1 Kings 13:3

_AND HE GAVE A SIGN THE SAME DAY, SAYING, THIS IS THE SIGN WHICH THE LORD HATH SPOKEN; BEHOLD, THE ALTAR SHALL BE RENT, AND THE ASHES THAT ARE UPON IT SHALL BE POURED OUT._ No JFB commentary on these verses....

1-10 In threatening the altar, the prophet threatens the founder and worshippers. Idolatrous worship will not continue, but the word of the Lord will endure for ever. The prediction plainly declared that the family of David would continue, and support true religion, when the ten tribes would not be able to resist them. If God, in justice, harden the hearts of sinners, so that the hand they have stretched out in sin they cannot pull in again by repentance, that is a spiritual judgment, represented by this, and much more dreadful. Jeroboam looked for help, not from his calves, but from God only, from his power, and his favour. The time may come when those that hate the preaching, would be glad of the prayers of faithful ministers. Jeroboam does not desire the prophet to pray that his sin might be pardoned, and his heart changed, but only that his hand might be restored. He seemed affected...

Verse 1 Kings 13:3. _AND HE GAVE A SIGN_] A miracle to prove that the prophecy should be fulfilled in its season....

HE GAVE A SIGN - A sign of this kind - an immediate prophecy to prove the divine character of a remote prophecy - had scarcely been given before this. In the later history, however, such signs are not unfrequent (compare 2 Kings 19:29; Isaiah 7:14). THE ASHES ... SHALL BE POURED OUT - i. e., “The half-burnt remains of the offerings shall be ignominiously spilled upon the ground.”...

EXPOSITION THE TESTIMONY OF GOD AGAINST THE CALF WORSHIP.—We have in this chapter, which some commentators consider to be derived from a different source from the narratives which precede and follow it—the expression of 1 Kings 13:32, "the cities of Samaria," according to them, proving it to be of a later date, while the style and colouring of the story suggest that it embodies a tradition current in the time of the compiler—an account of certain circumstances of profound significance which marked the inauguration of Jeroboam's first great feast—for the close connexion with 1 Kings 12:1. shows that it is "the fifteenth day of the eighth month" that is he

AND HE GAVE A SIGN THE SAME DAY, SAYING, THIS IS THE SIGN WHICH THE LORD HATH SPOKEN,.... As a confirmation of the truth of what the prophet had said, and for the proof of his being a true prophet of the Lord: BEHOLD, THE ALTAR SHALL BE RENT; of itself, by an invisible hand, by the power of God: AND THE ASHES THAT ARE UPON IT SHALL BE POURED OUT; signifying it should be entirely demolished, not only shaken but destroyed, so as not to be capable of retaining the ashes on it; this was an emblem of the utter abolition of idolatry here in future times....

2. JEROBOAM AND REHOBOAM AND THEIR REIGN CHAPTER 13 The Man of God from Judah _ 1. The man of God and Jeroboam (1 Kings 13:1)_ 2. The temptation and lying message (1 Kings 13:11) 3. Judgment announced (1 Kings 13:20) 4. The fate of the man of Judah (1 Kings 13:23) 5. Jeroboam's impenitence (1 Kings 13:33) A dramatic scene opens this chapter. The idolatrous King is engaged in his religious ceremony when an unnamed man of God interrupted him. He did not rebuke Jeroboam, but addressed

1 Kings 12:25 to 1 Kings 13:34. THE SIN OF JEROBOAM. THE PROPHET AT BETHEL. The sources cannot be exactly determined. Some (see Cent.B) may belong to the annals of the northern kingdom, but the tone is decidedly Deuteronomic. The prophet's message to Jeroboam is certainly late. Jeroboam's first act as recorded was to build or fortify Shechem (1 Kings 12:25). Then for some reason he transferred his seat of government to the E. of Jordan to Penuel. Possibly he was hard pressed by his former patron Shishak, who invaded Israel in his reign (1 Kings 14:25). There is no proof of this; but Abner after Saul's death set up Ishbosh

A SIGN. We have similar signs in Exodus 3:12; 2 Kings 19:29; 2 Kings 20:8; Isaiah 7:14; Isaiah 8:18....

_And he gave a sign the same day_ The sign was necessary because the event foretold was to be at so remote a date that none who were living in Jeroboam's day would be alive to see it. Hence to assure them that it would come to pass a startling token of the power in which the prophet spake is exhibited by the rending of the altar and the scattering of what was on it in the presence of all who stood by. The word מופת rendered -sign", is much more frequently used of -wonders" and -miracles", and it has that sense in some degree here. With this we may compare the use of τέρας as well as σημεῖον for the miracles of the New Testament. _and the ashes that_are _upon it_ The Hebrew word, which is the same as that so often rendered -fatness", applies only to the ashes _of an altar_, which would be mixed up with the fat of sacrifices burnt upon it. Hence the LXX. renders by ἡ πιότης -the fat", or...