1
ST
KINGS
Week 23, chapter 13

We concluded our last lesson as the deluded Jeroboam was proudly standing at the altar of
the golden calf that he had erected in Beit-El. Acting somewhat like the Pope, one can imagine
the eyes of the thousands of his people who were fixed on him as he regally made his way up
the ramp to the smoking fire pit in order to inaugurate this new holiday in the 8
th
month of the
year where one had not existed before (a kind of anti-Sukkot); he had created it in honor of his
two golden calf gods. Just as people today will venture substantial distances to witness the
presence of a high head of state so it was in that era when to get a close-up glimpse of the
king usually required a journey and some persistence.

It was now time for the most important and solemn part of the service; the king would offer
incense to the calf god; but suddenly the hush of the crowd and the impact of the event is
interrupted when a voice from the throngs shouts something to King Jeroboam. The crowd
freezes in shock and the King throws a deadly glare at this man. Let’s read about this startling
moment in 1
st
Kings 13.

READ 1
ST
KINGS 13 all


This man who dared to confront Jeroboam at this most reverent moment was a stranger to the
people of the northern tribes of Israel. No doubt his accent gave him away that he was not one
of them but rather was a Judahite. And of course being a member of their enemy tribe made
his presence all the more unsettling and confusing. Was he here simply to disrupt and
embarrass? We are told that this fellow was a man of God, an ish elohim, and that he had
come to the ceremony upon “a word from Yehoveh”. An ish elohim no doubt was some kind of
prophet, but it seems that at least to the people of that era there was a subtle distinction
between someone called an ish elohim and the more typical biblical prophet that they called a
navi in Hebrew. Try as scholars might, they’ve not really been able to identify the nature of the
distinction between the two titles; so perhaps in practice there was none.
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Now the Rabbis have an explanation for the use of these two different terms for a prophet and
I must admit that it is a compelling argument. In the part of our narrative where this ish elohim
from Judah interacts with a navi from Beit-El, the purpose for using these two different terms is
to distinguish between the genuine prophet (the ish elohim) and the false prophet (the navi).
And that is backed-up by the fact that neither prophet is referred to by name so if both
unnamed prophets in the story were called navi, it would be an insult to the genuine one or
even make the story hard to follow. However if we look at 2
nd
Chronicles 9:29 and 12:15 we do
find mention of a prophet named Ye’do or Iddo who was a seer and he interacted with both
Rehoboam and Jeroboam.

CJB
2 Chronicles 9:29 Other activities of Shlomo, from beginning to end, are written in
the records of Natan the prophet, in the prophecy of Achiyah of Shiloh and in the
visions of Ye'do the seer concerning Yarov'am the son of N'vat.

CJB
2 Chronicles 12:15 The activities of Rechav'am from beginning to end are written in
the genealogically organized histories of Sh'ma'yah the prophet and 'Iddo the seer. But
there were continual wars between Rechav'am and Yarov'am.

So apparently our ish elohim was named Ye-do or Iddo and the false prophet has remained
anonymous to history.

Notice that we’re STILL in the first verse of chapter 13 and there is another interesting phrase
not to be easily stepped over. In Hebrew it is ish elohim va miyhuda bidbar Yehoveh. In
English it is “a man of God from Judah came by a word of Yehoveh”. The key phrase is “a
word of Yehoveh”. Many translations make it “because of a word from Yehoveh” or “by the
word of Yehoveh” or some such rendering. But the grammar demands “by a word of
Yehoveh”. The reason I focus on this is because the intent is to say that the man came not
because he made a decision to come, or simply because he was a prophet it was his job to
deliver God’s word to Jeroboam, but because the inherent power in God’s word to him
virtually lifted him into action and brought him to Beit-El. The ish elohim from Judah as the
bearer of the word was in a sense powerless to do anything else but to go and deliver God’s
oracle; and we of course see the power of God’s word go to work on Yarov’am.

