1 Kings 14:11

_HIM THAT DIETH OF JEROBOAM IN THE CITY SHALL THE DOGS EAT; AND HIM THAT DIETH IN THE FIELD SHALL THE FOWLS OF THE AIR EAT: FOR THE LORD HATH SPOKEN IT._ NO JFB COMMENTARY ON THIS VERSE....

7-20 Whether we keep an account of God's mercies to us or not, he does; and he will set them in order before us, if we are ungrateful, to our greater confusion. Ahijah foretells the speedy death of the child then sick, in mercy to him. He only in the house of Jeroboam had affection for the true worship of God, and disliked the worship of the calves. To show the power and sovereignty of his grace, God saves some out of the worst families, in whom there is some good thing towards the Lord God of Israel. The righteous are removed from the evil to come in this world, to the good to come in a better world. It is often a bad sign for a family, when the best in it are buried out of it. Yet their death never can be a loss to themselves. It was a present affliction to the family and kingdom, by which both ought to have been instructed. God also tells the judgments which should come upon the peop...

Verse 1 Kings 14:11. _SHALL THE DOGS EAT_] They shall not have an honourable burial: and shall not come into the sepulchres of their fathers....

The dogs are the chief scavengers of Oriental cities (compare Psalms 59:6, Psalms 59:14). And the vulture is the chief scavenger in the country districts, assisted sometimes by kites and crows (see Job 39:27, where the vulture, not the eagle, is intended). Vultures are very abundant in Palestine....

EXPOSITION THE DEATH OF JEROBOAM'S SON.—The protest of the prophet of Judah, the signs which supported it, and above all the solemn visitation, with its strange portents, which straightway followed it, having alike failed to arrest Jeroboam (1 Kings 13:33) in his high-handed and shameless depravation of the true religion, we now read of the retribution which came upon his family, and which began with the sickness and death of his firstborn. We can hardly regard this as a part of the discipline designed to reform the king, and so avert the schism, for the narrative distinctly conveys the impression that Jeroboam's day of grace was past, and that judgment was already begun. Moreover these events would seem to belong to a much later period than that of which the preceding chapter treats—a peri

HIM THAT DIETH OF JEROBOAM IN THE CITY SHALL THE DOGS EAT, AND HIM THAT DIETH IN THE FIELDS SHALL THE FOWLS OF THE AIR EAT,.... The meaning is, that they should have no burial: FOR THE LORD HATH SPOKEN IT; and therefore shall be fulfilled, for what he hath said he will do, Numbers 23:19....

CHAPTER 14 THE PASSING OF JEROBOAM AND REHOBOAM _ 1. Sickness and death of Jeroboam's son (1 Kings 14:1)_ 2. Jeroboam's reign and death (1 Kings 14:19) 3. Rehoboam's apostasy, punishment and death (1 Kings 14:21) We come now to the passing of both kings, Jeroboam of Israel and Rehoboam of Judah. Abijah (Jehovah is my father), the son of wicked Jeroboam, was sick. “That child was the one green spot in Jeroboam's life and home; the one germ of hope. And as his father loved him truly, so all Israel had set their hopes on him. Upon the inner life of this child, its struggles and its victories, lies the veil of Scripture silence; and best that it should be so. But now his pulses were b

VISIT OF JEROBOAM'S WIFE TO AHIJAH. Here we have an ancient story with Deuteronomic additions. According to the LXX (1 Kings 12:24 _g-m),_ Jeroboam sent his wife (Ano) to the prophet _before_ he became king. Ahijah foretells the child's death, and the ruin of Jeroboam's house, but gives no reason for either calamity. He is introduced as a new person, and he is not blind. Ano is not yet queen, so she has no need to disguise herself. As 1 Kings 14:7 in the Heb. is obviously Deuteronomic, probably the early story merely related that Ahijah foretold the death of Ahijah. Notice that even in the Deuteronomic amplification Jeroboam's sin is not that of neglecting Jerusalem, but making other gods and molten images (1 King

_shall the dogs eat_ It was this circumstance which rendered it so horrible to the Oriental mind to be cast out unburied. The dogs of an Eastern city were many and devoured all they found....

B. THE MESSAGE OF GOD'S PROPHET 14:6-16 TRANSLATION (6) And it came to pass when Ahijah heard the sound of her feet coming at the door, that he said, Enter, wife of Jeroboam! Why are you pretending to be someone else? For I have been sent unto you with a heavy word. (7) Go say to Jeroboam, Thus says the LORD the God of Israel: Because I raised you up from the midst of the people and made you a prince over My people Israel, (8) and rent the kingdom from the house of David, and gave it to you, and you have not become like My servant David who kept My commandments and who walked after Me with all his heart to do only that which was upright in My eyes, (9) and you have done evil more than all who were before you, and have made for yourself other gods and molten images to provoke Me to anger; and Me you have pushed behind your back: (10) Therefore, behold I am about to bring a calamity upon...