Beginning

II. The Reign of Jeroboam^[a]

Chapter 12

Political Disunity.^{[b] 1} Rehoboam went to Shechem,^[c] where all Israel had come to make him king. ² When Jeroboam, son of Nebat, heard about it, he was still in Egypt. He had fled from King Solomon and remained in Egypt, ³ and they sent for him.

Then Jeroboam and the whole assembly of Israel came and they said to Rehoboam, ⁴ “Your father put a heavy yoke on us. If you now lighten the harsh servitude and the heavy yoke your father imposed on us, we will be your servants.” ⁵ He answered them, “Come back to me in three days,” and the people went away.

⁶ King Rehoboam asked advice of the elders who had been in his father Solomon’s service while he was alive, and asked, “How do you advise me to answer this people?” ⁷ They replied, “If today you become the servant of this people and serve them, and give them a favorable answer, they will be your servants forever.” ⁸ But he ignored the advice the elders had given him, and asked advice of the young men who had grown up with him and were in his service. ⁹ He said to them, “What answer do you advise that we should give this people, who have told me, ‘Lighten the yoke your father imposed on us’?” ¹⁰ The young men who had grown up with him replied, “This is what you must say to this people who have told you, ‘Your father made our yoke heavy; you lighten it for us.’ You must say, ‘My little finger is thicker than my father’s loins. ¹¹ My father put a heavy yoke on you, but I will make it heavier. My father beat you with whips, but I will beat you with scorpions.’” ¹² Jeroboam and the whole people came back to King Rehoboam on the third day, as the king had instructed them: “Come back to me in three days.” ¹³ Ignoring the advice the elders had given him, the king gave the people a harsh answer. ¹⁴ He spoke to them as the young men had advised: “My father made your yoke heavy, but I will make it heavier. My father beat you with whips, but I will beat you with scorpions.” ^15 (A)The king did not listen to the people, for this turn of events was from the Lord: he fulfilled the word the Lord had spoken through Ahijah the Shilonite to Jeroboam, son of Nebat. ^16 (B)When all Israel saw that the king did not listen to them, the people answered the king:

So Israel went off to their tents. ¹⁷ But Rehoboam continued to reign over the Israelites who lived in the cities of Judah.

¹⁸ King Rehoboam then sent out Adoram,^[e] who was in charge of the forced labor, but all Israel stoned him to death. King Rehoboam then managed to mount his chariot and flee to Jerusalem. ¹⁹ And so Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day. ²⁰ When all Israel heard that Jeroboam had returned, they summoned him to an assembly and made him king over all Israel. None remained loyal to the house of David except the tribe of Judah alone.

Divine Approval.^{[f] 21} On his arrival in Jerusalem, Rehoboam assembled all the house of Judah and the tribe of Benjamin—one hundred and eighty thousand elite warriors—to wage war against the house of Israel, to restore the kingdom to Rehoboam, son of Solomon. ²² However, the word of God came to Shemaiah, a man of God: ²³ Say to Rehoboam, son of Solomon, king of Judah, and to all the house of Judah and to Benjamin, and to the rest of the people: ²⁴ Thus says the Lord: You must not go out to war against your fellow Israelites. Return home, each of you, for it is I who have brought this about. They obeyed the word of the Lord and turned back, according to the word of the Lord.

²⁵ Jeroboam built up Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim and lived there. Then he left it and built up Penuel.

Jeroboam’s Cultic Innovations.^{[g] 26} Jeroboam thought to himself: “Now the kingdom will return to the house of David. ²⁷ If this people go up to offer sacrifices in the house of the Lord in Jerusalem, the hearts of this people will return to their master, Rehoboam, king of Judah, and they will kill me and return to Rehoboam, king of Judah.” ^28 (C)The king took counsel, made two calves of gold, and said to the people: “You have been going up to Jerusalem long enough. Here are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt.” ^29 (D)And he put one in Bethel, the other in Dan.^{[h] 30} This led to sin, because the people frequented these calves in Bethel and in Dan. ³¹ He also built temples on the high places and made priests from among the common people who were not Levites.

Divine Disapproval.^{[i] 32} Jeroboam established a feast in the eighth month on the fifteenth day of the month like the pilgrimage feast in Judah, and he went up to the altar. He did this in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves he had made. He stationed in Bethel the priests of the high places he had built. ³³ Jeroboam went up to the altar he built in Bethel on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, the month he arbitrarily chose. He established a feast for the Israelites, and he went up to the altar to burn incense.

