and Judah into the Maccabean diplomacy of the second temple period.
Forbidden Alliances With Idolaters
The Mosaic legislation is direct. To the generation entering the land Yahweh says, "You will make no covenant with them, nor with their gods. They will not dwell in your land, or else they will make you sin against me; for if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you" (Ex 23:32-33). The prohibition is repeated in stronger terms before the renewal at Sinai: "You be careful not to make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land where you go, or else it will be for a snare in the midst of you... For Yahweh, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God" (Ex 34:12-15). Deuteronomy is just as plain: "you will make no covenant with them, nor show mercy to them" (De 7:2). When Israel later neglects the command, the messenger of Yahweh confronts them at Bochim: "you⁺ will make no covenant with the inhabitants of this land; you⁺ will break down their altars. But you⁺ haven't listened to [my Speech]: why have you⁺ done this?" (Jud 2:2).
The prophets carry the same charge into the monarchy. Jehu the seer meets Jehoshaphat returning from his alliance with Ahab and asks, "Should you help the wicked, and love those who hate Yahweh? For this thing wrath is on you from before Yahweh" (2Ch 19:2). Eliezer of Mareshah delivers the same verdict on Jehoshaphat's later partnership with Ahaziah: "Because you have joined yourself with Ahaziah, Yahweh has destroyed your works" (2Ch 20:37). The pattern is named in Chronicles in the same idiom the umbrella heading uses — "Jehoshaphat had riches and honor in abundance; and he joined affinity with Ahab" (2Ch 18:1); "after this Jehoshaphat king of Judah joined himself with Ahaziah king of Israel; the same did very wickedly" (2Ch 20:35). The diagnosis of Ephraim is shorter still: "Ephraim is joined to idols; leave him alone" (Ho 4:17).
When the political class of Judah panics under the Syro-Ephraimite threat, Isaiah is told not to think in their categories: "Yahweh spoke thus to me with a strong hand, and he turned me away [so as] not to walk in the way of this people, saying, Don't say⁺, A conspiracy, concerning all of which this people will say, A conspiracy" (Isa 8:11-12). The forbidden alliance and the alliance-fearing imagination are addressed in the same breath.
Ratification: Oaths and the Giving of the Hand
The standing form of ratification in Scripture is the oath sworn before God. Abimelech to Abraham: "Now therefore swear to me here [by the Speech of] God that you will not deal falsely with me, nor with my son, nor with my son's son" (Ge 21:23). The same form a generation later: "We saw plainly that [the Speech of] Yahweh was with you. And we said, Let there now be an oath between us, even between us and you, and let us make a covenant with you" (Ge 26:28). Joshua's princes ratify with the Gibeonites by the same procedure: "Joshua made peace with them, and made a covenant with them, to let them live: and the princes of the congregation swore to them" (Jos 9:15). The oath is what binds Israel even after the deception is uncovered — "we have sworn to them by [the Speech of] Yahweh, the God of Israel: now therefore we may not touch them... lest wrath be on us, because of the oath which we swore to them" (Jos 9:19-20).
Personal alliances follow the same form. Jonathan binds himself to David twice over: "So Jonathan made a covenant with the house of David... And Jonathan caused David to swear again, for the love that he had to him; for he loved him as he loved his own soul" (1Sa 20:16-17).
Alongside the oath, Scripture preserves the giving of the hand as a ratification gesture. Lamentations confesses for Judah, "We have given the hand to the Egyptians, And to the Assyrians, to be satisfied with bread" (La 5:6). The gesture is named here as part of Judah's collapse into dependence on foreign powers.
For the covenants God himself makes with his people, see Covenants.
Patriarchal Alliances
The first alliance recorded is Abraham's confederacy with three local chieftains in the hill country: "he stayed by the oaks of Mamre, the Amorite, brother of Eshcol, and brother of Aner; and these were confederate with Abram" (Ge 14:13). The narrative records the alliance without comment beyond the word "confederate."
The Abimelech episodes are fuller. At Beer-sheba, Abimelech and Phicol his captain seek out Abraham because "[The Speech of] God is with you in all that you do" (Ge 21:22). The covenant is sworn, sealed with sheep and oxen, and named by the seven ewe lambs Abraham sets aside as witnesses to the disputed well: "So they made a covenant at Beer-sheba. And Abimelech rose up, and Phicol the captain of his host, and they returned into the land of the Philistines" (Ge 21:32). The pattern repeats with Isaac: "they said, We saw plainly that [the Speech of] Yahweh was with you... let us make a covenant with you, that you will do us no hurt... And they rose up early in the morning, and swore one to another. And Isaac sent them away, and they departed from him in peace" (Ge 26:28-31). In each case the foreign king initiates because he has seen Yahweh's blessing on the patriarch; the covenant carries no religious obligation, limited to non-aggression and just dealing.
