Training the Teacher Part 8

Lesson 8

Rehoboam to Hoshea

Old Testament Division--Fourth Period (Continued)

LEADING PERSONS

#Rehoboam.#--Ascended the throne on death of Solomon, his father. Rejected wise counsel and angered his subjects (1 Kings 12:1-20).

Israel, the Northern Kingdom.

#Jeroboam I.#--Set up as king by the ten tribes in revolt (Israel, or the Northern Kingdom), erected two golden calves for wors.h.i.+p (1 Kings 12:25-33).

#Ahab.#--Followed Omri as ruler of Northern Kingdom (1 Kings 16:28). Married Jezebel, who established a heathen wors.h.i.+p (1 Kings 16:31).

#Elijah and Elisha.#--Prophets of G.o.d, sent to stay the wickedness of the Northern Kingdom. Elijah enters remarkable contest with Ahab (1 Kings 17:1 to 18:46. See also 1 Kings 21). For elaboration of this story see Lesson 10.

#Jehu.#--Ruler of the nation; tried to abolish Baal wors.h.i.+p (2 Kings 9, 10). His reforms partially successful. His son Jehoahaz continued in gross idolatry (2 Kings 13:2-9).

#Jeroboam II.#--Ruler of the Northern Kingdom. His reign marked by great outward prosperity, but continued inward decay (2 Kings 14:24). The time of the prophecy of Amos (read the whole book) and of Hosea.

#Hoshea.#--Last of the kings. Samaria captured by the King of a.s.syria, and Israel taken captive. Read 2 Kings 17:1-41.

#Shalmaneser.#--The a.s.syrian king.

#TIME.#--982 B. C. to 718 B. C.

#PLACES.#--Shechem, Bethel, Dan, Mt. Carmel, Jezreel, h.o.r.eb, Samaria, Cherith, Zarephath.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

#SIGNIFICANCE OF EVENTS.#--G.o.d's unceasing efforts to save his people from their sins are marked by the sending of prophets, like Elijah and Elisha, at a time when wicked kings had led the people into abominable idolatry.

The Divided Kingdom. Israel, or the Northern Kingdom

#65. Rehoboam Becomes King.#--After the death of Solomon his son Rehoboam ascended the throne. At once there came to him a delegation headed by Jeroboam, asking for relief from the intolerable taxation that Solomon had levied. Rehoboam, guided by the foolish counsel of his hot-headed young men, replied roughly, saying, "my little finger is thicker than my father's loins" (1 Kings 12:1-20). At once the men of Israel revolted, and set up Jeroboam to be their king. From that time on, to the end, the kingdom was divided, and many times the one part was antagonistic to the other.

#66. The Northern Kingdom.#--Jeroboam as its first king, fearing that if the religion of the two peoples remained substantially the same, and if his people went regularly to Jerusalem, the capital of the Southern Kingdom, to wors.h.i.+p, they would be alienated from him, devised a system of calf wors.h.i.+p, and set up two golden calves, the one at Bethel, just over the border of Judah, and the other at Dan, in the extreme north of his domain. To these two centers of wors.h.i.+p he invited his people to resort, in order to keep them from a.s.sembling with the men of Judah in Jerusalem. "It is too much for you," he said, "to go so far as to Jerusalem; behold your G.o.ds right in your midst"

(1 Kings 12:25-33). All this he did in utter defiance of G.o.d's command, "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image," and in spite of the bitter experience of Israel in the wilderness in the matter of the golden calf that Aaron made.

#67.# This action on the part of Jeroboam "set the pace" for the Northern Kingdom, and from that day to the end of their history the land was full of gross idolatry. Not that all the men of the Northern Kingdom refused to follow Jehovah, for this was not the case, but the rulers were leaders in one form or another of idolatry.