Chapter 13

¹ A man of God came from Judah to Bethel by the word of the Lord, while Jeroboam was standing at the altar to burn incense. ^2 (E)He cried out against the altar by the word of the Lord: “Altar, altar, thus says the Lord: A child shall be born to the house of David, Josiah by name, who shall slaughter upon you the priests of the high places who burn incense upon you, and they shall burn human bones upon you.” ^3 (F)He also gave a sign that same day and said: “This is the sign that the Lord has spoken: The altar shall be torn apart and the ashes on it shall be scattered.” ⁴ When the king heard the word of the man of God which he was crying out against the altar in Bethel, Jeroboam stretched forth his hand from the altar and said, “Seize him!” But the hand he stretched forth against him withered, so that he could not draw it back. ⁵ (The altar was torn apart and the ashes from the altar were scattered, in accordance with the sign the man of God gave by the word of the Lord.)

⁶ Then the king said to the man of God, “Entreat the Lord, your God, and intercede for me that my hand may be restored.” So the man of God entreated the Lord, and the king’s hand was restored as it was before. ⁷ The king told the man of God, “Come with me to the house for some refreshment so that I may give you a present.” ⁸ The man of God said to the king, “If you gave me half your palace, I would not go with you, nor eat bread or drink water in this place. ⁹ For I was instructed by the word of the Lord: Do not eat bread or drink water, and do not return by the way you came.” ¹⁰ So he departed by another road and did not go back the way he had come to Bethel.

Prophetic Disunity.^{[j] 11} There was an old prophet living in Bethel, whose son came and told him all that the man of God had done that day in Bethel. When his sons repeated to their father the words the man of God had spoken to the king, ¹² the father asked them, “Which way did he go?” So his sons pointed out to him the road taken by the man of God who had come from Judah. ¹³ Then he said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me.” When they had saddled it, he mounted ¹⁴ and followed the man of God, whom he found seated under a terebinth. When he asked him, “Are you the man of God who came from Judah?” he answered, “Yes.” ¹⁵ Then he said, “Come home with me and have some bread.” ¹⁶ “I cannot return with you or go with you, and I cannot eat bread or drink water with you in this place,” he answered, ¹⁷ “for I was told by the word of the Lord: You shall not eat bread or drink water there, and do not go back the way you came.” ¹⁸ But he said to him, “I, too, am a prophet like you, and an angel told me by the word of the Lord: Bring him back with you to your house to eat bread and drink water.” But he was lying to him. ¹⁹ So he went back with him, and ate bread and drank water in his house. ²⁰ But while they were sitting at table, the word of the Lord came to the prophet who had brought him back, ²¹ and he cried out to the man of God who had come from Judah: “Thus says the Lord: Because you rebelled against the charge of the Lord and did not keep the command which the Lord, your God, gave you, ²² but returned and ate bread and drank water in the place where he told you, Do not eat bread or drink water, your corpse shall not be brought to the grave of your ancestors.” ²³ After he had eaten bread and drunk, they saddled for him the donkey that belonged to the prophet who had brought him back, ²⁴ and he set out. But a lion met him on the road, and killed him. His body lay sprawled on the road, and the donkey remained standing by it, and so did the lion.

²⁵ Some passersby saw the body lying in the road, with the lion standing beside it, and carried the news to the city where the old prophet lived. ²⁶ On hearing it, the prophet who had brought him back from his journey said: “It is the man of God who rebelled against the charge of the Lord. The Lord has delivered him to a lion, which mangled and killed him, according to the word which the Lord had spoken to him.” ²⁷ Then he said to his sons, “Saddle the donkey for me,” and they saddled it. ²⁸ He went off and found the body sprawled on the road with the donkey and the lion standing beside it. The lion had not eaten the body nor had it harmed the donkey. ²⁹ The prophet lifted up the body of the man of God and put it on the donkey, and brought him back to the city to mourn and to bury him. ³⁰ He laid the man’s body in his own grave, and they mourned over it: “Alas, my brother!” ^31 (G)After he had buried him, he said to his sons, “When I die, bury me in the grave where the man of God is buried. Lay my bones beside his. ^32 (H)For the word which he proclaimed by the word of the Lord against the altar in Bethel and against all the temples on the high places in the cities of Samaria shall certainly come to pass.”

