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[215]
By these words the people were struck as it were by all iron hammer,
and were so grieved at the words, as if they had already felt the effects
of them; and they had great indignation at the king; and all cried out
aloud, and said, "We will have no longer any relation to David or
his posterity after this day." And they said further, "We only
leave to Rehoboam the temple which his father built;" and they threatened
to forsake him. Nay, they were so bitter, and retained their wrath so long,
that when he sent Adoram, which was over the tribute, that he might pacify
them, and render them milder, and persuade them to forgive him, if he had
said any thing that was rash or grievous to them in his youth, they would
not hear it, but threw stones at him, and killed him. When Rehoboam saw
this, he thought himself aimed at by those stones with which they had killed
his servant, and feared lest he should undergo the last of punishments
in earnest; so he got immediately into his chariot, and fled to Jerusalem,
where the tribe of Judah and that of Benjamin ordained him king; but the
rest of the multitude forsook the sons of David from that day, and appointed
Jeroboam to be the ruler of their public affairs. Upon this Rehoboam, Solomon's
son, assembled a great congregation of those two tribes that submitted
to him, and was ready to take a hundred and eighty thousand chosen men
out of the army, to make an expedition against Jeroboam and his people,
that he might force them by war to be his servants; but he was forbidden
of God by the prophet [Shemaiah] to go to war, for that it was not just
that brethren of the same contry should fight one against another. He also
said that this defection of the multitude was according to the purpose
of God. So he did not proceed in this expedition. And now I will relate
first the actions of Jeroboam the king of Israel, after which we will relate
what are therewith connected, the actions of Rehoboam, the king of the
two tribes; by this means we shall preserve the good order of the history
entire.
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