God Sends a Lying Spirit Into All of Ahab's Prophets

Micaiah is brought before Ahab and Jehoshaphat to prophesy about the coming battle. He tells them what he saw in a vision: God on his throne, and the host of heaven asking how to entice Ahab to go to Ramoth-gilead and fall there. A spirit steps forward and says, 'I will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets.' God says: 'Go out and do so.' The four hundred prophets already chanting victory are, in this vision, the instruments of deliberate divine deception — their confident prophecies a mechanism for luring Ahab to his death.