Thus every circumstance, attending this revolution, had a most direct and powerful tendency to excite in both these kings, and their subjects, a spirit of pious emulation in their obedience to the divine Law: but the impious policy of Jeroboam, who, forgetting the divine promise, looked only to worldly means for securing his power, * afraid least his subjects, if they attended the temple worship at Jerusalem, where the house of David reigned, should be tempted to submit again to their ancient sovereigns, set up idolatrous symbols of the divine presence, in two places of his own dominions, and ordained priests, who were not of the tribe of Levi, and celebrated religious festivals, to counteract the attraction of the feasts at the temple. This conduct, however, though it proves a most criminal inattention to the injunctions of the Mosaic Law, yet it implies no deliberate disbelief of its divine original, or rejection of its authority, in either the monarch or the people on the contrary, the conduct of Jeroboam bears. (as has been already noticed) the strongest attestation * 1 Kings, xii. from 25 to the end. Supra, Vol. I. from p. 20 to 23, attestation to the universal notoriety and established authority of that Law. Apprehensive as he was, least the observance of its ritual should alienate his subjects, and endanger his crown, he yet attempts not to dispute its authority, or discredit its rites; he merely-introduces an innovation as to the place where these rites were to observed, and the persons by whom they were to be performed he endeavours to captivate a people addicted to idolatrous emblems, by introducing the same symbols of the divine presence, which the Jews had compelled Aaron to set up, and which he himself had been familiarized to in Egypt: he yet declares them the symbols of that Divinity, who had delivered the nation from Egypt, and thus recognises the reality of that divine interposition on which the which the Mosaic Law was founded." Behold," says he, "thy gods, "oh Israel, which brought thee up out of "the land of Egypt:" and still more, he appoints a feast similar to the feast of tabernacles at Jerusalem, which solemnly recognised the abode of the Jews in the wilderness, and all the miracles which attended it. Such Such was the nature and extent of that schism and corruption, introduced by Jeroboam, dictated by the policy of the monarch, and adapted to the idolatrous propensities of his subjects, but not at all indicating any disbelief of the Mosaic history, or the divine original of the Mosaic Law; on the contrary, evidently admitting both. But this, it will be said, was a strange inconsistency; true, but yet it is an inconsistency by no means incredible or unnatural. The history of Christianity, confirmed by our own experience, may teach us, that a departure, from the pure simplicity of a religion, derived from an acknowledged revelation, may be introduced by policy, recommended by idolatrous corruptions, to an unreflecting multitude, and subsist for ages; while, at the same time, nothing is farther from the ideas of that multitude, than any disbelief or rejection of the original revelation itself. Nor ought it to be forgotten, that this schism, and idolatry of the ten tribes, gave occasion for the most signal displays of divine power, and the most emphatic de nunciations nunciations and manifestations of divine justice, in the correction and government of this perverse race, and their guilty monarchs; the miraculous reproof and punishment of * Jeroboam himself; the death of his the three royal houses of favourite son; the utter destruction of Jeroboam, of Baasha, and of | Ahab; all foretold by the prophets, afforded awful examples of the divine vengeance, There also were exhibited the miracles of ¶ Elijah and Elisha; and concerning the kings and people of the ten tribes, were pronounced some of the most distinguished prophecies of * Amos, Hosea, and Isaiah; and finally, after a series of instructions and chastisements, which illustrated the spirit of the divine Law, manifested the perpetual controul of divine Providence, and verified all the denunciations Vide 1 Kings, xiii. + Ibid, xiv. Compare 1 Kings, xiv. 10, with xv. 29. § 1 Kings, xvi. 11. of || 1 Kings, xxi. from 20 to 22; and 2 Kings, ix. and x. ¶ Vide 1 Kings, from xvii. to the end of the book; and 2 Kings, seven first chapters, and ch. xiii. * Vide Isaiah, i. viii. and ix. 18; xvii. and xxviii.; Hosea passim, particularly viii. ix. x. and xiii. 15, to the end. of their inspired Lawgiver; but which, though doubtless operative on many indivi duals, could not reform either the sovereigns or the great mass of the people. God executed judgment on this deluded and corrupted race, *For he removed Israel out "of his sight, as he had said by all his ser"vants, the prophets; so was Israel carried 66 away out of their own land to Assyria; "there was none left but the tribe of Judah If, from the effects of this revolution on the ten tribes, we direct our reflections to its corresponding effects on the remaining two, we shall, I think, perceive, that it was the most powerful means of preserving in them, whatever degree of attention to the divine Law subsisted amongst them; and preventing that universal idolatry and corruption in the entire Jewish nation, which would, to all appearance, have defeated the great purposes of the divine œconomy. This event rendered it the obvious political interest of the kings of Judah, to adhere with strictness to the Mosaic Law, and promote * Vide 2 Kings, xvii. particularly from 18 to 23. |