4 Your father made our yoke grievous: now therefore make you the grievous service of your father, and his heavy yoke which he put on us, lighter, and we will serve you.
He said, This will be the manner of the king who shall reign over you: he will take your sons, and appoint them to him, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and they shall run before his chariots; and he will appoint them to him for captains of thousands, and captains of fifties; and [he will set some] to plow his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and the instruments of his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers, and to be cooks, and to be bakers. He will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your olive groves, even the best of them, and give them to his servants. He will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants. He will take your men-servants, and your maid-servants, and your best young men, and your donkeys, and put them to his work. He will take the tenth of your flocks: and you shall be his servants. You shall cry out in that day because of your king whom you shall have chosen you; and Yahweh will not answer you in that day.
Judah and Israel were many as the sand which is by the sea in multitude, eating and drinking and making merry. Solomon ruled over all the kingdoms from the River to the land of the Philistines, and to the border of Egypt: they brought tribute, and served Solomon all the days of his life. Solomon's provision for one day was thirty measures of fine flour, and sixty measures of meal, ten fat oxen, and twenty oxen out of the pastures, and one hundred sheep, besides harts, and gazelles, and roebucks, and fattened fowl. For he had dominion over all [the region] on this side the River, from Tiphsah even to Gaza, over all the kings on this side the River: and he had peace on all sides round about him. Judah and Israel lived safely, every man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan even to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon.
But of the children of Israel did Solomon make no bondservants; but they were the men of war, and his servants, and his princes, and his captains, and rulers of his chariots and of his horsemen. These were the chief officers who were over Solomon's work, five hundred fifty, who bore rule over the people who labored in the work.
Your father made our yoke grievous: now therefore make you the grievous service of your father, and his heavy yoke which he put on us, lighter, and we will serve you. He said to them, Come again to me after three days. The people departed.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on 1 Kings 12
Commentary on 1 Kings 12 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 12
The glory of the kingdom of Israel was in its height and perfection in Solomon; it was long in coming to it, but it soon declined, and began to sink and wither in the very next reign, as we find in this chapter, where we have the kingdom divided, and thereby weakened and made little in comparison with what it had been. Here is,
1Ki 12:1-15
Solomon had 1000 wives and concubines, yet we read but of one son he had to bear up his name, and he a fool. It is said (Hos. 4:10), They shall commit whoredom, and shall not increase. Sin is a bad way of building up a family. Rehoboam was the son of the wisest of men, yet did not inherit his father's wisdom, and then it stood him in little stead to inherit his father's throne. Neither wisdom nor grace runs in the blood. Solomon came to the crown very young, yet he was then a wise man. Rehoboam came to the crown at forty years old, when men will be wise if ever they will, yet he was then foolish. Wisdom does not go by age, nor is it the multitude of years nor the advantage of education that reaches it. Solomon's court was a mart of wisdom and the rendezvous of learned men, and Rehoboam was the darling of the court; and yet all was not sufficient to make him a wise man. The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong. No dispute is made of Rehoboam's succession; upon the death of his father, he was immediately proclaimed. But,
1Ki 12:16-24
We have here the rending of the kingdom of the ten tribes from the house of David, to effect which,
1Ki 12:25-33
We have here the beginning of the reign of Jeroboam. He built Shechem first and then Penuel-beautified and fortified them, and probably had a palace in each of them for himself (v. 25), the former in Ephraim, the latter in Gad, on the other side Jordan. This might be proper; but he formed another project for the establishing of his kingdom which was fatal to the interests of religion in it.