The kings of Israel and Judah

King Jeroboam I

The kingdom of Israel (the north) · Reigned twenty-two years (1 Kings 14:20) · Evil before God · 1 Kings 11:26 to 14:20; 2 Chronicles 13

Jeroboam, son of Nebat, was the first king of the northern kingdom of Israel after the split from Judah. Though God had promised him the throne of the ten tribes, he feared losing the people's loyalty if they went to worship in Jerusalem, so he set up two golden calves at Bethel and Dan and invented his own priesthood and feasts. This sin, which led Israel into idolatry for good, became the phrase that haunts the whole northern history: the sin of Jeroboam, who made Israel to sin.

And he shall give Israel up because of the sins of Jeroboam, who did sin, and who made Israel to sin.1 Kings 14:16 (KJV)

Chosen by God, and warned

Jeroboam was an able young officer under Solomon whom the prophet Ahijah met on the road, tore his own new cloak into twelve pieces, and gave ten to Jeroboam, declaring that God would tear ten tribes from Solomon's son and give them to him. God even made him a promise like the one given to David: if Jeroboam would walk in God's ways and keep his statutes, God would build him a sure house and be with him.

When Solomon died and Rehoboam foolishly threatened the people, the ten tribes made Jeroboam their king, exactly as God had said. He was handed a kingdom by God's own word, with a promise of blessing if he would be faithful.

The golden calves

But Jeroboam did not trust the God who had given him the throne. He reasoned in his heart that if the people kept going up to the temple in Jerusalem to worship, their hearts would turn back to the house of David and they would kill him. So he made two calves of gold, set one in Bethel and one in Dan, and said to the people, It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem: behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.

He made priests who were not Levites, appointed a feast of his own devising, and offered sacrifices himself at the altar in Bethel. A man of God cried out against that altar and foretold that a king named Josiah would one day defile it, a prophecy fulfilled three centuries later. When Jeroboam stretched out his hand to seize the prophet, his hand withered, and only the prophet's prayer restored it. Even so, Jeroboam did not turn from his evil way.

The sign at the altar of Bethel

As Jeroboam stood by his altar at Bethel to burn incense, a man of God came out of Judah and cried against the altar, foretelling that a son named Josiah would one day be born to the house of David who would burn the bones of Jeroboam's false priests upon it, and giving a sign: the altar would be torn and its ashes poured out that very day. When Jeroboam stretched out his hand and ordered the man seized, his hand dried up so that he could not pull it back, and the altar was torn as the sign had said. Only when the man of God prayed was the king's hand restored.

Even so great a sign did not turn Jeroboam. After this thing Jeroboam returned not from his evil way, but made again of the lowest of the people priests of the high places. His hardness in the face of a miracle of both judgment and mercy shows how set his heart was, and this thing became sin unto the house of Jeroboam, to cut it off and to destroy it from the face of the earth.

The sin that defined a kingdom

When Jeroboam's son fell sick, he sent his wife in disguise to the aged, blind prophet Ahijah, who knew her at once and pronounced doom on the whole house of Jeroboam: because he had done evil above all before him and cast God behind his back, his line would be swept away, and Israel would in the end be rooted up and scattered beyond the river, because of the sins of Jeroboam, who did sin, and who made Israel to sin.

That phrase becomes the refrain of the entire northern kingdom. King after king is condemned for walking in the way of Jeroboam and the sin he made Israel to sin. His false worship became the settled religion of the north for two centuries, until it destroyed the nation.

The biblical verdict and where it points

Jeroboam is one of the pivotal villains of the Old Testament, the man who took a kingdom given by God's grace and, out of fear and calculation, founded it on idolatry. He is judged wholly evil, and his name becomes shorthand for the sin that doomed his people. Given the same kind of promise as David, he threw it away for golden calves.

His story is a lesson in the fear that will not trust God. He grasped to keep by scheming what God had freely promised, and so lost it all. Against his false worship and false priesthood stands the true King and true Priest from David's line, who does not divide God's people with idols but gathers them to the one living God, and whose throne, unlike Jeroboam's house, will never be cut off.

A note on the record: everything here is drawn from the books of Samuel, Kings, and Chronicles. Kings and Chronicles sometimes tell a reign differently, Chronicles often adding a king's repentance or building works, and where they differ this is said plainly rather than smoothed over. The exact lengths and overlaps of the reigns are genuinely complex, because kings often shared the throne with a son for a time, so the totals in Scripture do not always add up in a simple line. The verdict good or evil is the Bible's own assessment, whether a king did right or evil in the sight of the LORD.

Related: Rehoboam · Solomon · Nadab · All the kings of Israel and Judah