In verse 2 the man of God unleashes a curse upon the golden calf altar. Yes, not upon
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Jeroboam per se but upon the altar. The Sages say that he said the word “altar” twice (altar,
altar) because this was alluding to the two altars in Dan and Beit-El that Jeroboam had built.
Why was the altar cursed? Because that altar kept the people from going to Solomon’s
authorized Temple in Jerusalem and thus the false altar was a cause for God’s wrath to fall
upon the people of the 10 northern tribes. As part of the curse a prophecy was uttered that
some years into the future a son would be born to the Davidic dynasty (meaning this
descendant would be a king from David’s line) and the king would desecrate this heathen altar
and kill the wicked priests (who weren’t of the Levite line) who rendered it service.

Part of the desecration was to be that human bones would be burned on the altar instead of
animal bones; and the implication is that the human bones would be of those who had paid
homage to this altar, especially the priests. This prophecy was fulfilled by David’s descendant
Josiah (Yoshiyahu) during his reign over Judah from 641 to 609 B.C.


CJB
2 Kings 23:16 Then, as Yoshiyahu was turning around, he noticed the burial caves
that were there on the mountain; so he sent and had the bones taken out of the burial
caves and burned them on the altar, thus desecrating it, in keeping with the word of
ADONAI which the man of God had proclaimed, foretelling that these things would
happen.


Thus we see that even those who were long dead had their bones removed from their bone
boxes (call ossuaries) in the burial caves and then burned up to ash on the pagan altars that
Jeroboam first ordained. It is believed that the bones of the dead were probably those of the
false priests. Why burn up their bones? Because proper burial was terribly important in the
Israelite death cult and in some unexplained way the memory of the dead was in their skeletal
remains. And if the memory remained, then in an ethereal and hazy way they lived on. This
burning up to destruction of their bones was symbolic of a final, complete end to their existence
on any level. Does that have a ring to it that is familiar to modern day Christians?

Rev 20:11-15 CJB

11
Next I saw a great white throne and the One sitting on it. Earth and heaven fled from
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his presence, and no place was found for them.

12
And I saw the dead, both great and small, standing in front of the throne. Books were
opened; and another book was opened, the Book of Life; and the dead were judged
from what was written in the books, according to what they had done.

13
The sea gave up the dead in it; and Death and Sh'ol gave up the dead in them; and
they were judged, each according to what he had done.

14
Then Death and Sh'ol were hurled into the lake of fire. This is the second death- the
lake of fire.

15
Anyone whose name was not found written in the Book of Life was hurled into the
lake of fire.

The parallel is too close not to see a pattern. The dead are only dead physically; some
essence of the dead lives on (we call it the soul or the spirit). Josiah opened the graves of the
already dead and took their bones that were representative of their ongoing life essence and
burned them up on the pagan altar where they worshipped false gods. At the end of human
history the Lord is going to open up the graves of the already dead and take the remaining life
essence of those who are not found in the Book of Life (meaning the unrighteous dead), and
together with the Evil one (whom they worshipped by denying God) will burn them up to final
destruction whereby no essence of them on any level remains.

After the man of God had cursed the altar with a prophetic curse he then offered a sign or a
proof that what he had said was from God and it was a sealed promise that was unalterable.
He says in verse 3 that the altar will split and the fat-filled ashes (in Hebrew the deshen) from
the sacrifices will spill onto the ground and be scattered. The splitting of the altar symbolized its
future destruction and the ashes falling to the dirt were representative of those priests who had
served this altar over the centuries and whose remains would be exhumed and burned up to
unclean ashes.

An interesting question arises here for us to ponder; it is one that Christian denominations (and
Rabbis and Sages for that matter) have differing viewpoints on and even at times brings about
the establishment of inflexible doctrines to explain it. It is the matter of God’s foreknowledge
versus mankind’s free will. That is, now that the Lord had issued this prophecy was
Jeroboam’s path set in concrete? Now that the Lord had decreed it, was Jeroboam virtually
unable to repent and change course? Unlike so many of the oracles we have read about in the
Bible thus far that were essentially warnings and threats of dire consequences IF someone
didn’t change their ways, there is none of that present here. There was no real or implied call
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for Jeroboam to repent from his idolatry and thus avert personal and national disaster; it is
assumed that he will not. The ish elohim presented the oracle as a fact already established in
heaven; it is a closed matter and therefore one that has no alternative but to play out on earth.

