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NAVARRE BIBLE COMMENTARY (RSV)

Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam (To the Greater Glory of God)

From: 1 Kings 12:26-32; 13:33-34

Jeroboam’s Sin (Continuation)
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[26] And Jeroboam said in his heart, “Now the kingdom will turn back to the house of David; [27] if this people go up to offer sacrifices in the house of the LORD at Jerusalem, then the heart of this people will turn again to their lord, to Rehoboam king of Judah, and they will kill me and return to Rehoboam king of Judah.” [28] So the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold. And he said to the people, “You have gone up to Jerusalem long enough. Behold your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt.” [29] And he set one in Bethel, and the other he put in Dan. [30] And this thing became a sin, for the people went to the one at Bethel and to the other as far as Dan. [31] He also made houses on high places, and appointed priests from among all the people, who were not of the Levites. [32] And Jeroboam appointed a feast on the fifteenth day of the eighth month like the feast that was in Judah, and he offered sacrifices upon the altar; so he did in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves that he had made. And he placed in Bethel the priests of the high places that he had made.

Unlawful Priests
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[33] After this thing Jeroboam did not turn from his evil way, but made priests for the high places again from among all the people; any who would, he consecrated to be priests of the high places. [34] And this thing became sin to the house of Jeroboam, so as to cut it off and to destroy it from the face of the earth.

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Commentary:

12:20-33. The tribes of the North, severing their links with the house of David, proclaim Jeroboam king in a manner similar to the way Saul was elected (cf. 1 Sam 11:15). Rehoboam, Solomon’s son and successor, eventually bows to the inevitable because he sees it must be the Lord’s will (v. 24).

But more serious than the political split is the religious split, as described here. It looks like a return to the idolatry of the golden calf (Ex 32:1-5).

By pointing out that the priests at these shrines or sanctuaries were not Levites, the sacred writer is at pains to stress that the worship carried out there was unlawful. And he is making the same point when he says that Jeroboam established a feast (v. 32) of his own making instead of keeping the feast of Tabernacles that was celebrated in Jerusalem.

In the story of Jeroboam the great Christian writer Origen sees an example of those who, by imprudently delving into human philosophies, risk abandoning Christian truth. The Israelites (of old), Origen explains, went down into Egypt and, taking the things sacred to the Egyptians and inspired by divine wisdom, they used them to honor God. But Holy Scripture “wanted to show symbolically how living together with the Egyptians became an occasion of sin for some; that is, to show how the knowledge of this world became a temptation to evil for some of those who had been formed in the law of God and the worship that the Israelites were to give him. For as long as Jeroboam lived in the land of Israel and found the bread of the Egyptians distasteful, he did not build idols. But when he went down to Egypt, in flight from wise Solomon--as if in flight from the wisdom of God himself--and became a kinsman of the pharaoh [...], although he later returned to the land of Israel, he came only to bring disunity to the people of God and to force them to say, ' Here are your gods...'" (Origen, "Ad Gregorium", 2).

13:33-34. Despite seeing the fulfillment of the oracle of the man of Judah (cf. 13:5-7), and even though a prophet of Bethel ratified what that man said (cf. 13:32), King Jeroboam persisted in his line of conduct. The terrible outcome (v. 34) makes one ponder the grave consequences of persisting in sin, because, as Scripture often reminds us and St John Chrysostom explains, “what angers and offends God, more than sin itself, is that sinners show no sorrow for their sins” ("Homiliae in Matthaeum", 14, 4).