of Ephraim, 1 Kings xi, 26. He is the subject of frequent mention in
Scripture, as having been the cause of the ten tribes revolting from the
dominion of Rehoboam, and also of his having “made Israel to sin,” by
instituting the idolatrous worship of the golden calves at Dan and
Bethel, 1 Kings xii, 26–33. He seems to have been a bold, unprincipled,
and enterprising man, with much of the address of a deep politician
about him; qualities which probably pointed him out to King Solomon as a
proper person to be entrusted with the obnoxious commission of levying
certain taxes throughout the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh. On a
certain day, as Jeroboam was going out of Jerusalem into the country,
having a new cloak wrapped about his shoulders, the Prophet Ahijah met
him in a field where they were alone, and seizing the cloak of Jeroboam,
he cut it into twelve pieces, and then addressing him, said, “Take ten
of them to thyself; for thus saith the Lord, I will divide and rend the
kingdom of Solomon, and will give ten tribes to thee. If, therefore,
thou obeyest my word and walkest in my ways as David my servant has
done, I will be with thee, and will establish thy house for ever, and
put thee in possession of the kingdom of Israel,” 1 Kings xi, 14–39.
Whether it were that the promises thus made by Ahijah prompted Jeroboam
to aim at taking their accomplishment into his own hands, and, with a
view to that, began to solicit the subjects of Solomon to revolt; or
whether the bare information of what had passed between the prophet and
Jeroboam, excited his fear and jealousy, it appears evident that the
aged monarch took the alarm, and attempted to apprehend Jeroboam, who,
getting notice of what was intended him, made a precipitate retreat into
Egypt, where he remained till the death of Solomon. He then returned,
and found that Rehoboam, who had succeeded his father Solomon in the
throne of David, had already excited the disgust of ten of the tribes by
some arbitrary proceedings, in consequence of which they had withdrawn
their allegiance from the new monarch. These tribes no sooner heard of
his return than they invited him to appear among them in a general
assembly, in which they elected him to be king over Israel. Jeroboam
fixed his residence at Shechem, and there fortified himself; he also
rebuilt Penuel, a city beyond Jordan, putting it into a state of
defence, in order to keep the tribes quiet which were on that side
Jordan, 1 Kings xii, 1–25.
But Jeroboam soon forgot the duty which he owed to God, who had given
him the kingdom; and thought of nothing but how to maintain himself in
the possession of it, though he discarded the worship of the true God.
The first suggestion of his unbelieving heart was, that if the tribes
over whom he reigned were to go up to Jerusalem to sacrifice and keep
the annual festivals, they would be under continual temptations to
return to the house of David. To counteract this, he caused two golden
calves to be made as objects of religious worship, one of which he
placed at Dan, and the other at Bethel, the two extremities of his
dominions; and caused a proclamation to be made throughout all his
territories, that in future none of his subjects should go up to
Jerusalem to worship; and, directing them to the two calves which had
been recently erected, he cried out, “Behold thy gods, O Israel, which
brought thee up out of Egypt!” He also caused idolatrous temples to be
built, and priests to be ordained of the lowest of the people, who were
neither of the family of Aaron nor of the tribe of Levi, 1 Kings xii,
26–33. Having appointed a solemn public festival to be observed on the
fifteenth day of the eighth month, in order to dedicate his new altar
and consecrate his golden calves, he assembled the people at Bethel, and
himself went up to the altar for the purpose of offering incense and
sacrifices. At that instant a prophet, who had come, divinely directed,
from Judah to Bethel, accosted Jeroboam, and said, “O altar, altar, thus
saith the Lord, A child shall be born to the house of David, Josiah by
name; and upon thee shall he sacrifice the priests of the high places
who now burn incense upon thee: he shall burn men’s bones upon thee.” To
