Readings:
1 Kings 15
Ecclesiastes 10-12

1 Kings 15

Rehoboam is dead and his son Abijam reigns for three years as king of Judah. The book of Kings is short on details of Abijam’s reign, but when we get to Chronicles it goes into greater detail on him and many of the lesser kings of Judah. What we are told here though is he done evil just as his father did before him, and then he was no more.

After Abijam’s short reign, his brother Asa takes the throne. Asa was a good king, one of the few, and he set about correcting some of the wrongs that were taking place in his kingdom. He cut down the pagan Asherah poles and destroyed many idols, he even removed his own mother from the position of Queen because of her promotion of idolatry and personally commissioning an idol that it seems like was supposed to resemble her. So maybe she was even deifying herself too? It got her removed from power.

The writer says that he didn’t destroy all the high places, these were pagan altars and shrines on mountain tops, but he was still righteous. I take this to mean that he destroyed everything in his direct control and brought abominable practices like male cultic prostitution under control, but he wasn’t able to root it all out completely. This isn’t counted against him though because giving it his all, and the people have to cooperate somehow.

Then we hear about two kings of Israel, one was Nadab, and the other was Baasha. Nadab’s reign only lasted a couple of years, and then he was deposed by Baasha, who wasn’t part of the family of Jeroboam. He was a usurper who killed the king and took his throne, and then proceeded to kill every remaining male in the extended family of Jeroboam to fulfill the prophecy that he’d be cut off because of the idolatry he’d introduced to the people.

During Baasha’s reign he was a thorn in the side of Asa in Judah, and he attacked constantly, so that Asa makes a treaty with the Syrians to attack Israel from the east while he comes up from the south. The plan works and he drives Israel back across their borders.

Tomorrow’s Readings:
1 Kings 16-18
Wisdom 1