Commentaria in III Regum
Chapter 13
The Prophet threatens the altar of Jeroboam with schism and destruction by king Josias. Jeroboam orders him to be seized; but his hand withers, which the Prophet restores to him praying for pardon, who, against the command of God eating with another prophet in Bethel, on returning home is killed by a lion.
1. And behold a man of God came out of Juda by the word of the Lord to Bethel, as Jeroboam stood upon the altar, and burnt incense. 2. And he cried out against the altar by the word of the Lord, and said: O altar, altar, thus saith the Lord: Behold a child shall be born to the house of David, Josias by name, and he shall immolate upon thee the priests of the high places, who now burn incense upon thee, and he shall burn men’s bones upon thee.
3. And he gave a sign the same day, saying: This shall be the sign that the Lord hath spoken: Behold the altar shall be rent, and the ashes that are upon it shall be poured out. 4. And when the king heard the word of the man of God, which he had cried out against the altar in Bethel, he stretched forth his hand from the altar, saying: Lay hold on him. And his hand which he stretched forth against him, withered, and he was not able to draw it back again to him. 5. The altar also was rent, and the ashes were poured out from the altar, according to the sign which the man of God had given by the word of the Lord. 6. And the king said to the man of God: Entreat the face of the Lord of thy God, and pray for me, that my hand may be restored to me. And the man of God besought the face of the Lord, and the king’s hand was restored to him, and it became as it was before. 7. And the king said to the man of God: Come home with me to dine, and I will make thee presents. 8. And the man of God said to the king: If thou wouldst give me half of thy house, I will not go with thee, nor eat bread, nor drink water in this place: 9. For so it was commanded me by the word of the Lord, saying: Thou shalt not eat bread, nor drink water, nor return by the way that thou camest. 10. So he went another way, and returned not by the way that he came to Bethel. 11. Now a certain old prophet dwelt in Bethel, and his sons came to him and told him all the works that the man of God had done that day in Bethel: and they told their father the words that he had spoken to the king. 12. And their father said to them: What way went he? and his sons shewed him the way by which the man of God went, that came from Juda. 13. And he said to his sons: Saddle me the ass. And when they had saddled, he got up on it, 14. And went after the man of God, and found him sitting under a turpentine tree, and he said to him: Art thou the man of God that camest from Juda? He answered: I am. 15. And he said to him: Come home with me, to eat bread. 16. But he said: I may not return, nor go with thee, neither will I eat bread nor drink water in this place: 17. Because the Lord spoke to me in the word of the Lord, saying: Thou shalt not eat bread nor drink water there, nor shalt thou return by the way that thou wentest. 18. And he said to him: I also am a prophet like unto thee: and an angel spoke to me in the word of the Lord, saying: Bring him back with thee into thy house, that he may eat bread, and drink water. He deceived him, 19. And brought him back with him: so he ate bread in his house, and drank water. 20. And as they sat at the table, the word of the Lord came to the prophet that had brought him back. 21. And he cried out to the man of God, that came from Juda, saying: Thus saith the Lord: Because thou hast not been obedient to the mouth of the Lord, and hast not kept the commandment which the Lord thy God commanded thee, 22. And hast returned, and eaten bread, and drunk water in the place wherein he commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat bread nor drink water, thy body shall not be brought into the sepulchre of thy fathers. 23. And when he had eaten and drunk, he saddled his ass for the prophet whom he had brought back. 24. And when he was gone, a lion found him in the way, and killed him: and his body was cast in the way: and the ass stood by him, and the lion stood by the body. 25. And behold men passing by saw the body cast in the way, and the lion standing by the body: and they came and told it in the city, in which the old prophet dwelt. 26. And when that prophet heard it, who had brought him back from his way, he said: It is the man of God, that was disobedient to the mouth of the Lord, and the Lord hath delivered him up to the lion, and he hath torn him, and killed him, according to the word of the Lord which he spoke to him. 27. And he said to his sons: Saddle me the ass. And when they had saddled it, 28. And he was gone, he found his body cast in the way, and the ass and the lion standing by the body: the lion had not eaten of the body, nor hurt the ass. 29. And the prophet took up the body of the man of God, and laid it upon the ass, and brought it back to the city of the old prophet to mourn for him. 30. And he laid his body in his own sepulchre: and they mourned over him, saying: Alas, alas, my brother. 31. And when they had mourned over him, he said to his sons: When I am dead, bury me in the sepulchre wherein the man of God is buried: lay my bones beside his bones. 32. For that shall surely come to pass which he foretold by the word of the Lord against the altar that is in Bethel, and against all the temples of the high places that are in the cities of Samaria. 33. After these words Jeroboam returned not from his wicked way, but on the contrary he made of the meanest of the people priests of the high places: whosoever would, filled his hand, and was made a priest of the high places. 34. And for this cause the house of Jeroboam sinned, and was cut off, and destroyed from off the face of the earth.
1. AND BEHOLD A MAN OF GOD (a prophet sent by God to chastise and check the rising idolatry of Jeroboam) CAME OUT OF JUDA (from Judea) BY THE WORD (the prompting and command) OF THE LORD TO BETHEL.—This prophet is here called “Jadon” by Josephus; by St. Jerome on 2 Paralipomenon 10 “Jaddo”; by Hugh, Lyranus, Dionysius, Serarius and Sanchez “Addo,” who in 2 Paralipomenon 9:29 is said to have written the acts of Solomon in the vision which he had against Jeroboam. But since our prophet here was killed by a lion immediately after his vision and prophecy against Jeroboam, he does not seem to have had time and life to write the acts of Solomon, as Addo had, who moreover wrote the acts of Abias, son and successor of Roboam, as is plain from 2 Paralipomenon 12:15; wherefore he cannot be the one of whom this chapter speaks, who was killed at the beginning of the reign of Roboam.
St. Jerome and the Gloss on Zacharias chapter 1, verse 1, add: Addo was the grandfather of the prophet Zacharias, who is named there. But between this Addo and this Zacharias more than four hundred years flowed. It is more likely what Epiphanius says in the Lives of the Prophets, near the beginning, that this prophet was “Joas” (whom Theodoret and Glycas call “Joel”), who describes his life there from this chapter 13. Finally Tertullian, in the book On Fasting against the Psychics, chapter 16, calls him “Semeias.” So also Clement of Alexandria, book 1 Stromata, chapter 1, names him “Semeias,” son of Amame.
2. O ALTAR, ALTAR, THUS SAITH THE LORD: BEHOLD A CHILD SHALL BE BORN TO THE HOUSE OF DAVID, JOSIAS BY NAME, AND HE SHALL IMMOLATE (sacrifice) UPON THEE THE PRIESTS OF THE HIGH PLACES.—This prophecy was uttered of king Josias three hundred years before his birth, and at the same time his name was uttered, namely that he should be called “Josias,” that is, “salvation of God,” because he, overthrowing the idols, brought the faith of the true God and his salvation to all. So Isaias, chapter 45, verse 1, two hundred years before Cyrus uttered his name, and prophesied many splendid things of him, which the Jews afterwards showing to Cyrus obtained from him liberation from Babylon, according to Josephus.