confirm the truth of this threatening, the prophet also added a sign,
namely, that the altar should immediately be rent asunder, and the ashes
and every thing upon it poured upon the earth. Jeroboam, incensed at
this interference of the prophet, stretched out his hand and commanded
him to be seized; but the hand which he had stretched out was instantly
paralyzed, and he was unable to draw it back again. The altar, too, was
broken, and the ashes upon it fell to the ground according to the
prediction of the prophet. Jeroboam now solicited his prayers that his
hand might be restored to him. The man of God interposed his
supplication to Heaven, and the king’s hand was restored to him sound as
before. Jeroboam then entreated him that he would accompany him to his
own house, and accept a reward; but he answered, “Though thou shouldst
give me the half of thine house, I would not go with thee, nor will I
taste any thing in this place, for the Lord hath expressly forbidden me
to do so,” 1 Kings xiii, 1–10. But notwithstanding this manifest
indication of the displeasure of Heaven, it failed of recovering
Jeroboam from his impious procedure. He continued to encourage his
subjects in idolatry, by appointing priests of the high places, and
engaging them in such worship as was contrary to the divine law. This
was the sin of Jeroboam’s family, and it was the cause of its utter
extirpation. Some time after his accession to the throne of Israel, his
favourite son Abijah fell sick, and, to relieve his parental solicitude,
Jeroboam instructed his wife to disguise herself, and in that state to
go and consult the Prophet Ahijah concerning his recovery. This was the
same prophet who had foretold to Jeroboam that he should be king of
Israel. He was now blind through old age; but the prophet was warned of
her approach, and, before she entered his threshold, he called her by
name, told her that her son should die, and then, in appalling terms,
denounced the impending ruin of Jeroboam’s whole family, which shortly
after came to pass. After a reign of two-and-twenty years, Jeroboam
died, and Nadab, his son, succeeded to the crown, 1 Kings xiii, 33, 34;
xiv, 1–20.
2. JEROBOAM, the second of that name, was the son of Jehoash, king of
Israel. He succeeded to his father’s royal dignity, A. M. 3179, and
reigned forty-one years. Though much addicted to the idolatrous
practices of the son of Nebat, yet the Lord was pleased so far to
prosper his reign, that by his means, according to the predictions of
the Prophet Jonah, the kingdom of the ten tribes was restored from a
state of great decay, into which it had fallen, and was even raised to a
pitch of extraordinary splendour. The Prophets Amos and Hosea, as well
as Jonah, lived during this reign.
JERUSALEM, formerly called Jebus, or Salem, Joshua xviii, 28; Heb. vii,
2, the capital of Judea, situated partly in the tribe of Benjamin, and
partly in that of Judah. It was not completely reduced by the Israelites
till the reign of David, 2 Sam. v, 6–9. As Jerusalem was the centre of
the true worship, Psalm cxxii, 4, and the place where God did in a
peculiar manner dwell, first in the tabernacle, 2 Sam. vi, 7, 12; 1
Chron. xv, 1; xvi, 1; Psalm cxxxii, 13; cxxxv, 2, and afterward in the
temple, 1 Kings vi, 13; so it is used figuratively to denote the church,
or the celestial society, to which all that believe, both Jews and
Gentiles, are come, and in which they are initiated, Gal. iv, 26; Heb.
xii, 22; Rev. iii, 12; xxi, 2, 10. Jerusalem was situated in a stony and
barren soil, and was about sixty furlongs in length, according to
Strabo. The territory and places adjacent were well watered, having the
fountains of Gihon and Siloam, and the brook Kidron, at the foot of its
walls; and, beside these, there were the waters of Ethan, which Pilate
had conveyed through aqueducts into the city. The ancient city of
Jerusalem, or Jebus, which David took from the Jebusites, was not very
large. It was seated upon a mountain southward of the temple. The
opposite mountain, situated to the north, is Sion, where David built a
new city, which he called the city of David, wherein was the royal
palace, and the temple of the Lord. The temple was built upon Mount
Moriah, which was one of the little hills belonging to Mount Sion.
