The Concept of a Nation Divided
Meaning
During biblical times the decline of Israel as a nation started with the reign of King Solomon, as unexpected as that sounds. King Solomon was the wisest and richest man who ever lived, and not because of any attributes he possessed naturally, but because of the supernatural blessings of God. See Solomon had a heart for God when he first became king. When Solomon first became king the Lord gave Solomon permission to make a request of God. Solomon because of his love for the Lord asked God for wisdom to govern God’s people wisely. Because Solomon did not ask for anything for himself, the Lord promised to give Solomon wisdom and wealth. However, Solomon during his reign, through marriage alliances with other kings, and through personal lust violated God’s commandment of separation from pagan cultures and idolatry. Primarily through marriage to pagan wives who practiced idolatry.
Solomon had more wives than anyone else before or after him, and as a result, in the end they turned his heart away from God and Solomon abandoned the Lord. But for Solomon’s father’s sake, King David, the Lord did not take the kingdom away from Solomon, but instead God would remove the kingdom from Solomon’s son Rehoboam. Rehoboam, when he became king did not seek the Lord and instead followed foolish council. He used his young friends as advisors, instead of the older, wiser advisors of his father Solomon. And as a result the kingdom was taken away from him. Ten of the twelve tribes followed a man God had raised up named Jeroboam. They became the Northern Kingdom which retained the name “Israel,” ruled by King Jeroboam I. Only the tribe of Judah (the largest priestly tribe) followed Rehoboam, along with the part of the tribe of Ephraim. What used to be Solomon’s kingdom, became the Southern Kingdom who took on the name of “Judah,” named after the one remaining tribe who followed Solomon’s son, the grandson of King David.
The Northern Kingdom of Israel immediately fell into idolatry, never having a godly king. And despite the warnings of the prophets, they were eventually destroyed by the Assyrian Empire, they were sent into exile and never returned. This final destruction and exile took place in 722 B.C., those left behind intermarried with the surrounding pagan cultures and became known as the Samaritans of Jesus day. The Southern Kingdom of Judah, had a mixture of godly and idolatrous kings. They too eventually fell into idolatry and God judged them with the Babylonian Empire. The Southern Kingdom of Judah went into exile in Babylon in three successive waves. The first one occurred in 597 B.C. and the last one occurring in 586 B.C., and in each instance the people refused the commandments of God to submit to Babylonian rule. Instead, they rebelled against King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon and as a result King Nebuchadnezzar, who laid siege to Jerusalem deported the people to Babylon to quell the insurrection. However, God promised the people their exile would only last seventy years. God restored the nation of Judah seventy years later through the Persian King named Cyrus, who defeated the Babylonian Empire.
“And King David said, ‘Call to me Zadok the priest, Nathan the prophet, and Benaiah the son of Jehoiada.’ So they came before the king. The king also said to them, ‘Take with you the servants of your lord, and have Solomon my son ride on my own mule, and take him down to Gihon. ‘There let Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet anoint him king over Israel; and blow the horn, and say, ‘Long live King Solomon.’ ‘Then you shall come up after him, and he shall come and sit on my throne, and he shall be king in my place. For I have appointed him to be ruler over Israel and Judah.'” (1st Kings 1:32-35)
“But King Solomon loved many foreign women, as well as the daughter of Pharaoh: women of the Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians, and Hittites, from the nations of whom the Lord had said to the children of Israel, “You shall not intermarry with them, nor they with you. Surely they will turn away your hearts after their gods.” Solomon clung to these in love. And he had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines; and his wives turned away his heart. For it was so, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned his heart after other gods; and his heart was not loyal to the Lord his God, as was the heart of his father David. For Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and after Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites. Solomon did evil in the sight of the Lord, and did not fully follow the Lord, as did his father David.” (1st Kings 11:1-6)
“So the Lord became angry with Solomon, because his heart had turned from the Lord God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice, and had commanded him concerning this thing, that he should not go after other gods; but he did not keep what the Lord had commanded. Therefore the Lord said to Solomon, ‘Because you have done this, and have not kept My covenant and My statutes, which I have commanded you, I will surely tear the kingdom away from you and give it to your servant. Nevertheless I will not do it in your days, for the sake of your father David; I will tear it out of the hand of your son.'” (1st Kings 11:9-12)
“Now it happened at that time, when Jeroboam went out of Jerusalem, that the prophet Ahijah the Shilonite met him on the way; and he had clothed himself with a new garment, and the two were alone in the field. Then Ahijah took hold of the new garment that was on him, and tore it into twelve pieces. And he said to Jeroboam, “Take for yourself ten pieces, for thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: ‘Behold, I will tear the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon and will give ten tribes to you (but he shall have one tribe for the sake of My servant David, and for the sake of Jerusalem, the city which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel), because they have forsaken Me, and worshiped Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, Chemosh the god of the Moabites, and Milcom the god of the people of Ammon, and have not walked in My ways to do what is right in My eyes and keep My statutes and My judgments, as did his father David.'” (1st Kings 11:29-33)