Study Desk

You must regard the prayer of your servant and his plea! O Yahweh my God, listen to the pleading and to the prayer that your servant is praying before you this day,

May Yahweh our God be with us as he was with our ancestors, and may he not leave us or abandon us,

Let these my words which I pleaded before Yahweh be near to Yahweh our God, by day and by night, to maintain the justice of his servant and the justice of his people Israel as each day requires

so that all of the people of the earth may know that Yahweh, he is God; there is none other.

Let your heart be completely with Yahweh our God by walking in his statutes, by keeping his commands as this day."

Solomon held the festival at that time and all of Israel with him, a great assembly from Lebo Hamath up to the wadi of Egypt before Yahweh our God, for seven days and seven days, a total of fourteen days.

And they will say, ‘Because they have forsaken Yahweh their God who brought their ancestors out from the land of Egypt and they embraced other gods and bowed down to them and served them. Therefore, Yahweh brought on them all of this disaster.'"

May Yahweh your God be blessed, who has delighted in you to set you on the throne of Israel, because of the love of Yahweh for Israel forever, and he has made you king to execute justice and righteousness."

All of the earth was seeking the presence of Solomon, to hear his wisdom which God had put in his heart.

It happened at the time of Solomon's old age that his wives guided his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully with Yahweh his God as the heart of David his father had been.

Solomon went after Ashtoreth the god of the Sidonians and after Molech the abhorrence of the Ammonites.

Yahweh was angry with Solomon, for he had turned his heart from Yahweh, the God of Israel who had appeared to him twice.

God had also raised Rezon the son of Eliada as an adversary against him, who had fled from Hadadezer the king of Zobah, his master.

Then he said to Jeroboam, "Take for yourself ten pieces, for thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel: ‘Behold, I am about to tear the kingdom from the hand of Solomon, and I will give to you ten tribes,

because he has forsaken me, and they bowed down to Ashtoreth, the god of the Sidonians, to Chemosh, the god of Moab, and to Molech, the god of the Ammonites. They did not walk in my ways to do right in my eyes, my ordinances, or my judgments, as did David his father.

Then the word of God came to Shemaiah the man of God, saying,

Suddenly a man of God from Judah came to Bethel, by the word of Yahweh, while Jeroboam was standing at the altar to offer incense.

It happened at the moment the king heard the word of the man of God that he cried out against the altar in Bethel, Jeroboam stretched out his hand from the altar, saying, "Seize him!" But his hand which he stretched out to him was paralyzed, and he was not able to draw it back to himself.

Then the altar was torn apart and the ashes from the altar poured out according to the sign which the man of God had announced by the word of Yahweh.

Then the king responded and said to the man of God, "Please entreat the favor of Yahweh your God, and pray for me that my hand may return to me." So the man of God entreated the face of Yahweh, and the hand of the king returned to him, as it was in the beginning.