King Abijah
13
📚Now in the eighteenth year of King Jeroboam, Abijah began to reign over Judah. 2 📚He reigned three years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Michaiah; she was the daughter 📖 of Uriel of Gibeah. And there was war between Abijah and Jeroboam. 3 📚And Abijah drew up the battle lines with an army of valiant warriors, four hundred thousand chosen men. Jeroboam also drew up the battle lines against him with eight hundred thousand chosen men, strong and brave men.4 📚And Abijah stood up on Mount Zemaraim, which is in the hill country of Ephraim, and said, “Hear me, Jeroboam, and all Israel 📖! 5 📚Should you not know that the LORD God of Israel gave the kingdom over Israel to David 📖 forever, to him and to his sons by a covenant of salt 📖? 6 📚Yet Jeroboam the son of Nebat, the servant of Solomon the son of David, rose up and rebelled against his lord. 7 📚And vain men gathered around him, wicked men, and strengthened themselves against Rehoboam the son of Solomon, when Rehoboam was young 📖 and inexperienced and could not withstand them.
8 📚“And now you think to oppose the kingdom of the LORD 📖 in the hand of the sons of David; and you are a great multitude, and there are with you golden calves 📖, which Jeroboam made as gods for you. 9 📚Have you not expelled the priests of the LORD, the sons of Aaron, and the Levites, and made priests 📖 for yourselves according to the custom of the nations of other lands? So that whoever comes to consecrate himself with a young bull and seven rams, he can become a priest for those which are not gods 📖.
10 📚“But as for us, the LORD is our God, and we have not forsaken him; and the priests, who serve the LORD, are the sons of Aaron, and the Levites attend to their work;
13:10 This was not altogether true – see 1 Kings 15:3.⚜
11 📚and each morning and each evening they burn sacrifices and fragrant incense to the LORD. Also they arrange the Showbread on the pure table, and the gold lampstands with their lamps, to burn every evening. For we keep the charge of the LORD our God; but you have forsaken him.
12 📚And, see, God himself is with us as our commander, and his priests with signal trumpets to sound the alarm against you. O children of Israel, do not fight against the LORD God of your fathers; for you will not succeed”.
13:4-12 Abijah was far from practicing what he preached (1 Kings 15:3-4). Like many, it seems he thought the form of religion was all that God required. His victory was more a sign of God’s disapproval of Jeroboam, than of His approval of Abijah.⚜
13 📚But Jeroboam had placed an ambush to come from their rear, so that they were in front of Judah and the ambush was behind them. 14 📚And when Judah looked back, they saw the battle was in front and in the rear; and they cried out 📖 to the LORD, and the priests sounded with the trumpets. 15 📚Then the men of Judah gave a shout, and when the men of Judah shouted, it came about that God struck down Jeroboam and all Israel before Abijah and Judah. 16 📚And the children of Israel fled before Judah, and God delivered them into their hands. 17 📚And Abijah and his people killed them in a great slaughter, so five hundred thousand chosen men of Israel fell dead. 18 📚Thus the children of Israel were subdued at that time, and the children of Judah prevailed, because they relied on the LORD God of their fathers.
19 📚And Abijah pursued Jeroboam, and took cities from him: Bethel with its towns, and Jeshanah with its towns, and Ephraim with its towns. 20 📚And Jeroboam did not recover strength again in the days of Abijah, and the LORD struck him, and he died.
21 📚But Abijah became powerful. And he married fourteen wives, and had twenty-two sons and sixteen daughters. 22 📚And the rest of the acts of Abijah, and his ways and his words, are recorded in the writings of the prophet Iddo.