Old/New Testament

The Revolt Against Rehoboam at Shechem

10 Rehoboam went to Shechem, for all Israel had come to Shechem to make him king. ² Now it came to pass that when Jeroboam the son of Nebat heard this—for he was in Egypt where he had fled from King Solomon—Jeroboam returned from Egypt. ³ So they sent and summoned him; and Jeroboam and all Israel came to Rehoboam and spoke to Rehoboam saying, ⁴ “Your father made our yoke grievous but now lighten the harsh labor of your father and his heavy yoke that he put on us—then we will serve you.”

⁵ He answered them, “Come back to me in three days.” So the people departed.

⁶ Then King Rehoboam consulted with the elders who had served his father Solomon while he was alive, saying, “How do you advise me to answer this people?”

⁷ They answered him saying, “If you will be kind to this people and please them and speak good words to them, then they will be your servants forever.”

⁸ But he disregarded the counsel that the elders had given him and consulted with the young men who grew up with him and served him. ⁹ He said to them, “How do you advise me to answer this people who have spoken to me saying, ‘Lighten the yoke that your father put on us?’”

¹⁰ The young men that grew up with him answered him saying: “Speak thus to the people who spoke to you saying, ‘Your father made our yoke heavy, now you make it lighter for us’. Thus shall you say to them, ‘My little finger is thicker than my father’s loins. ¹¹ Now, whereas my father laid a heavy yoke on you, I will add to your yoke; my father disciplined you with whips, but I will do so with scorpions.’”

¹² Then Jeroboam and all the people returned to Rehoboam on the third day as the king had said to them saying, “Come back to me on the third day.” ¹³ The king answered them harshly. King Rehoboam ignored the counsel of the elders ¹⁴ and spoke to them according to the counsel of the young men saying, “I will make your yoke heavy—I will make it even heavier. My father punished you with whips, but I will punish you with scorpions.”

¹⁵ So the king did not listen to the people, for this turn of events was from God so that Adonai might establish His word that He had spoken through Ahijah the Shilonite to Jeroboam the son of Nebat.

¹⁶ When all Israel saw that the king did not listen to them, the people answered the king saying,

So all Israel departed to their tents. ¹⁷ But Rehoboam continued to reign over Bnei-Yisrael who lived in the cities of Judah. ¹⁸ Then King Rehoboam sent Hadoram, who was over the forced labor, but men of Israel pelted him to death with stones. King Rehoboam, however, managed to mount his chariot and to flee to Jerusalem. ¹⁹ So Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day.

11 Now when Rehoboam arrived at Jerusalem, he assembled the House of Judah and Benjamin, 180,000 chosen men who were warriors, to fight against Israel in order to restore the kingdom back to Rehoboam.

² But the word of Adonai came to Shemaiah the man of God saying: ³ “Speak to Rehoboam the son of Solomon, king of Judah, and to all Israel in Judah and Benjamin saying, ⁴ ‘Thus says Adonai, You shall not go up nor fight against your kinsmen. Let everyone return to his house for this matter is of Me.’” So they listened to the words of Adonai and returned from marching against Jeroboam.

Reign of Rehoboam

⁵ Rehoboam lived in Jerusalem and built fortified cities for defense in Judah.

⁶ He built up Beth-lehem, Etam, Tekoa, ⁷ Beth-zur, Soco, Adullam, ⁸ Gath, Mareshah, Ziph, ⁹ Adoraim, Lachish, Azekah, ¹⁰ Zorah, Aijalon and Hebron, which are fortified cities in Judah and in Benjamin. ¹¹ He also strengthened the fortified towns and put commanders in them, along with stores of food, oil and wine. ¹² He also put shields and spears in every town, and made them very strong. So he held Judah and Benjamin.

¹³ Moreover, the kohanim and the Levites from all their territories throughout Israel presented themselves to him. ¹⁴ The Levites even abandoned their pastures and their possessions and came to Judah and Jerusalem because Jeroboam and his sons had rejected them as kohanim to Adonai, ¹⁵ and had appointed his own priests for the high places, for the he-goats and for the calves that he had made. ¹⁶ Those from all the tribes of Israel, who had set their hearts to seek Adonai, followed the Levites to Jerusalem to sacrifice to Adonai, the God of their fathers. ¹⁷ So they strengthened the kingdom of Judah and supported Rehoboam the son of Solomon for three years, for they walked in the way of David and Solomon for three years.

¹⁸ Rehoboam married Mahalat the daughter of Jerimoth the son of David and of Abihail the daughter of Eliab the son of Jesse. ¹⁹ She bore him sons: Jeush and Shemariah and Zaham. ²⁰ After her he took Maacah the daughter of Absalom and she bore him Abijah, Attai, Ziza and Shelomith. ²¹ Now Rehoboam loved Maacah the daughter of Absalom more than all his wives and concubines—for he took 18 wives and 60 concubines and fathered 28 sons and 60 daughters.

²² Rehoboam appointed Abijah the son of Maacah as chief and commander among his brothers, for he intended to make him king. ²³ He also wisely dispersed some of his sons throughout the territories of Judah and Benjamin to all the fortified cities and he gave them plenty of food and sought many wives for them.

