Tuesday, November 11, 2025

Reading 59 | The Bible in 100 Passages

Today's Scripture
1 Kings 12:1–5, 12–19

Rehoboam went to Shechem, for all Israel had come to Shechem to make him king. When Jeroboam son of Nebat heard of it (for he was still in Egypt, where he had fled from King Solomon), then Jeroboam returned from Egypt. And they sent and called him; and Jeroboam and all the assembly of Israel came and said to Rehoboam, “Your father made our yoke heavy. Now therefore lighten the hard service of your father and his heavy yoke that he placed on us, and we will serve you.” He said to them, “Go away for three days, then come again to me.” So the people went away. So Jeroboam and all the people came to Rehoboam the third day, as the king had said, “Come to me again the third day.” The king answered the people harshly. He disregarded the advice that the older men had given him and spoke to them according to the advice of the young men, “My father made your yoke heavy, but I will add to your yoke; my father disciplined you with whips, but I will discipline you with scorpions.” So the king did not listen to the people, because it was a turn of affairs brought about by the Lord that he might fulfill his word, which the Lord had spoken by Ahijah the Shilonite to Jeroboam son of Nebat.

When all Israel saw that the king would not listen to them, the people answered the king, “What share do we have in David? We have no inheritance in the son of Jesse. To your tents, O Israel! Look now to your own house, O David.” So Israel went away to their tents. But Rehoboam reigned over the Israelites who were living in the towns of Judah. When King Rehoboam sent Adoram, who was taskmaster over the forced labor, all Israel stoned him to death. King Rehoboam then hurriedly mounted his chariot to flee to Jerusalem. So Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day. (NRSV)

Reflection

Israel is in the news practically every day, and Israel appears thousands of times in the pages of the Bible. It’s important to make a distinction from the biblical kingdom of Israel and the modern nation state that is Israel (members of the former are called “Israelites” while the latter go by “Israelis.”)

But there is also a distinction to be made within the biblical kingdom of Israel, and this gets a little confusing. It happens here in our passage for today. At the start of the story, “All Israel” refers to the whole nation — the twelve tribes we’ve known since Genesis — but by the end “Israel” refers only to a rebellious faction. From here on out in the Hebrew Scriptures, “Israel” will refer both to the ten seceding tribes in the north and also, somehow, to all twelve tribes together.

We shouldn’t let the terminology obscure the pain in the distinction. What had been one people is now two, and that is a tragedy. The collective that endured bondage in Egypt but then triumphantly crossed the sea on dry land has ruptured. The people who together followed the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night are going their separate ways.

You may recall that God didn’t want this people to be a kingdom to begin with (1 Samuel 8). God wanted this community to be bonded together by covenant loyalty, as their forebears had been. Yet they clamored for a king, and, though this was not among the warnings God had for them about the perils of kingship, it was kind of hiding in the background: that kings tend to their own security and their own power and their own wealth, and, in so doing, they create division among the people they are charged to rule.

Perhaps there would have been no appetite for secession without a king like Rehoboam, who foolishly interprets his peoples’ cries for relief as a challenge to his manhood.

The good news to cling to as the ground splits apart is that God is not absent from this. God is in the midst of it somehow, promising to remain God for us, though “us” is not what it once was. God still is, and God will always be.

Prayer

Holy God, giver of all life, look upon us with mercy. We give you thanks that even when we cannot keep covenant with one another, you keep covenant with us. By the power of your Holy Spirit, strengthen us in this hour, that we may honor one another, and you, in all we say and do; through Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. Amen.

[From the Book of Common Worship, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)]

Reflection written by Rocky Supinger, Senior Associate Pastor