1 Kings 15:33
In the third year of Asa king of Judah began Baasha the son of Ahijah to reign over all Israel in Tirzah, twenty and four years. In the third year of Asa king of Judah began Baasha the son of Ahijah to reign over all Israel in Tirzah, twenty and four years.
Baasha the son of Ahijah began to reign over all Israel in Tirzah in the third year of Asa king of Judah, and he reigned twenty-four years. His reign over the ten tribes of Israel followed that of Nadab and came before those of Elah, Zimri, Omri, and the wicked Ahab, while Abijah and Asa reigned in Judah. His dynasty ended with his death, his royal house continuing for only two generations before Omri, who built Samaria, became king.
The verse belongs to the part of 1 Kings after chapter 11 that records the history of the kings after the division of the kingdom, as one of the reigns of several kings of both Judah and Israel in the roughly eighty-year history from the revolt of the ten tribes to the death of Jehoshaphat. That division followed Solomon's mistake in multiplying wives; at Solomon's death Rehoboam took the kingdom but through imprudent stubbornness lost a large portion of it in the revolt under Rehoboam and Jeroboam, leaving Judah with two and a half tribes and Israel with ten tribes.
The verse records Baasha's reign over the northern wicked kingdom during that continuing time of war and strife when the two kingdoms lived side by side, sometimes at war and sometimes at peace, following the idolatry of Jeroboam and before Israel was obliterated in 721 B.C. The account belongs to the history of Israel's apostasy under its kings, as the nation turned from the worship of God to idols, and illustrates the fruits of righteousness, backsliding, and sin.