Shishak of Egypt Invades Judah

12 When the kingdom of Rehoboam was established and strong, he and all Israel with him abandoned the law of the Lord. ² And it came about in King Rehoboam’s fifth year, because they had been unfaithful to the Lord, that ^[a]Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem ³ with 1,200 chariots and 60,000 horsemen. The people who came with him from Egypt were beyond counting—the Lubim, the Sukkiim, and the ^[b]Ethiopians. ⁴ Shishak took the fortified cities of Judah and came as far as Jerusalem. ⁵ Then Shemaiah the prophet came to Rehoboam and the leaders of Judah who had gathered at Jerusalem because of Shishak, and said to them, “Thus says the Lord: ‘You have abandoned (turned away from) Me, so I have abandoned you into the hands of Shishak.’” ⁶ Then the leaders of Israel and the king humbled themselves and said, “The Lord is righteous.”

⁷ When the Lord saw that they humbled themselves, the word of the Lord came to Shemaiah, saying, “They have humbled themselves so I will not destroy them, but I will grant them some measure of a remnant [that escapes]; and My wrath shall not be poured out on Jerusalem by means of Shishak. ⁸ Nevertheless they will become his slaves, so that they may know [the difference between] My service and the service of the kingdoms of the countries.”

Plunder Impoverishes Judah

⁹ So Shishak king of Egypt went up against Jerusalem; he took the treasures of the house of the Lord and the treasures of the king’s house (palace). He took everything. He even took the shields of gold which Solomon had made. ¹⁰ In their place King Rehoboam made shields of bronze and entrusted them to the care of the officers of the guard who guarded the door of the king’s house. ¹¹ And whenever the king entered the house of the Lord, the guards came and carried the shields and then brought them back into the guards’ room. ¹² When Rehoboam humbled himself, the wrath of the Lord turned away from him, so as not to destroy him completely; and also conditions were good in Judah.

¹³ So King Rehoboam established himself in Jerusalem and reigned. Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he began to reign, and he reigned seventeen years in Jerusalem, the city in which the Lord had chosen from all the tribes of Israel to put His Name. And his mother was Naamah the Ammonitess. ¹⁴ He did evil because he did not set his heart to seek and worship and honor the Lord.

¹⁵ Now the acts of Rehoboam, from the first to the last, are they not written in the records of Shemaiah the prophet and of Iddo the seer, according to genealogical enrollment? There were wars between Rehoboam [of Judah] and Jeroboam [of Israel] continually. ¹⁶ And Rehoboam slept with his fathers [in death] and was buried in the City of David; and Abijah his son became king in his place.