Through the reigns of David and Solomon, Jerusalem was the metropolis of
the whole Jewish kingdom, and continued to increase in wealth and
splendour. It was resorted to at the festivals by the whole population
of the country; and the power and commercial spirit of Solomon,
improving the advantages acquired by his father David, centred in it
most of the eastern trade, both by sea, through the ports of Elath and
Ezion-Geber, and over land, by the way of Tadmor or Palmyra. Or, at
least, though Jerusalem might not have been made a depot of merchandise,
the quantity of precious metals flowing into it by direct importation,
and by duties imposed on goods passing to the ports of the
Mediterranean, and in other directions, was unbounded. Some idea of the
prodigious wealth of Jerusalem at this time may be formed by stating,
that the quantity of gold left by David for the use of the temple
amounted to £21,600,000 sterling, beside £3,150,000 in silver; and
Solomon obtained £3,240,000 in gold by one voyage to Ophir, while silver
was so abundant, “that it was not any thing accounted of.” These were
the days of Jerusalem’s glory. Universal peace, unmeasured wealth, the
wisdom and clemency of the prince, and the worship of the true God,
marked Jerusalem, above every city, as enjoying the presence and the
especial favour of the Almighty. But these days were not to last long:
intestine divisions and foreign wars, wicked and tyrannical princes,
and, last of all, the crime most offensive to Heaven, and the one least
to be expected among so favoured a people, led to a series of
calamities, through the long period of nine hundred years, with which no
other city or nation can furnish a parallel. After the death of Solomon,
ten of the twelve tribes revolted from his successor Rehoboam, and,
under Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, established a separate kingdom: so
that Jerusalem, no longer the capital of the whole empire, and its
temple frequented only by the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, must have
experienced a mournful declension. Four years after this, the city and
temple were taken and plundered by Shishak, king of Egypt, 1 Kings xiv,
26, 27; 2 Chron. xii, 2–9. One hundred and forty-five years after, under
Amaziah, they sustained the same fate from Joash, king of Israel, 2
Kings xiv; 2 Chron. xxv. One hundred and sixty years from this period,
the city was again taken, by Esarhaddon, king of Assyria; and Manasseh,
the king, carried a prisoner to Babylon, 2 Chron. xxxiii. Within the
space of sixty-six years more it was taken by Pharaoh-Necho, king of
Egypt, whom Josiah, king of Judah, had opposed in his expedition to
Carchemish; and who, in consequence, was killed at the battle of
Megiddo, and his son Eliakim placed on the throne in his stead by Necho,
who changed his name to Jehoiakim, and imposed a heavy tribute upon him,
having sent his elder brother, Jehoahaz, who had been proclaimed king at
Jerusalem, a prisoner to Egypt, where he died, 2 Kings xxiii; 2 Chron.
xxxv. Jerusalem was three times besieged and taken by Nebuchadnezzar,
king of Babylon, within a very few years. The first, in the reign of the
last mentioned king, Jehoiakim, who was sent a prisoner to Babylon, and
the vessels of the temple transported to the same city, 2 Chron. xxxvi.
The second, in that of his son Jehoiachin; when all the treasures of the
palace and the temple, and the remainder of the vessels of the latter
which had been hidden or spared in the first capture, were carried away
or destroyed, and the best of the inhabitants, with the king, led into
captivity, 2 Kings xxiv; 2 Chron. xxxvi. And the third, in the reign of
Zedekiah, the successor of Jehoiachin; in whose ninth year the most
formidable siege which this ill fated city ever sustained, except that
of Titus, was commenced. It continued two years; during a great part of
which the inhabitants suffered all the horrors of famine: when, on the
ninth day of the fourth month, in the eleventh year of Zedekiah, which
answers to July in the year B. C. 588, the garrison, with the king,
endeavoured to make their escape from the city, but were pursued and
defeated by the Chaldeans in the plains of Jericho; Zedekiah taken
prisoner; his sons killed before his face at Riblah, whither he was
taken to the king of Babylon; and he himself, after his eyes were put
out, was bound with fetters of brass, and carried prisoner to Babylon,
where he died: thus fulfilling the prophecy of Ezekiel, which declared
that he should be carried to Babylon, but should not see the place,
though he should die there, Ezekiel xii, 13. In the following month, the
Chaldean army, under their general, Nebuzaradan, entered the city, took
away every thing that was valuable, and then burned and utterly
destroyed it, with its temple and walls, and left the whole razed to the
ground. The entire population of the city and country, with the
exception of a few husbandmen, were then carried captive to Babylon.