I think it is fair to ask where Jeroboam’s free will comes into play in this matter. Where is the
free will of the many generations of false priests who will arise to serve the altar of this cult of
which Jeroboam is its founder? Are the fates of unborn generations of priests therefore already
determined for them in advance? Or are we merely getting an expression not of God
essentially hardening Jeroboam’s heart as He did with Pharaoh and thus assuring Egypt’s
destruction, but rather of God foreknowing how all would play out? That is, a man makes his
choices and the consequences inevitably flow from the course he chooses. It is my belief that
this was not the removal of Jeroboam’s or the future priests’ free will by the Lord but instead
this prophetic utterance was the Lord saying that Jeroboam had already hardened his own
heart and committed himself to follow a path that would ensnare an order of false priests who
would follow their natures to their destructive end.

Truly this is one of the great mysteries of our God. How He can look to the future, determine an
end result and yet simultaneously permit each of us to operate in our own free wills that wind
up bringing about the very thing He has ordained centuries earlier, boggles the mind. Yet it is
so. That said I think it is probably better to resist establishing theological labels and fixed
doctrines that purport to have full understanding of not only the Lord’s mind on this issue, but
how He makes His determinations and brings it about.

King Jeroboam responded about like one would think he might: deeply offended he stopped
what he was doing, raised his arm and pointing at the ish elohim from Judah ordered the man
to be arrested. Instantly Jeroboam’s arm froze in position. In complete paralysis Yarov’am was
unable to retract his arm from being outstretched. At that moment the altar where he stood split
and the ashes fell. There is no mention of an earthquake; what happened was purely
supernatural. Yarov’am instantly understood the source of these twin disasters and humbled
spoke to the ish elohim and asked that his God would allow his arm to function from its
humiliating condition. It should be noticed that Jeroboam spoke of Yehoveh as the ish
elohim’s God, and not as his own. Whether he meant that fully literally is doubtful; he likely
intended it in the sense of the man of God being Yehoveh’s prophet so he had the position
and the right to beseech the Lord in prayer on Jeroboam’s behalf. And yet what man who
trusted the Lord would refer to Him as “your God”? Jeroboam was now a lost soul and
separated on every level from Yehoveh. He had not misplaced or “lost” his relationship with
God; he had willingly renounced it in exchange for chasing after gods created in his own mind.
The man of God prayed and Jeroboam’s arm was restored.

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In verses 7 and 8 the King decided he would try to flatter the ish elohim and just ignore the
prophecy of doom. In typical Eastern thought the King ascribed the power that caused the altar
to split and his arm to wither to the man of God from Judah. So by offering the most gracious
hospitality that only a King could, the hope was that not only would the prophecy be annulled
but he might even receive the reward of a blessing!

But contained in that dialogue are specific instructions to the man of God about what he is
prohibited from and those include 1) not eating food, 2) not drinking water, 3) and not taking
the same route back to Judah that he took going up to Beit-El. And, when he was in the
presence of the King and then departed Beit-El, he followed those instructions. Why not eat the
food and drink the water? Because Beit-El was now under the ban. It was off-limits in every
aspect to Yehoveh’s followers. The uncleanness of idol worship was so thorough that even the
food and water supply of Beit-El was now spiritually impure. Why not return home by the same
road? Even the way by which this special messenger had come was consecrated and the
unholy dust that was now on his sandals would pollute the pathway.

Now however, we see another side of this ish elohim that is not so flattering. In verse 11 an
old prophet (a zaqen navi) who lived in Beit-El heard from his sons about this great flap at the
altar between Jeroboam and the man of God from Judah. It piqued his interest and he
determined that he must talk with the ish elohim.