Coalitions Against Israel
The conquest is told as a series of king-coalitions assembling against Joshua. When the kings beyond the Jordan hear of Israel's advance, "they gathered themselves together, to fight with Joshua and with Israel, with one accord" (Jos 9:1-2). After Gibeon defects, "the five kings of the Amorites, the king of Jerusalem, the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmuth, the king of Lachish, the king of Eglon, gathered themselves together, and went up, they and all their hosts, and encamped against Gibeon, and made war against it" (Jos 10:5). At Gezer, "Horam king of Gezer came up to help Lachish; and Joshua struck him and his people, until he had left him none remaining" (Jos 10:33). At the waters of Merom, "all these kings met together; and they came and encamped together at the waters of Merom, to fight with Israel" (Jos 11:5). In the period of the judges Eglon does the same on a smaller scale — "Yahweh strengthened Eglon the king of Moab against Israel" (Jud 3:12) and "he gathered to him the sons of Ammon and Amalek; and he went and struck Israel, and they possessed the city of palm-trees" (Jud 3:13).
The Psalter generalizes the pattern. "The kings of the earth set themselves, And the rulers take counsel together, Against Yahweh, and against his anointed" (Ps 2:2). "They gather themselves together, they hide themselves, They mark my steps, Even as they have waited for my soul" (Ps 56:6). And the great catalogue of Psalm 83: "they have consulted together with one consent; Against you they make a covenant" (Ps 83:5). Micah looks toward the same scene at the end: "now many nations are assembled against you, that say, Let her be defiled, and let our eye see [our desire] on Zion" (Mi 4:11). The hostile alliance is framed not against Israel only but against Israel's God.
Royal Alliances of Israel and Judah
After the kingdom is established the pattern shifts to bilateral treaties between thrones. Solomon and Hiram of Tyre stand at one end of the spectrum: "Yahweh gave Solomon wisdom, as he promised him; and there was peace between Hiram and Solomon; and the two made a league together" (1Ki 5:12). Centuries later Amos remembers the bond as a "brotherly covenant" Tyre had broken: "Thus says Yahweh: For three transgressions of Tyre, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they delivered up the whole people to Edom, and did not remember the brotherly covenant" (Am 1:9).
Asa moves the other way. Pressed by Baasha of Israel, "Asa took all the silver and the gold that were left in the treasures of the house of Yahweh, and the treasures of the king's house, and delivered them into the hand of his slaves; and King Asa sent them to Ben-hadad... king of Syria" (1Ki 15:18). His message is open about the calculation: "[There is] a league between me and you, between my father and your father: look, I have sent to you a present of silver and gold; go, break your league with Baasha king of Israel, that he may depart from me" (1Ki 15:19; cf. 2Ch 16:3). The treasury of Yahweh's house buys a Syrian alliance against Yahweh's own people in the north.
Jehoshaphat's alliance with Ahab is contracted in personal terms: "I am as you are, my people as your people, my horses as your horses" (1Ki 22:4). The Chronicler names it as marriage-affinity (2Ch 18:1), and it draws Jehoshaphat into the disastrous campaign against Ramoth-gilead. His later joint shipping venture with Ahaziah is wrecked at Ezion-geber (2Ch 20:35-37). Both alliances draw a prophetic condemnation in the next chapter.
The Assyrian crisis produces the sharpest examples. Ahaz, pinned between Rezin of Syria and Pekah of Israel — "Rezin king of Syria and Pekah son of Remaliah king of Israel came up to Jerusalem to war: and they besieged Ahaz, but could not overcome him" (2Ki 16:5) — appeals to Tiglath-pileser: "I am your slave and your son: come up, and save me out of the hand of the king of Syria, and out of the hand of the king of Israel, who rise up against me. And Ahaz took the silver and gold that was found in the house of Yahweh, and in the treasures of the king's house, and sent it for a present to the king of Assyria" (2Ki 16:7-8). The Chronicler's verdict is short: "King Ahaz sent to the kings of Assyria to help him... For Ahaz took away a portion out of the house of Yahweh... and gave it to the king of Assyria: but it did not help him" (2Ch 28:16, 21).
