Jeroboam
63
centuries of Egyptian bondage. Jeroboam’s recent residence in Egypt
should have taught him the folly of placing before the people such
heathen representations. But his set purpose of inducing the northern
tribes to discontinue their annual visits to the Holy City led him to
adopt the most imprudent of measures. “It is too much for you to go
up to Jerusalem,” he urged; “behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought
thee up out of the land of Egypt.”
1 Kings 12:28
. Thus they were
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invited to bow down before the golden images and adopt strange forms
of worship.
The king tried to persuade the Levites, some of whom were living
within his realm, to serve as priests in the newly erected shrines at
Bethel and Dan; but in this effort he met with failure. He was therefore
compelled to elevate to the priesthood men from “the lowest of the
people.”
Verse 31
. Alarmed over the prospect, many of the faithful,
including a great number of the Levites, fled to Jerusalem, where they
might worship in harmony with the divine requirements.
“Jeroboam ordained a feast in the eighth month, on the fifteenth
day of the month, like unto the feast that is in Judah, and he offered
upon the altar. So did he in Bethel, sacrificing unto the calves that he
had made: and he placed in Bethel the priests of the high places which
he had made.”
Verse 32
.
The king’s bold defiance of God in thus setting aside divinely
appointed institutions was not allowed to pass unrebuked. Even while
he was officiating and burning incense during the dedication of the
strange altar he had set up at Bethel, there appeared before him a
man of God from the kingdom of Judah, sent to denounce him for
presuming to introduce new forms of worship. The prophet “cried
against the altar, ... and said, O altar, altar, thus saith the Lord; Behold,
a child shall be born unto the house of David, Josiah by name; and
upon thee shall he offer the priests of the high places that burn incense
upon thee, and men’s bones shall be burnt upon thee.
“And he gave a sign the same day, saying, This is the sign which
the Lord hath spoken; Behold, the altar shall be rent, and the ashes that
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are upon it shall be poured out.” Immediately the altar “was rent, and
the ashes poured out from the altar, according to the sign which the
man of God had given by the word of the Lord.”
1 Kings 13:2, 3, 5
.
On seeing this, Jeroboam was filled with a spirit of defiance against
God and attempted to restrain the one who had delivered the message.