1 Kings 14:6-16

B. THE MESSAGE OF GOD'S PROPHET 14:6-16

TRANSLATION

(6) And it came to pass when Ahijah heard the sound of her feet coming at the door, that he said, Enter, wife of Jeroboam! Why are you pretending to be someone else? For I have been sent unto you with a heavy word. (7) Go say to Jeroboam, Thus says the LORD the God of Israel: Because I raised you up from the midst of the people and made you a prince over My people Israel, (8) and rent the kingdom from the house of David, and gave it to you, and you have not become like My servant David who kept My commandments and who walked after Me with all his heart to do only that which was upright in My eyes, (9) and you have done evil more than all who were before you, and have made for yourself other gods and molten images to provoke Me to anger; and Me you have pushed behind your back: (10) Therefore, behold I am about to bring a calamity upon the house of Jeroboam; and I will cut off from Jeroboam male offspring, both the fettered and the free in Israel, and I will exterminate the rest of the house of Jeroboam, as one takes away dung until it be gone. (11) The one of Jeroboam who dies in the city the dogs shall eat, and the one who dies in the field shall the birds of the heaven eat; for the LORD has spoken. (12) But as for you, Arise, Go to your house. When your feet enter the city the lad will die. (13) And all of Israel shall lament for him and bury him, for he alone of Jeroboam shall come to the grave, because in him there was found a good thing toward the LORD God of Israel in the house of Jeroboam. (14) And the LORD shall raise up for Himself a king over Israel who will cut off the house of Jeroboam this day. And what? Now! (15) For the LORD shall smite Israel, as a reed is shaken in the water; and He shall pluck up Israel from upon this good land which He gave to their fathers, and He shall scatter them beyond the River, because they have made their Asherim, provoking the LORD. (16) And He shall give Israel up on account of the sins of Jeroboam, who sinned and who caused Israel to sin.

COMMENTS

When the queen stood at the door, the prophet ripped away the deception by identifying her and asking why she had attempted to perpetrate this masquerade. No favorable oracle would fall from the lips of the prophet, for he had been instructed by his God to bring to her heavy or rough tidings (1 Kings 14:6). Some writers detect in the phrase heavy tidings a certain sympathy for Jeroboam and his wife. If this be the case, Ahijah did not permit his sympathy to compromise the message he was to deliver from the Lord.

The message which Ahijah gave the queen to take back to Jeroboam was indeed ominous. Before pronouncing sentence, the prophet briefly stated the divine case against Jeroboam. It was God who had raised the lowly Jeroboam to the throne of Israel and, whether he realized it or not, the king was merely God's vice-regent ruling over God's people (1 Kings 14:7). In spite of the fact that God had torn such a large part of the kingdom from the house of David and had given it to Jeroboam, the king of Israel had not walked the paths of spiritual fidelity which David had trod (1 Kings 14:8). As a matter of fact Jeroboam had committed a more grievous sin than any of his predecessors whether kings (Saul and Solomon in particular) or judges. In defiance of the decalogue, (Exodus 20:4) Jeroboam had made other gods which were merely molten images, two names for the same things, viz., the calves at Bethel and Dan. Doubtlessly Jeroboam had not intended his calves to be considered idols, but only symbols like the Cherubim in the Jerusalem Temple. But God did not recognize whatever theological distinctions the king had worked out. In His view those calves were other gods, and the introduction of this element into the religion of Israel had provoked God to anger. Jeroboam had put God behind his back, i.e., had contemptuously disregarded God's revealed will (1 Kings 14:9). For these reasons the king and his dynasty had to be punished.

The judgment which Ahijah pronounced against the house of Jeroboam would be swift[357] and thorough. Every male of his house would be cut off.[358] The proverbial expression him that is shut up and left in Israel (KJV) probably refers to those both bond and free or, in other words, men of all kinds and classes.[359] The translation, proposed by Honor, the fettered and free, preserves the alliteration of the original Hebrew. God would continue to exterminate the members of the royal household until they had all been removed. The expression as one takes away dung indicates the loathing and contempt with which the members of the royal house would be treated in that day of judgment (1 Kings 14:10). The corpses of those pathetic princes would be left unburied. Those who fell in the city would be eaten by the roving packs of savage dogs; those who fall in the open field, by vultures and other birds of prey. To the eastern mind, the thought of being left unburied was the ultimate in disgrace and dishonor. Yet this is exactly what would take place with respect to the offspring of Jeroboam because the Lord has spoken it (1 Kings 14:11).

[357] The Hebrew hinne (behold) and the participle after lakhen (therefore) introduces a prophetic threat in the immediate future.

[358] The Hebrew literally reads, he who urinates against the wall. Hammond (PC, p. 315) restricts the phrase to boys (as opposed to men).

[359] The expression also occurs in Deuteronomy 32:36; 1 Kings 21:21; 2 Kings 9:8. It has been taken to mean: (1) married and single; (2) precious and vile; (3) minors and those of age.

As a sign that the long-range prediction concerning the dynasty of Jeroboam would come to pass, Ahijah gave a prediction which could be verified within a matter of hours. At the precise moment that the queen arrived back at the palace, her son would die (1 Kings 14:12). The entire nation would mourn for the crown prince and they would bury him. He would be the one exception to the gruesome picture of 1 Kings 14:11 of the sons of Jeroboam being left unburied. Of all the members of the royal household, this young prince alone had demonstrated the kind of disposition and piety which deserved recognition by the Lord (1 Kings 14:13). The words almost suggest that Abijah dissented from his father's ecclesiastical policy. To accomplish His divine purposes against the house of Jeroboam the Lord would raise up a king which later history reveals to be Baasha (1 Kings 15:29). The day of judgment for the house of Jeroboam was to begin on that very day that Ahijah delivered his oracle of doom. The last three words of 1 Kings 14:14 are difficult to interpret. Probably they mean something like, and what do I say? Even now! They are intended to underscore the immediacy of the prediction.[360]

[360] Slotki, SBB, p. 106.

The people as well as the king of Israel would share in the judgment of God. They had acquiesced in the wicked innovations of Jeroboam and had joined in the worship of the calves. God would smite Israel and sweep it away as easily and swiftly as a reed might be swept down a turbulent stream. Israel shall be removed from the land God had promised to the godly patriarchs and carried into captivity beyond the Euphrates river. The captivity foreshadowed by Moses (Deuteronomy 28) and by Solomon (1 Kings 8:46-50) is here prophesied for the first time. This terrible fate would befall the nation because they had provoked the Lord by making their Asherim (1 Kings 14:15). Asherah (not grove as in KJV) was a goddess represented by a wooden pole or a tree stripped of its branches, set up by the side of an altar to Baal.[361] It is clear from this passage that the old Canaanite abominations had survived in Israel and that during the reign of Jeroboam these pagan practices flourished alongside of the recently established calf cult. So because of all the sins inaugurated and tolerated during the reign of the first king of the Northern Kingdom, God was forced to simply give up Israel to her enemies for punishment and judgment (1 Kings 14:16).

[361] Because it was made of wood, there is no possibility of discovering one through archaeological excavation, except perhaps in a carbonized form. Moreover, thus far there has not been found in Palestine any depiction on stone engraving which could be definitely identified as an Asherah. Honor, JCBR, p. 202.