During seventy years, the city and temple lay in ruins: when those Jews
who chose to take immediate advantage of the proclamation of Cyrus,
under the conduct of Zerubbabel, returned to Jerusalem, and began to
build the temple; all the vessels of gold and silver belonging to which,
that had been taken away by Nebuchadnezzar, being restored by Cyrus.
Their work, however, did not proceed far without opposition; for in the
reign of Cambyses, the son of Cyrus, who in Scripture is called
Ahasuerus, the Samaritans presented a petition to that monarch to put a
stop to the building, Ezra iv, 6. Cambyses appears to have been too
busily engaged in his Egyptian expedition to pay any attention to this
malicious request. His successor, Smerdis, the Magian, however, who in
Scripture is called Artaxerxes, to whom a similar petition was sent,
representing the Jews as a factious and dangerous people, listened to
it, and, in the true spirit of a usurper, issued a decree putting a stop
to the farther building of the temple, Ezra iv, 7, &c; which, in
consequence, remained in an unfinished state till the second year,
according to the Jewish, and third, according to the Babylonian and
Persian account, of Darius Hystaspes, who is called simply Darius in
Scripture. To him also a representation hostile to the Jews was made by
their inveterate enemies, the Samaritans; but this noble prince refused
to listen to it, and having searched the rolls of the kingdom, and found
in the palace at Acmetha the decree of Cyrus, issued a similar one,
which reached Jerusalem in the subsequent year, and even ordered these
very Samaritans to assist the Jews in their work; so that it was
completed in the sixth year of the same reign, Ezra iv, 24; v; vi, 1–15.
But the city and walls remained in a ruinous condition until the
twentieth year of Artaxerxes, the Artaxerxes Longimanus of profane
history; by whom Nehemiah was sent to Jerusalem, with a power granted to
him to rebuild them. Accordingly, under the direction of this zealous
servant of God, the walls were speedily raised, but not without the
accustomed opposition on the part of the Samaritans; who, despairing of
the success of an application to the court of Persia, openly attacked
the Jews with arms. But the building, notwithstanding, went steadily on;
the men working with an implement of work in one hand, and a weapon of
war in the other; and the wall, with incredible labour, was finished in
fifty-two days, in the year B. C. 445; after which, the city itself was
gradually rebuilt, Neh. ii, iv, vi. From this time Jerusalem remained
attached to the Persian empire, but under the local jurisdiction of the
high priests, until the subversion of that empire by Alexander, fourteen
years after. See ALEXANDER.
At the death of Alexander, and the partition of his empire by his
generals, Jerusalem, with Judea, fell to the kings of Syria. But in the
frequent wars which followed between the kings of Syria and those of
Egypt, called by Daniel, the kings of the north and south, it belonged
sometimes to one and sometimes to the other,--an unsettled and unhappy
state, highly favourable to disorder and corruption,--the high
priesthood was openly sold to the highest bidder; and numbers of the
Jews deserted their religion for the idolatries of the Greeks. At
length, in the year B. C. 170, Antiochus Epiphanes, king of Syria,
enraged at hearing that the Jews had rejoiced at a false report of his
death, plundered Jerusalem, and killed eighty thousand men. Not more
than two years afterward, this cruel tyrant, who had seized every
opportunity to exercise his barbarity on the Jews, sent Apollonius with
an army to Jerusalem; who pulled down the walls, grievously oppressed
the people, and built a citadel on a rock adjoining the temple, which
commanded that building, and had the effect of completely overawing the
seditious. Having thus reduced this unfortunate city into entire
submission, and rendered resistance useless, the next step of Antiochus
was to abolish the Jewish religion altogether, by publishing an edict
which commanded all the people of his dominions to conform to the
religion of the Greeks: in consequence of which, the service of the
temple ceased, and a statue of Jupiter Olympus was set up on the altar.
But this extremity of ignominy and oppression led, as might have been
expected, to rebellion; and those Jews who still held their insulted
religion in reverence, fled to the mountains, with Mattathias and Judas
Maccabeus; the latter of whom, after the death of Mattathias, who with
his followers and successors, are known by the name of Maccabees, waged
successful war with the Syrians; defeated Apollonius, Nicanor, and
Lysias, generals of Antiochus; obtained possession of Jerusalem,
purified the temple, and restored the service, after three years’
defilement by the Gentile idolatries.
