King James Version · The divided kingdom
1 Kings 12
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And went to : for all Israel were come to to make him king. And it came to pass, when the son of , who was yet in , heard of it, (for he was fled from the of king , and dwelt in ;) 3That they sent and called him. And and all of Israel came, and spake unto , saying, Thy made our grievous: now therefore make thou the grievous of thy , and his heavy which he put upon us, lighter, and we will thee. And he said unto them, Depart yet for three days, then come again to me. And the people departed. And king consulted with the old men, that stood before his while he yet lived, and said, How do ye advise that I may answer this people? And they spake unto him, saying, If thou wilt be a servant unto this people this day, and wilt them, and answer them, and speak good words to them, then they will be thy servants for ever. But he forsook the of the old men, which they had given him, and consulted with the young men that were grown up with him, and which stood before him: And he said unto them, What give ye that we may answer this people, who have spoken to me, saying, Make the which thy did put upon us lighter? And the young men that were grown up with him spake unto him, saying, Thus shalt thou speak unto this people that spake unto thee, saying, Thy made our heavy, but make thou it lighter unto us; thus shalt thou say unto them, My little finger shall be thicker than ’s loins. And now whereas did lade you with a heavy , I will add to your : hath chastised you with whips, but I will you with scorpions. So and all the people came to the third day, as the king had appointed, saying, Come to me again the third day. And the king answered the people roughly, and forsook the old men’s that they gave him; And spake to them after the of the young men, saying, made your heavy, and I will add to your : also chastised you with whips, but I will you with scorpions. Wherefore the king hearkened not unto the people; for the cause was from , that he might perform his saying, which spake by the Shilonite unto the son of . So when all Israel saw that the king hearkened not unto them, the people answered the king, saying, What have we in ? neither have we in the son of : to your tents, O Israel: now see to thine own house, . So Israel departed unto their tents. But as for the which dwelt in the cities of Judah, reigned over them. Then king sent , who was over the tribute; and all Israel stoned him with stones, that he . Therefore king made speed to get him up to his chariot, to flee to . So Israel rebelled against the house of unto this day. And it came to pass, when all Israel heard that was come again, that they sent and called him unto , and made him king over all Israel: there was none that followed the house of , but the tribe of Judah only. And when was come to , he assembled all the house of Judah, with the tribe of , an hundred and fourscore thousand chosen men, which were warriors, to fight against the , to bring again to the son of . But the word of came unto the , saying, Speak unto , the son of , king of Judah, and unto all the house of Judah and , and to of the people, saying, Thus saith , Ye shall not go up, nor fight against your brethren the : return every man to his house; for this thing is from me. They hearkened therefore to the word of , and returned to depart, according to the word of . Then built in mount , and dwelt therein; and went out from thence, and built . And said in , Now shall return to the house of : If this people go up to do in the at , then shall of this people turn again unto their , even unto king of Judah, and they shall kill me, and go again to king of Judah. Whereupon the king , and made two calves of gold, and said unto them, It is too much for you to go up to : behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of . And he set the one in Beth–el, and the other put he in Dan. And this thing became a : for the people went to before the one, even unto Dan. And he made an house of , and made priests of the lowest of the people, which were not of the . And 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 . So did he in Beth–el, sacrificing unto the calves that he had made: and he placed in Beth–el the priests of the which he had made. So he offered upon the which he had made in Beth–el the fifteenth day of the eighth month, even in the month which he had devised of his own ; and ordained a feast unto the : and he offered upon the , and burnt .
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · The divided kingdom, 931 BC to 745 BC ›
Israel in the north and Judah in the south, often at odds, with Aram of Damascus as the immediate threat and Assyria growing in the distance.
- Aram of Damascus
- The immediate enemy for most of two centuries, close enough to raid every campaigning season and strong enough to take territory. Most of the wars in Kings that read like national emergencies are border wars with Damascus.
- Assyria
- Growing steadily in the distance. Shalmaneser III fights a coalition at Qarqar in 853 BC and his own inscription lists King Ahab of Israel among his opponents with two thousand chariots, the earliest Assyrian mention of an Israelite king. A later monument shows Jehu bowing and paying tribute. Assyria is not yet the destroyer, but it is already taking notes.
- Egypt
- Divided and unreliable, capable of the occasional raid, such as Shishak stripping the temple in Rehoboam's fifth year, but no longer an empire that governs the Levant.
- Further afield
- The Greeks adopt the alphabet, hold the first Olympiad by tradition in 776 BC, and begin to compose the Homeric poems. Rome is founded by tradition in 753 BC, a village of huts at this point. This is the century in which the classical world begins.