Jeroboam
65
Having delivered his message, the prophet was about to return,
when Jeroboam said to him, “Come home with me, and refresh thyself,
and I will give thee a reward.” “If thou wilt give me half thine house,”
the prophet replied, “I will not go in with thee, neither will I eat bread
nor drink water in this place: for so was it charged me by the word of
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the Lord, saying, Eat no bread, nor drink water, nor turn again by the
same way that thou camest.”
1 Kings 13:7-9
.
Well would it have been for the prophet had he adhered to his
purpose to return to Judea without delay. While traveling homeward
by another route, he was overtaken by an aged man who claimed to
be a prophet and who made false representations to the man of God,
declaring, “I am a prophet also as thou art; and an angel spake unto
me by the word of the Lord, saying, Bring him back with thee into
thine house, that he may eat bread and drink water.” Again and again
the lie was repeated and the invitation urged until the man of God was
persuaded to return.
Because the true prophet allowed himself to take a course con-
trary to the line of duty, God permitted him to suffer the penalty of
transgression. While he and the one who had invited him to return to
Bethel were sitting together at the table, the inspiration of the Almighty
came upon the false prophet, “and he cried unto the man of God that
came from Judah, saying, Thus saith the Lord, Forasmuch as thou hast
disobeyed the mouth of the Lord, and hast not kept the commandment
which the Lord thy God commanded thee, ... thy carcass shall not
come unto the sepulcher of thy fathers.”
Verses 18-22
.
This prophecy of doom was soon literally fulfilled. “It came to
pass, after he had eaten bread, and after he had drunk, that he saddled
for him the ass.... And when he was gone, a lion met him by the way,
and slew him: and his carcass was cast in the way, and the ass stood
by it, the lion also stood by the carcass. And, behold, men passed by,
and saw the carcass cast in the way, ... and they came and told it in the
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city where the old prophet dwelt. And when the prophet that brought
him back from the way heard thereof, he said, It is the man of God,
who was disobedient unto the word of the Lord.”
Verses 23-26
.
The penalty that overtook the unfaithful messenger was a still
further evidence of the truth of the prophecy uttered over the altar. If,
after disobeying the word of the Lord, the prophet had been permitted
to go on in safety, the king would have used this fact in an attempt to