#68. Ahab and Jezebel.#--In 925 B. C. Ahab ascended the throne of the Northern Kingdom. He married Jezebel, the daughter of Ethbaal, king of the Sidonians, a most masterful and wicked woman. She led her husband to establish the wors.h.i.+p of Baal and Ashtoreth, nature divinities, whose wors.h.i.+p was connected with most abhorrent practises. Not only so, but between them they did their best to root out all those who persisted in the wors.h.i.+p of the G.o.d of Abraham. They persecuted the sons of the prophets, and put them to the sword. It was now no longer safe to try, even in secret, to wors.h.i.+p the G.o.d of truth.

#69. Elijah and Elisha.#--It was just at this time that G.o.d in his mercy sent two very great prophets to Israel to try to win them back to their allegiance to the G.o.d of Moses and the Patriarchs. This, the student will remember, was one of those periods which was mentioned in the introduction, in which the narrative is amplified and the miracle multiplied, as betokening that the period was of great importance.

Elijah and his successor, Elisha, did their best to stay the downward tendency of their people, but quite largely in vain. For a while it seemed as though there was to be some real reformation. But it did not last long, and soon the people, led astray by their rulers, lapsed into idolatry once more.

#70. Jehu.#--The one bright spot in all this sad story of the decline of the Northern Kingdom is found in the story of Jehu, 891 B. C. (2 Kings 9, 10.) He dealt drastically with the wors.h.i.+pers of Baal, and tried his best to put a final stop to all Baal wors.h.i.+p. He ruled about twenty-eight years. His son Jehoahaz continued the sin of calf wors.h.i.+p, and led his people once more into the downward path.

#71.# Under #Jeroboam the Second# the Northern Kingdom attained much outward prosperity, but its spiritual life did not improve at all.

Men became greedy of gain, and worldliness and sin of gross description gained the upper hand. It was possibly during this reign that G.o.d sent the prophet Amos to bear witness against the sins of the rulers and people. At this point read the prophecy of Amos, and try to realize how earnestly he pleaded with the men of Israel to return to the wors.h.i.+p of the G.o.d of their fathers. But it was all in vain.

Israel was joined to his idols.

#72. Hosea#, too, comes at about this same time, and he did his best to win Israel back from their apostasy. He has well been called the "pleading prophet," for his tenderness is most touching. Yet all in vain were his pleas. Israel would have none of them.

#73. Hoshea, Last of the Kings.#--At last the Divine patience seems to have been exhausted, and G.o.d gave the Northern Kingdom over into the hands of its enemies, and they were marched off into captivity. Hoshea is the last of the kings of Israel, and during his rule the King of a.s.syria captured Samaria, and led the people off into a strange land.

Here let the student carefully read 2 Kings 17:1-41 to see the resume that the sacred writer gives of the reasons for the final catastrophe that befell Israel. It was on account of their sins that they were suffered to experience these dire disasters.

#74.# In the place of the deported people, the a.s.syrians, in accordance with the customs of those days, placed peoples from alien lands in their stead. In this manner the population of Samaria became much mixed, and the false wors.h.i.+p of these idolatrous peoples became the religion of the land of the Patriarchs in its northern portion.

This will account for the hostility between Jew and Samaritan which we find in the days of Nehemiah, and even as late as the times of our Lord.

Test Questions

What led to the disruption of the United Kingdom?

Who was chosen king over Israel, or the Northern Kingdom?

Of what was Jeroboam afraid at this time?

What did he do to hold his people from possible allegiance with Judah?

Where were the golden calves set up?

Whom did Ahab marry?

What innovation in matters religious did Jezebel introduce?

How did she treat those who desired to wors.h.i.+p Jehovah?

What two great prophets did G.o.d send to Israel at this time?

Was the mission of Elijah and his successor permanently effective?

How did the kingdom fare under Jeroboam II?

Was religion any better off for this prosperity?

Name two prophets whom G.o.d sent at this time to try to win his people back to himself.

Were these two prophets successful?

Under what king was Israel at last carried into captivity?