Now this old navi from Beit-El was essentially a false prophet. In fact, he was likely a prophet
of Ba’al because in 2
nd
Kings 23 we’re told that he was from Shomron (Samaria) which was a
Ba’al stronghold at that time.

2Kings 23:17-18 CJB

17
Then he asked, "This monument here that I'm looking at, what is it?" The men of the
city told him, "It marks the burial cave of the man of God who came from Y'hudah and
foretold the very things you have done to the altar of Beit-El."

18
He replied, "Let him be; no one is to move his bones." So they left his bones
undisturbed, along with the bones of the prophet who had come from Shomron.

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So anxious was the navi to visit with the man of God that he immediately got onto his donkey
and rode down the pathway by which the man of God was returning home. In verse 14 he
catches up with him and coaxes him into coming back to Beit-El to be shown hospitality. He
says, “Come home with me and have a meal”. The ish elohim replies that the Lord has
directly told him that he cannot do that and repeats word for word to the navi the instructions
God had given to him. The navi from Beit-El brushes it all aside and says that he too is a
prophet. In other words he says that they are colleagues of the same profession so they must
have much in common.

But then in verse 18 this navi proceeds to lie to the man of God from Judah, and explains that
a malach (a messenger, an angel) came to him and essentially overturned everything that
God had instructed the ish elohim. For some inexplicable reason the man of God believes him
and follows the navi to his home. Let me pause for a moment and say that what he did was as
wrong as the false prophet who lied to get him to come. In fact we see that the ish elohim
behaved in the way of another infamous prophet that we read about long ago: Balaam. Recall
the story in Numbers of Balaam, the pagan seer who was called first by the King of Moab to
curse Israel but wound up blessing them after Yehoveh confronted him. Balaam was what we
might today call a deist; he definitely believed in Yehoveh, but he also believed in all gods. He
would answer the call of most any god in order to please them.

So like Balaam, this man of God from Judah wasn’t all that dedicated or loyal to Yehoveh.
Rather he was like a container for hire. He was like an MP3 player or a blank CD disk; he
would willingly deliver whatever he was filled up with; the content and the source were
irrelevant. It brings to mind the true sense of the word “legalistic”. He would mechanically
accept and recite whatever he felt he was told without regard for the content or its
trustworthiness. Have you not heard recently of the growing number of even mainstream
Christian leaders and denominations who say they respect all faiths and all religions? It
doesn’t matter what anyone believes as long as they have faith in something; trust in a being
greater than themselves is what’s important regardless of that spiritual being’s name or the
culture that honors him. That is essentially the state of mind of the ish elohim from Judah.

Then as the two men are dining, the prophet from Beit-El suddenly receives a true word from
Yehoveh! Yes, this prophet who had lied to the man of God from Judah, and who likely was a
completely pagan prophet, is visited by the God of Israel and given an oracle to say to his
guest. So, we see that both the navi and the ish elohim operated in the manner of Balaam.
And the message is the ultimate irony; from the mouth of the liar now came the word that
because the man of God believed him and came to his home in Beit-El and ate and drank in
rebellion to Yehoveh, he would die and his corpse would not lie with his ancestors.

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What are we to take from this contorted situation? For one thing it again draws a spotlight on
one of my pet peeves: people who say they have a word from the Lord for you. And often this
word contradicts what up to now you felt the Lord was telling you to do or not do. So one
element of this story shows us that we are personally responsible to carry out what God tells
us to carry out, and if He wants that changed (highly unlikely) he’ll tell you personally and it
won’t be coming from someone else.

