1 Kings 12:1-5
Make the yoke lighter
All Israel comes to Shechem, which means the coronation is not automatic. They send for Jeroboam out of Egypt, and the request they make is modest and specific.
People of the Bible
Rehoboam
Was asked to lighten the load, took three days to think about it, and gave the worst answer in the Old Testament.
Rehoboam goes to Shechem to be made king and the assembly of Israel arrives with a single request: your father made our yoke heavy, lighten it and we will serve you. He asks for three days. The old men who stood before Solomon tell him to speak good words to them and they will be his servants forever. The young men he grew up with tell him to say that his little finger is thicker than his father’s waist. He takes the second answer, and ten tribes walk out, and the kingdom of David lasts exactly three reigns.
Scroll down to the storyThe movements, in the order the text gives them.
The story of Rehoboam
- 01
- 02
1 Kings 12:6-11
Two councils in three days
The elders give him a sentence that would have held the kingdom together. The men he grew up with give him a boast about his little finger, and he prefers it.
- 03
1 Kings 12:12-19
To your tents, O Israel
He answers roughly, and Israel answers with a line from an old rebellion. He sends the officer over the forced labour to settle it, and they stone him, and the king leaves in a chariot at speed.
- 04
2 Chronicles 12:1-12
The LORD is righteous
Shishak of Egypt takes the fortified cities and the treasures of the house, including the gold shields. Rehoboam humbles himself, and what is left is bronze shields carried by the guard.
Why it matters
The split of the kingdom is the largest single event between Solomon and the exile, and it turns on one speech by one man who had a genuinely easy way out and did not take it. The account gives the cause twice over: the young men’s advice, and a note that the turn of events was from the LORD, so that the word by Ahijah would stand. Both are left in. Chronicles adds the one good thing about him, that when Shishak came he and the princes humbled themselves and said the LORD is righteous.
6 songs
The music
Every song in the catalogue whose passage falls inside these chapters.
