"In the eighteenth year of Jeroboam son of Nebat, Abijah became king of Judah, and he reigned in Jerusalem three years. His mother's name was Maakah daughter of Abishalom." (1 Kings 15:1-2) Maakah was the second wife Rehoboam took for himself, so Abijah is likely not Rehoboam's firstborn son. But Maakah was Rehoboam's favorite of his eighteen wives and sixty concubines. (2 Chronicles 11:21) Abijah was probably chosen as successor by Rehoboam because he is the firstborn son of Maakah and is presumably Rehoboam's favorite of his twenty-eight sons.
Abijah's reign will only last for three years. We don't know his age at death since the Bible doesn't tell us how old he was when he ascended to the throne. But his father Rehoboam was already forty-one when he became king and reigned for seventeen years so Abijah was likely born while Rehoboam was still quite young (in his twenties) and could have been middle aged when he became king. Still, he did not live to be an old man and his reign was short, leading many scholars to conclude that the Lord was not very favorable toward the way he lived his life and that as a result He did not bless Abijah with a long reign. We are going to study an account of Abijah standing for the Lord but in tomorrow's study we are also going to be told that he mixed the worship of the one true God with the worship of idols.
"There was war between Abijah and Jeroboam. Abijah went into battle with an army of four hundred thousand able fighting men, and Jeroboam drew up a battle line against him with eight hundred thousand able troops." (2 Chronicles 13:2b-3) We do not know what prompted this battle but the Bible has already told us that there were repeated conflicts between King Jeroboam of Israel and King Rehoboam of Judah. It seems as if there must have been no clear winners in any of those conflicts, with each man retaining hold over his own kingdom. Now that Rehoboam is dead, it may be that Jeroboam thinks it's a good time to set out toward Judah in case Abijah is not as good of an army general as his father was. But Abijah makes a speech that rallies his own troops and strengthens their hearts in the Lord. We will study the first half of his speech today.
"Abijah stood on Mount Zemaraim, in the hill country of Ephraim, and said, 'Jeroboam and all Israel, listen to me! Don't you know that the Lord, the God of Israel, has given the kingship of Israel to David and his descendants forever by a covenant of salt?'" (2 Chronicles 13:4-5) What does he mean by "a covenant of salt"? Scholars are divided on their opinions on this but salt was offered with sacrifices, salt was considered pure, salt was used as a preservative, and salt was a valuable commodity. I don't know whether Abijah is making a literal reference or a metaphorical one, but it's clear that he considers the promise the Lord made to David to be an everlasting promise. Salt in the Bible always carries a positive connotation with it.
Now Abijah makes reference to the discord that occurred between Jeroboam and King Solomon, who had employed Jeroboam as an overseer over some of the workers at his building projects. "Yet Jeroboam son of Nebat, an official of Solomon son of David, rebelled against his master." (2 Chronicles 13:6) We don't know what form this rebellion took but when we studied that passage of Scripture it appeared that Jeroboam had become disenchanted with King Solomon and with the way King Solomon was running his forced labor projects. It has been suggested that Solomon began forcing his own citizens into slavery as his plans for the city and the nation became more and more elaborate and costly. It could be that Jeroboam objected to working as a taskmaster over his own people. Whatever the case, Solomon was displeasing the Lord by that time by engaging in idolatrous practices with his many foreign wives, causing the Lord to send a message to Jeroboam by Ahijah the prophet that Solomon's kingdom would not remain intact after his death and that Jeroboam would someday become king over ten tribes of Israel. Jeroboam must have published this information widely, perhaps in an effort to gather a large movement behind him to take over the kingship by force in his own timing and not in the Lord's timing, and Solomon ordered him captured and put to death for treason. That's when Jeroboam fled to Egypt and was sheltered by Pharaoh Shishak until Solomon's death.
Abijah also accuses Jeroboam of plotting against his father, King Rehoboam, during the early years of his father's reign. He leaves out the part where Rehoboam antagonized the people by not only refusing to lower their taxes and to stop conscripting their men into the building projects, but also by vowing to tax and conscript them even more. "Some worthless scoundrels gathered around him and opposed Rehoboam son of Solomon when he was young and indecisive and not strong enough to resist them." (2 Chronicles 13:7) Abijah does some creative editing of history here but his next points are valid, or at least mostly, for the northern kingdom has fallen far further into idolatry than the southern kingdom. The northern kingdom seems to have embraced it entirely while the people of the southern king are still worshiping at the house of the Lord. There was repentance and revival near the end of King Rehoboam's reign and there may be people of the southern kingdom dabbling in idolatry again but it has not reached the proportions it has reached in the northern kingdom.
"And now you plan to resist the kingdom of the Lord, which is in the hands of David's descendants. You are indeed a vast army and have with you the golden calves that Jeroboam made to be your gods. But didn't you drive out the priests of the Lord, the sons of Aaron, and the Levites, and make priests of your own as the peoples of other lands do? Whoever comes to consecrate himself with a young bull and seven rams may become a priest of what are not gods. As for us, the Lord is our God, and we have not forsaken Him." (2 Chronicles 13:8-10a) This shouted speech from the mountaintop is intended to encourage Abijah's soldiers and to discourage Jeroboam's soldiers. He says something like, "We have not forsaken the living God and He will defend the covenant He made with His servant David. But who do you have on your side? You have turned your backs on the Lord and are worshiping things which are not gods. Will Jeroboam's golden calves be able to save you? No, they have no power to save you. And on top of that you have made the Lord angry. His wrath will fall on you and victory will be ours!"
In tomorrow's study we will look at the second half of his speech and the battle.
No comments:
Post a Comment