From this time, during several succeeding Maccabean rulers, who were at
once high priests and sovereigns of the Jews, but without the title of
king, Jerusalem was able to preserve itself from Syrian violence. It
was, however, twice besieged, first by Antiochus Eupator, in the year
163, and afterward by Antiochus Sidetes, in the year B. C. 134. But the
Jews had caused themselves to be sufficiently respected to obtain
conditions of peace on both occasions, and to save their city; till, at
length, Hyrcanus, in the year 130 B. C., shook off the Syrian yoke, and
reigned, after this event, twenty-one years in independence and
prosperity. His successor, Judas, made an important change in the Jewish
government, by taking the title of king, which dignity was enjoyed by
his successors forty-seven years, when a dispute having arisen between
Hyrcanus II. and his brother Aristobulus, and the latter having overcome
the former, and made himself king, was, in his turn, conquered by the
Romans under Pompey, by whom the city and temple were taken, Aristobulus
made prisoner, and Hyrcanus created high priest and prince of the Jews,
but without the title of king. By this event Judea was reduced to the
condition of a Roman province, in the year 63 B. C. Nor did Jerusalem
long after enjoy the dignity of a metropolis, that honour being
transferred to Cæsarea. Julius Cæsar, having defeated Pompey, continued
Hyrcanus in the high priesthood, but bestowed the government of Judea
upon Antipater, an Idumæan by birth, but a Jewish proselyte, and father
of Herod the Great. For the siege and destruction of Jerusalem by the
Romans, see JEWS.
Jerusalem lay in ruins about forty-seven years, when the Emperor Ælius
Adrian began to build it anew, and erected a Heathen temple, which he
dedicated to Jupiter Capitolinus. The city was finished in the twentieth
year of his reign, and called, after its founder, Ælia, or Ælia
Capitolina, from the Heathen deity who presided over it. In this state
Jerusalem continued, under the name of Ælia, and inhabited more by
Christians and Pagans than by Jews, till the time of the Emperor
Constantine, styled the Great; who, about the year 323, having made
Christianity the religion of the empire, began to improve it, adorned it
with many new edifices and churches, and restored its ancient name.
About thirty-five years afterward, Julian, named the Apostate, not from
any love he bore the Jews, but out of hatred to the Christians, whose
faith he had abjured, and with the avowed design of defeating the
prophecies, which had declared that the temple should not be rebuilt,
wrote to the Jews, inviting them to their city, and promising to restore
their temple and nation. He accordingly employed great numbers of
workmen to clear the foundations; but balls of fire bursting from the
earth, soon put a stop to their proceeding. This miraculous
interposition of Providence is attested by many credible witnesses and
historians; and, in particular, by Ammianus Marcellinus, a Heathen, and
friend of Julian; Zemuch David, a Jew; Nazianzen, Chrysostom, Ambrose
Ruffinus, Theodoret, Sozomen, and Socrates, who wrote his account within
fifty years after the transaction, and while many eye-witnesses of it
were still living. So stubborn, indeed, is the proof of this miracle,
that even Gibbon, who strives to invalidate it, is obliged to
acknowledge the general fact.
Jerusalem continued in nearly the same condition till the beginning of
the seventh century, when it was taken and plundered by the celebrated
Chosroes, king of Persia, by whom many thousands of the Christian
inhabitants were killed, or sold for slaves. The Persians, however, did
not hold it long, as they were soon after entirely defeated by the
Emperor Heraclius, who rescued Jerusalem, and restored it, not to the
unhappy Jews, who were forbidden to come within three miles of it, but
to the Christians. A worse calamity was, however, speedily to befall
this ill fated city. The Mohammedan imposture arose about this time; and
the fanatics who had adopted its creed carried their arms and their
religion with unprecedented rapidity over the greater part of the east.
The Caliph Omar, the third from Mohammed, invested the city, which,
after once more suffering the horrors of a protracted siege, surrendered
on terms of capitulation in the year 637; and has ever since, with the
exception of the short period that it was occupied by the crusaders,
been trodden under foot by the followers of the false prophet.