Knox Bible

1

And now Jeroboam’s son Abia fell sick.

2

Whereupon Jeroboam said to his wife, Here is a journey needs to be made; but first disguise thyself, so that none may know thou art the wife of Jeroboam. It is to Silo thou must go, where Ahias lives, the prophet who foretold that I should be king of this realm;

3

to him betake thyself, bearing ten loaves with thee, and some pastry, and a pot of honey; from him thou wilt learn what is to become of the boy.

4

So Jeroboam’s wife did his bidding; to Silo she made her way, and found Ahias’ house. Ahias had no sight left now, so dim were his eyes grown with old age;

5

but the Lord made it known to him that Jeroboam’s wife was coming to ask him about her son, that had fallen sick, and told him what words he must use to her. She, as she entered, would have given herself out to be other than she was;

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but Ahias, as soon as he heard the fall of her feet on the threshold, cried out, Come in, wife of Jeroboam; why dost thou feign thyself to be another? I am charged with bitter tidings for thee.

7

Go and give Jeroboam this message from the Lord God of Israel: Was it for this I chose thee out among the common folk, and gave thee command of my people Israel,

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tearing David’s kingdom asunder to enthrone thee? My servant David was not such a man as thou art. He kept my commandments, obeying me with all his heart, and doing my will.

9

And thou? Thou hast done more amiss than any who went before thee, making thyself molten images of alien gods; me thou hast defied, me thou hast rejected.

10

And I, in return, mean to bring ruin on all Jeroboam’s race, smiting every man that belongs to it, bondman or free man, throughout all Israel;✻ I mean to sweep away the last remnants of his race, like the dung that must be swept away till all is clean.

11

Die they in the city, they shall be food for the dogs; die they in the open country, they shall be food for all the birds of heaven; it is the Lord’s decree.

12

Up, then, betake thyself home, and as thy feet cross the threshold of the city, thy son will die.

13

Lament and burial he shall have from the people of Israel; in him alone, of all Jeroboam’s race, some loyalty to the God of Israel is found, and he alone, of all Jeroboam’s race, shall be carried to the grave.

14

This day, even as I speak, the Lord has marked out for the throne of Israel one who shall destroy the race of Jeroboam.

15

And as for Israel itself, it shall tremble under the hand of the Lord God, as a reed trembles in the water; he will root them out from the fair land which he gave to their fathers, and scatter them beyond the Great River, men that defied the Lord with forest-shrines of their own fashioning.

16

And if the Lord abandons Israel thus, it is for the guilt of Jeroboam, that sinned, and taught Israel to sin.

17

So Jeroboam’s wife left him, and made her way back to Thersa, where her feet no sooner crossed the threshold than her son died.

18

Burial he had, and all Israel mourned for him, as the prophet Ahias had promised in the Lord’s name.

19

What else Jeroboam did, how he fought and how he reigned, is to be found written in the Annals of the kings of Israel.

20

When his reign had lasted twenty-two years, he was laid to rest with his fathers, and the throne passed to his son Nadab.

21

Meanwhile king Solomon’s son Roboam was reigning in Juda. He was forty-one years old when he came to the throne, and for seventeen years he reigned as king at Jerusalem, the city which the Lord chose out of all the cities of Israel to be the sanctuary of his name. His mother was an Ammonitess called Naama.

22

In his reign the men of Juda earned the Lord’s displeasure by sinning against him more defiantly than their fathers ever had before them.

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They, like the men of Israel, raised altar and image and shrine, on every high hill and under every spreading tree;

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and these shrines had their prostitutes; they flourished again, all the unnatural deeds of the heathen, whom the Lord dispossessed at Israel’s coming.

25

In Roboam’s fifth year, Sesac king of Egypt marched on Jerusalem,

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and took away all the treasures from temple and palace, plundering everywhere; took away, too, the shields of gold which Solomon had fashioned.

27

In place of these, Roboam made shields of bronze, which he entrusted to the captains of his shield-bearers and palace guards;

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when he made a progress into the Lord’s house, they were carried by the officers that marched before him, and afterwards taken back to the shield-bearers’ armoury.

29

What else Roboam did, all the history of his reign, is to be found in the Annals of the kings of Juda.

30

All through his reign there was war between him and Jeroboam.

31

So Roboam, son of the Ammonitess Naama, was laid to rest with his fathers, with the Keep of David for his burying-place; and the throne passed to his son Abiam.