I Kings 22:12 Jewish Thought: Derekh Hashem

Regarding Tsidkiyah the son of Kana'anah and his colleagues: And the matter that happened to Ahab's prophets with the spirit that fooled them is of this type. And that is that on account of his misdeeds, it was decreed about him that he would fall at Ramoth-gilead. So it was appropriate that there would be a powerful seduction through which he would be drawn and go to that war and not retreat from it, even though that which would happen to him would have appropriately prevent him from it, as actually happened. For Jehoshaphat told him (I Kings 22:5), "Now first seek the word of the Lord," and the prophecy of [Ahab's] prophets did not suffice for him. And all of this was foreseen in front of Him, may He be blessed. And note that when they set up the case in front of the Heavenly court, there were prosecutors and those arguing innocence; but they sought to find ways to fool him. And it came out that the most proper way was through [a certain] spirit. And that is because all of the false prophets had prophesied in front of Ahab, and before his eyes. That means that they were doing those actions to make efforts in such ways as to bring down prophetic revelations. However they were [really] only making efforts to bring down a revelation of impurity that we mentioned above, and nothing more. [Hence] they were deceiving the king and acting as if they were bringing down [God's] light, may He be blessed. Nevertheless, they were still making efforts to bring it down in front of him. And the revelation that they were actually seeking came down. And this was done before the eyes of the king to strengthen his faith in them more. And this is what is stated in the verse (I Kings 22:10), "and all the prophets were prophesying [in front of them]." And behold what came down to them with that impure prophecy was (I Kings 22:12), "March [...] and triumph, the Lord will deliver it into the king's hand." These were the words that that spirit spoke in their mouths. But they were not mistaken about themselves, as they knew [the nature] of their own efforts. But Ahab was mistaken about them. And he was fooled to the point that he did not believe the words of Michayah, because of his great faith in what he saw from his false prophets. However Tsidkiyah the son of Kana'anah went further than those prophets. For they only said that which was brought down to them from that spirit, whereas Tsidkiyah went further by doing something like that which was done by the true prophets. And that is because he actually believed in that revelation and thought it to be true and brought down from before [God], may He be blessed, until he went so far as to wantonly say (I Kings 22:11), "So said the Lord, 'With these, etc.'" Note that he was not properly learned in the ways of true prophecy, so he did not distinguish between falsehood and truth. And therefore they, may their memory be blessed, said that he said that which he did not hear. And they likewise said (Sanhedrin 89a), "The spirit of Naboth fooled him." They furthermore said, "He should have been exacting, according to what Jehoshaphat had told him - that two prophets will not prophesy in the same style [of expression]." In fact, those [false] prophets really did attain a greater revelation at that time than what they were accustomed to attaining, and in a different way than what they were accustomed - to the point that Tsidkiyah erred; and it appeared to him that his prophecy was true this time, even though their efforts were only towards the side of impurity, as we have written. But this was caused by God, as we have written. And understand [this] well.