Fluent Translation · Read & Reflect
1 Kings 14
At that time Abijah son of Jeroboam became sick.
Jeroboam said to his wife, “Please get up and disguise yourself, so that they will not know that you are Jeroboam’s wife. Go to Shiloh. Ahijah the prophet is there; he is the one who spoke concerning me, that I would be king over this people.
Take in your hand ten loaves, cakes, and a jar of honey, and go to him. He will tell you what will happen to the boy.”
Jeroboam’s wife did so. She got up, went to Shiloh, and came to Ahijah’s house. Now Ahijah could not see, because his eyes had grown dim with age.
But the LORD had said to Ahijah, “Look, Jeroboam’s wife is coming to seek a word from you concerning her son, for he is sick. Say this and this to her. When she comes, she will be disguised.”
When Ahijah heard the sound of her feet as she came in at the doorway, he said, “Come in, wife of Jeroboam. Why are you disguising yourself? I have been sent to you with a hard message.
Go, tell Jeroboam: Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: Because I raised you up from among the people and made you leader over my people Israel,
and 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 all his heart, doing only what was right in my eyes.
But you have done more evil than everyone who were before you. You have gone and made for yourself other gods and cast images, provoking me to anger; and you have cast me behind your back.
So, look, I am bringing disaster upon the house of Jeroboam. I will cut off from Jeroboam everyone who urinates against a wall, both bond and free in Israel. I will burn up the house of Jeroboam as one burns up dung, until it is gone.
Anyone belonging to Jeroboam who dies in the city, the dogs will eat; and anyone who dies in the open country, the birds of the sky will eat. For the LORD has spoken.
As for you, get up; go to your house. When your feet enter the city, the child will die.
All Israel will mourn for him and bury him. He alone of Jeroboam’s house will come to a grave, because something good toward the LORD, the God of Israel, has been found in him in the house of Jeroboam.
The LORD will raise up for himself a king over Israel who will cut off the house of Jeroboam this very day. And what? Even now!
The LORD will strike Israel as a reed shakes in the water. He will uproot Israel from this good land that he gave to their ancestors, and scatter them beyond the River, because they made their Asherah poles, provoking the LORD to anger.
He will give Israel up because of the sins Jeroboam committed and by which he caused Israel to sin.”
Then Jeroboam’s wife got up and went away, and she came to Tirzah. As she came to the threshold of the house, the boy died.
They buried him, and all Israel mourned for him, according to the word of the LORD that he had spoken through his servant Ahijah the prophet.
Now the rest of the deeds of Jeroboam—how he fought and how he reigned—look, they are written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.
The days that Jeroboam reigned were twenty-two years. Then he lay down with his ancestors, and Nadab his son became king in his place.
Rehoboam son of Solomon reigned in Judah. Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he became king, and he reigned seventeen years in Jerusalem, the city that the LORD had chosen from all the tribes of Israel to put his name there. His mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonite.
Judah did what was evil in the eyes of the LORD, and by the sins they committed they made him jealous more than all that their ancestors had done.
For they too built for themselves high places, pillars, and Asherah poles on every high hill and under every flourishing tree.
There were also male cult prostitutes in the land. They practiced all the abominations of the nations that the LORD had dispossessed before the Israelites.
In the fifth year of King Rehoboam, Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem.
He took away the treasures of the house of the LORD and the treasures of the king’s house; he took everything. He took all the gold shields that Solomon had made.
In their place King Rehoboam made bronze shields, and he entrusted them to the commanders of the runners who guarded the entrance to the king’s house.
Whenever the king entered the house of the LORD, the runners carried them, and then returned them to the runners’ chamber.
Now the rest of the deeds of Rehoboam, and all that he did, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah?
There was war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all their days.
Then Rehoboam lay down with his ancestors and was buried with his ancestors in the city of David. His mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonite. Abijam his son became king in his place.