Shishak Attacks Jerusalem

12 Now it came to pass, when the kingdom of Rehoboam was established and he had become strong, that he and all Israel with him forsook the Torah of Adonai. ² It so happened that in the fifth year of King Rehoboam, King Shishak of Egypt marched against Jerusalem—because they had been unfaithful to Adonai— ³ with 1,200 chariots, 60,000 horsemen and innumerable troops that came with him from Egypt: Lybians, Sukkites and Cushites. ⁴ He captured the fortified cities of Judah and came as far as Jerusalem.

⁵ Then Shemaiah the prophet came to Rehoboam and the officers of Judah who had gathered in Jerusalem because of Shishak, and said to them, “Thus says Adonai:

‘You have abandoned Me—

so I also have abandoned you

into the hand of Shishak.’”

⁶ Then the officers of Israel and the king humbled themselves and said, “Adonai is just.”

⁷ But when Adonai saw that they humbled themselves, the word of Adonai came to Shemaiah saying: “Since they have humbled themselves, I will not destroy them but grant them some measure of deliverance, and My wrath will not be poured out upon Jerusalem by the hand of Shishak. ⁸ However, they will become subjects to him so that they may learn the difference between serving Me and serving the kings of the earth.”

⁹ So Shishak king of Egypt attacked Jerusalem and took away the treasures of the House of Adonai and the treasures of the king’s palace. He took away everything; he even took away the golden shields that Solomon had made. ¹⁰ So King Rehoboam made bronze shields to replace them and entrusted them to the hands of the captains of the royal guard that guarded the entrance to the royal palace. ¹¹ Whenever the king entered into the House of Adonai, the guards would carry them and then bring them back into the guard chamber. ¹² Because Rehoboam humbled himself, the anger of Adonai turned from him and He did not destroy him completely. Indeed there were good things in Judah.

¹³ So King Rehoboam strengthened himself in Jerusalem and reigned as king. Rehoboam was 41 years old when he began to reign and he reigned 17 years in Jerusalem—the city that Adonai had chosen out of all the tribes of Israel to put His Name there. His mother’s name was Naamah, the Ammonite. ¹⁴ But he did evil because he had not set his heart to seek Adonai.

¹⁵ Now the acts of Rehoboam, from beginning to end, are they not written in the chronicles of Shemaiah the prophet and of Iddo the seer for genealogies? There were continuous wars between Rehoboam and Jeroboam. ¹⁶ Then Rehoboam slept with his fathers and was buried in the city of David. Then his son Abijah became king in his place.

³⁰ Now Yeshua had not yet come into the village, but was still in the place where Martha had met Him. ³¹ The Judeans, who were with Miriam in the house and comforting her, seeing how quickly she got up and went out, followed her. They thought she was going to the tomb to weep there.

³² So when Miriam came to where Yeshua was, she saw Him and fell at His feet, saying to Him, “Master, if You had been here, my brother would not have died!”

³³ When Yeshua saw her weeping, and the Judeans who came with her weeping, He was deeply troubled in spirit and Himself agitated. ³⁴ “Where have you laid him?” He asked.

“Come and see, Master,” they tell Him.

³⁵ Yeshua wept. ³⁶ So the Judeans said, “See how He loved him!”

³⁷ But some of them said, “Couldn’t this One, who opened the eyes of the blind man, have also kept this man from dying?”

Yeshua’s Word Raises the Dead

³⁸ So Yeshua, again deeply troubled within Himself, comes to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. ³⁹ Yeshua says, “Roll away the stone!”

Martha, the dead man’s sister, said to Him, “Master, by this time he stinks! He’s been dead for four days!”

⁴⁰ Yeshua says to her, “Didn’t I tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?”

⁴¹ So they rolled away the stone. Yeshua lifted up His eyes and said, “Father, I thank you that you have heard Me. ⁴² I knew that You always hear Me; but because of this crowd standing around I said it, so that they may believe that You sent Me.”

⁴³ And when He had said this, He cried out with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” ⁴⁴ He who had been dead came out, wrapped in burial clothes binding his hands and feet, with a cloth over his face. And Yeshua tells them, “Cut him loose, and let him go!”

Better that One Man Die

⁴⁵ Therefore many of the Judeans, who had come to Miriam and had seen what Yeshua had done, put their trust in Him. ⁴⁶ But some of them went to the Pharisees and told them what Yeshua had done.

⁴⁷ So the ruling kohanim and Pharisees called a meeting of the Sanhedrin. “What are we doing?” they asked. “This Man is performing many signs! ⁴⁸ If we let Him go on like this, everyone will believe in Him, and the Romans will come and take away both our holy place and our nation.”

⁴⁹ But one of them, Caiaphas, who was kohen gadol that year, said to them, “You know nothing! ⁵⁰ You don’t take into account that it is better for you that one man die for the people rather than for the whole nation to be destroyed.”

⁵¹ Now he did not say this by himself; but as the kohen gadol that year, he prophesied that Yeshua would die for the nation. ^{[a] 52} And not for the nation only, but also so that He might gather together into one the scattered children of God.^[b]

⁵³ So from that day on, they plotted to kill Him. ⁵⁴ Therefore Yeshua no longer walked openly among the Judeans, but went from there to the country near the wilderness, to a city called Ephraim. He stayed there with His disciples.

⁵⁵ Now the Jewish Passover was near; and many people went up out of the regions to Jerusalem before Passover, to purify themselves. ⁵⁶ So they were searching for Yeshua, saying to one another as they stood in the Temple, “What do you think? Won’t He come to the feast at all?” ⁵⁷ Now the ruling kohanim and Pharisees had given orders that if anyone knew where He was, he should report it so that they might arrest Him.