Another aspect is the use of religious lingo to manipulate. I often say that the Church has its
own language that I call Christian-eze. It’s a language that few outsiders even understand.
These two men in our story held a common bond, common profession and thus spoke a
common language: they spoke prophet-eze. They understood one another like few others
could and they walked in an exclusive circle of a handful of other prophets and seers. So when
the old prophet from Beit-El was so very thirsty to have fellowship and conversation with a
colleague, he used the familiar lingo of prophets to get what he wanted. No doubt his mind was
not on evil; he just told a small white fib using prophet lingo that he knew would disarm the
other prophet: an angel had come to him and told the other prophet to forget all that the Lord
had told him. After all what could possibly be harmful in accepting hospitality from another
godly man? He had no intent on causing harm. So today when we end a conversation by
saying “I’ll pray for you”, we don’t always mean it literally. When we confirm that the Lord
wants what the other person says they want, is that really true or are we merely being kind in a
Christian way? When we say, “I have a word from the Lord for you”, is it perhaps just a
personal thought that we have that makes us feel pious or we hope will make the other person
feel good? Maybe we think they need what seems to us to be Godly advice and so we tell
them that God want us to tell them something. It all sounds so gracious and wonderful; but our
story of these two prophets demonstrates the darker side of such careless talk.

But there are also some other principles that flow to the surface. First, the Word of God does
not contradict itself. Second, we cannot break God’ scriptural commandments in the name of
supposedly following or pleasing God. Third, God’s direct commandment to us is not
amendable by someone else. On the surface these sound so basic; yet many of us routinely
violate these principles to our (or someone else’s) detriment and are blind to it just as were the
two prophets of our story; and that is because it feels so comfortable and customary.

After the meal the prophet from Judah leaves his new friend and on his way back a lion attacks
and kills him. The prophecy of the prophet from Beit-El was true. But in further proof that in
reality this death was at the hand of God, the lion not only doesn’t mutilate or eat the corpse,
but also doesn’t attack the donkey. Even more the lion stands next to the corpse along with
the donkey! None of this would be the natural way that either a lion or donkey would behave.
People passing by saw this befuddling sight and when some of them arrived in Beit-El they of
course couldn’t wait to tell everyone about what they had witnessed. The story circulated and
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soon reached the ears of the old prophet of Beit-El and he knew immediately who the victim
was; it was the fulfillment of God’s oracle to him.

Still behaving as a colleague, the old prophet travels by donkey to the place the corpse is lying
and finds the lion still standing guard; he fetches the body and brings it home. The old prophet
had such great respect for the ish elohim (and probably felt some measure of responsibility for
what had happened) that he buried him in his family grave plot and mourned over him. Not
only that, he ordered that when he died he should be buried side-by-side with this man. He
also told his sons that there was no longer any doubt in him that the curse that the dead
prophet had issued against the golden calf altar (and by extension upon Jeroboam) was
certain to come to pass. Those two things are actually tied together because that old prophet
of Ba’al knew that in time his own bones might be exhumed and burnt up on the altar by this
mysterious future descendant of David. So he figured that if he was buried along with the
remains of the man of God from Judah who had been the conveyer of God’s curse that
perhaps his bones would escape the same fate. And of course the outcome is what the old
navi had hoped for and we read about it a few minutes ago in 2
nd
Kings 23.

Verse 33 says that after this event Jeroboam still didn’t change his ways. In other words,
King Yarov’am who had his arm withered by God, was present as his wicked altar was
cracked and broken, heard the prophet’s message from God loud and clear, was told of the
prophet’s death, the lion that killed him and stood guard over the body, how the old navi from
Beit-El had prophesied it all and still the King refused to repent. He went right back to
appointing unqualified priests to the pagan altars he erected. Nothing, it seems, would cause
Jeroboam to cease his spiritual rebellion, and of course it doomed his monarchy and his
dynasty.

The final verse of chapter 13 sums up this tragedy. What began with such promise that the
Lord was willing to give Jeroboam an enduring dynasty on condition of obedience ended in the
worst possible condemnation of him. His successors failed to stop Israel’s tailspin into idolatry
and degradation and within little more than 130 years the 10 northern tribes were exiled by the
Assyrians from their lush and fertile territory and the legend of the 10 lost tribes of Israel was
born. Those 10 tribes’ exile has lasted for 2700 years, and only today has Ezekiel’s prophecy
of their restoration to the land begun in earnest.

Bad leadership, especially ungodly leadership, can be devastating to a nation for generations,
not just to the next election.
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