Page:The Books of Chronicles (1916).djvu/278

214 Abijah, and Attai, and Ziza, and Shelomith. And Rehoboam loved Maacah the daughter of Absalom above all his wives and his concubines: (for he took eighteen wives, and threescore concubines, and begat twenty and eight sons and threescore daughters.) And Rehoboam appointed Abijah the son of Maacah to be chief, even the prince among his brethren: for he was minded to make him king. And he dealt wisely, and dispersed of all his sons throughout all the lands of Judah and Benjamin, unto every fenced city: and he gave them victual in abundance. And he sought for them many wives And it came to pass, when the kingdom of Rehoboam was established, and he was strong, that he forsook the law of the, and all Israel with him. And it came to pass in the fifth year of king Rehoboam, that Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem, because they had trespassed

These sons may all have died young, but perhaps xiv. 27 is another tradition differing from xviii. 18.

Abijah] Called "Abijam" 1 Kin. xv. 1.

23. all the lands] i.e. the territory of Judah; cp. 1 Chr. xiii. 2 (mg.).

And he sought for them many wives] More exactly, as mg., And he sought a multitude of wives. It is difficult to say whether or not the Chronicler has Deut. xvii. 17 in his mind and is implicitly blaming the king. In any case he goes on in the next verse to say that Rehoboam forsook the law of the Lord. It is however probable that there is a slight error in the Hebrew and that the text ran originally thus, And he took for them (i.e. for his sons) a multitude of wives. Rehoboam's own conjugal affairs have been already described in ver. 21.

XII. 1—12 (cp. 1 Kin. xiv. 22, 25—28).&emsp;

1. all Israel] i.e. all the Southern Kingdom; cp. note on xi. 3. The details of Judah's apostasy are given in 1 Kin. xiv. 22—24.

2. Shishak] The Egyptian king has commemorated this expedition in a pictorial inscription on the wall of the temple of Karnak. It appears that the Northern Kingdom suffered as well as the Southern; much spoil was carried off, but no permanent conquest of Canaan was attempted. (Breasted, History of Egypt, pp. 529 f.)

because they had trespassed] A touch characteristic of the Chronicler; cp. xiii. 18, xxi. 10, xxiv. 24, xxv. 20, xxvii. 6, xxviii. 19; and 1 Chr.