The chain runs out in Zedekiah. He is set on Jerusalem's throne under oath to Babylon, and breaks that oath by appealing to Egypt. Jeremiah records the alliance and its undoing: "Pharaoh's army came forth out of Egypt; and when the Chaldeans who were besieging Jerusalem heard news of them, they broke up from Jerusalem... Look, Pharaoh's army, which has come forth to help you⁺, will return to Egypt into their own land. And the Chaldeans will come again, and fight against this city; and they will take it, and burn it with fire" (Jer 37:5, 7-8). Ezekiel, in the allegory of the eagles, names the broken oath itself as the offense: "he rebelled against him in sending his ambassadors into Egypt, that they might give him horses and many people. Will he prosper? Will he escape who does such things? Will he break the covenant, and yet escape?... whose oath he despised, and whose covenant he broke, even with him in the midst of Babylon he will die. Neither will Pharaoh with his mighty army and great company help him in the war" (Eze 17:15-17).
The Prophets on Egypt and Assyria
The prophets reduce the long royal record to a single warning: do not go down to Egypt, and do not run to Assyria. Isaiah's woes are explicit. "Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help, and rely on horses, and trust in chariots because they are many, and in horsemen because they are very strong, but don't rely on the [Speech] of the Holy One of Israel, neither seek Yahweh!" (Isa 31:1). The earlier woe catches the same departure: "who set out to go down into Egypt, and have not asked at my mouth; to strengthen themselves in the strength of Pharaoh, and to take refuge in the shadow of Egypt!" (Isa 30:2). Jeremiah captures the disposition behind the policy: "It is in vain; no, for I have loved strangers, and I will go after them" (Je 2:25). Hosea names both partners: "Ephraim feeds on wind, and follows after the east wind: he continually multiplies lies and violence; and they make a covenant with Assyria, and oil is carried into Egypt" (Ho 12:1). And Lamentations records the end of the path — "We have given the hand to the Egyptians, And to the Assyrians, to be satisfied with bread" (La 5:6).
Wisdom on Personal Alliances
Sirach moves the question from kings to ordinary friendships. The counsel is to weigh the partner before binding oneself. "Do not stick to the wicked or he will overthrow you; And he will turn you out of your house" (Sir 11:34). The follow-up is sharper: "Do not give him weapons of war. Why should he turn them against you?" (Sir 12:5). The caution is generalized: "So is he who joins with a man of pride And wallows in his iniquities" (Sir 12:14). The wisdom logic mirrors the prophetic logic at the level of the household.
For marriage understood as a personal alliance — the household-binding covenant Scripture treats as its own category — see Marriage.
Hellenistic-Era Alliances
First Maccabees opens with the same indictment Deuteronomy and Judges pronounced. "In those days there went out of Israel wicked men, and they persuaded many, saying: Let's go, and make a covenant with the nations that are round about us: for since we departed from them, many evils have befallen us" (1Ma 1:11). The book frames the assimilationist party in Jerusalem as a movement to make precisely the alliance the Mosaic law forbade.
The second-temple narrative also records harder cases of military and diplomatic alliance. The Ammonites' coalition is described in the same language as the conquest period: "they have hired the Arabians to help them, and they have pitched their tents beyond the torrent, ready to come to fight against you" (1Ma 5:39). The Hellenistic dynastic struggles are conducted in alliance form: "King Ptolemy got the dominion of the cities by the seaside, even to Seleucia, and he devised evil designs against Alexander. And he sent ambassadors to Demetrius, saying: Come, let's make a covenant between us, and I will give you my daughter whom Alexander has, and you will reign in the kingdom of your father" (1Ma 11:8-9). The marriage-alliance is treated here as a tool of diplomacy and a betrayal in one move. The corresponding Maccabean counter-bid, also a marriage-alliance, is Jonathan's offer to Alexander in Jerusalem (1Ma 10:54). Even Beth-zur, in 1Ma 10:14, is named as a refuge for those "who had forsaken the law and the commandments" — a political holdout maintained by men who had broken the covenant first.
The Maccabean record carries forward the same standard the prophets applied to Asa, Ahaz, and Zedekiah: alliances stand or fall on whether they hold the covenant with Yahweh, or trade it away.