³³ Even after this, Jeroboam did not turn from his evil way, but again made priests for the high places from among the common people. Whoever desired it was installed as a priest of the high places. ³⁴ This is the account of the sin of the house of Jeroboam for which it was to be cut off and destroyed from the face of the earth.

Chapter 14

Ahijah Announces Jeroboam’s Downfall.^{[k] 1} At that time Abijah, son of Jeroboam, took sick. ^2 (I)So Jeroboam said to his wife, “Go and disguise yourself so that no one will recognize you as Jeroboam’s wife. Then go to Shiloh, where you will find Ahijah the prophet. It was he who spoke the word that made me king over this people. ³ Take along ten loaves, some cakes, and a jar of honey, and go to him. He will tell you what will happen to the child.” ⁴ The wife of Jeroboam did so. She left and went to Shiloh and came to the house of Ahijah.

Now Ahijah could not see because age had dimmed his sight. ⁵ But the Lord said to Ahijah: Jeroboam’s wife is coming to consult you about her son, for he is sick. Thus and so you must tell her. When she comes, she will be in disguise. ⁶ So Ahijah, hearing the sound of her footsteps as she entered the door, said, “Come in, wife of Jeroboam. Why are you in disguise? For my part, I have been commissioned to give you bitter news. ⁷ Go, tell Jeroboam, ‘Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: I exalted you from among the people and made you ruler of my people Israel. ⁸ I tore the kingdom away from the house of David and gave it to you. Yet you have not been like my servant David, who kept my commandments and followed me with his whole heart, doing only what is right in my sight. ⁹ You have done more evil than all who were before you: you have gone and made for yourself other gods and molten images to provoke me; but me you have cast behind your back. ^10 (J)Therefore, I am bringing evil upon the house of Jeroboam:

For the Lord has spoken!’ ¹² As for you, leave, and go home! As you step inside the city, the child will die, ¹³ and all Israel will mourn him and bury him, for he alone of Jeroboam’s line will be laid in the grave, since in him alone of Jeroboam’s house has something pleasing to the Lord, the God of Israel, been found. ¹⁴ The Lord will raise up for himself a king over Israel who will cut off the house of Jeroboam—today, at this very moment! ¹⁵ The Lord will strike Israel like a reed tossed about in the water and will pluck out Israel from this good land which he gave their ancestors, and will scatter them beyond the River,^[l] because they made asherahs for themselves, provoking the Lord. ¹⁶ He will give up Israel because of the sins Jeroboam has committed and caused Israel to commit.” ¹⁷ So Jeroboam’s wife left and went back; when she came to Tirzah and crossed the threshold of her house, the child died. ¹⁸ He was buried and all Israel mourned him, according to the word of the Lord spoken through his servant Ahijah the prophet.

¹⁹ The rest of the acts of Jeroboam, how he fought and how he reigned, these are recorded in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Israel. ²⁰ The length of Jeroboam’s reign was twenty-two years. He rested with his ancestors, and Nadab his son succeeded him as king.

III. Kings of Judah and Israel^[m]

Reign of Rehoboam. ^21 [n]Rehoboam, son of Solomon, became king in Judah. Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he became king, and he reigned seventeen years in Jerusalem, the city in which, out of all the tribes of Israel, the Lord chose to set his name. His mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonite.

²² Judah did evil in the Lord’s sight and they angered him even more than their ancestors had done. ²³ They, too, built for themselves high places, sacred pillars, and asherahs,^[o] upon every high hill and under every green tree. ²⁴ There were also pagan priests in the land. Judah imitated all the abominable practices of the nations whom the Lord had driven out of the Israelites’ way. ^25 [p]In the fifth year of King Rehoboam, Shishak, king of Egypt, attacked Jerusalem. ^26 (L)He took everything, including the treasures of the house of the Lord and the treasures of the house of the king, even the gold shields Solomon had made. ²⁷ To replace them, King Rehoboam made bronze shields, which he entrusted to the officers of the guard on duty at the entrance of the royal house. ²⁸ Whenever the king visited the house of the Lord, those on duty would carry the shields, and then return them to the guardroom.

²⁹ The rest of the acts of Rehoboam, with all that he did, are recorded in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah. ³⁰ There was war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all their days. ³¹ Rehoboam rested with his ancestors; he was buried with his ancestors in the City of David. His mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonite. His son Abijam succeeded him as king.