1 Kings 13
1 One day a prophet, obeying what Yahweh commanded him to do, went from Judah [north] to Bethel. He arrived there right at the time that Jeroboam was standing at the altar, ready to burn incense.
The Lord ordered a man of God from Judah to go to Bethel. He arrived just as Jeroboam was standing beside the altar about to present a burnt offering.
2 Saying what Yahweh told him to say, the prophet shouted, “This is what Yahweh says [about this] altar [APO]: ‘I want you to know that [some day] a descendant [MTY] of King David will be born. His name will be Josiah, and he will come here. He will slaughter at this altar the priests who are burning incense for sacrifices on the hills [in this area], and he will burn the bones of dead people on this altar.’” [APO]
He shouted out the Lord's condemnation of the altar: “Altar, altar, this is what the Lord says. A son will be born to the house of David. His name will be Josiah, and on you he will sacrifice the priests of the high places who burn offerings on you, and human bones will be burned on you.”
3 Then the prophet also said, “This is what will prove to you that Yahweh has said this: This altar will be split apart, and the ashes that are on it will be scattered.’”
The same day the man of God gave a sign, saying, “This is the sign to prove that the Lord has spoken. Look! The altar will be split apart, and the ashes on it will spill out.”
4 When King Jeroboam heard the prophet say that, he pointed his finger at him and said to his servants, “Seize that man!” But immediately the king’s arm became paralyzed/stiff, with the result that he could not move it.
When King Jeroboam heard the condemnation the man of God had shouted out against the altar in Bethel, he pointed his hand at him and said, “Arrest him!” But the hand the king had pointed at him had become paralyzed and he couldn't draw it back.
5 And the altar immediately split apart, and the ashes spilled out [on the ground], which is what the prophet said that Yahweh [MTY] had predicted would happen.
The altar split apart, and the ashes spilled out from it, fulfilling the sign that the man of God had given from the Lord.
6 Then the king said to the prophet, “Please pray that Yahweh will be merciful to me and heal my arm!” So the prophet prayed, and Yahweh completely healed the king’s arm.
Then the king said to the man of God, “Please plead with the Lord your God—pray for me that I may have my hand back!” The man of God pleaded with the Lord, and the king was given back the use of his hand as it was before.
7 Then the king said to the prophet, “Come home with me and eat some food. And I will also give you a reward [for what you have done]!”
Then the king said to the man of God, “Come to my home and have a meal so I can give you a present.”
8 But the prophet replied, “Even if you would [promise to] give me half of everything that you own [MTY], I will not go with you, and I will not eat or drink anything with you here,
But the man of God told the king, “Even if you gave me half of everything you own, I still wouldn't go with you. In fact I refuse to eat or drink anything in this place.
9 because Yahweh commanded me not to eat or drink anything here. He also commanded me not to return home on the road on which I came here.”
The Lord ordered me not to eat or drink anything, and not to return by the way I came.”
10 So he started to return home, but he did not go on the road on which he came to Bethel. He went on a different road.
So he went a different way—he did not return the way he had come to Bethel.
11 At that time there was an old man living in Bethel who was a prophet. His sons came and told him what the prophet [from Judah] had done there on that day, and they also told him what the prophet had said to the king.
It so happened that an old prophet lived in Bethel. His sons came and told him everything the man of God had done that day in Bethel. They also told their father what the man had said to the king.
12 Their father said, “On which road did he go?” So his sons showed him the road on which the prophet from Judah had gone [when he left Bethel].
“Which way did he go?” their father asked them. So his sons showed him the way taken by the man of God from Judah.
13 Then he said to his sons, “Put a saddle on my donkey.” So they did that, and he got on the donkey.
“Saddle up a donkey for me,” he told his sons. They saddled up a donkey and he got on.
14 He went along the road to (find/catch up with) the prophet from Judah. He found him sitting under an oak tree. He said to him, “Are you the prophet who came from Judah?” He replied, “Yes, I am.”
He rode after the man of God and found him sitting under an oak tree. “Are you the man of God who came from Judah?” he asked him. “Yes I am,” the man replied.
15 The old prophet said to him, “Come home with me and eat some food.”
“Come home with me and have something to eat,” he told him.
16 He replied, “No, I am not allowed to go with you into your house, or to eat or drink anything with you,
“I can't turn around and go with you, and I won't eat or drink with you in this place,” the man of God replied.
17 because Yahweh told me, ‘Do not eat or drink anything here, and do not return home on the road on which you came.’”
“The Lord ordered me, saying ‘You must not eat or drink anything there, or return by the way you came.’”
18 Then the old prophet said to him, “I also am a prophet, like you are. Yahweh sent an angel to tell me that I should take you home with me and give you some food and drink.” But the old man was lying [when he said that].
But the old prophet told him, “I am also a prophet, just like you. An angel told me God said, ‘Take him home with you so that he can have something to eat and drink’” But he was lying to him.
19 But because of what the old prophet said, the prophet from Judah returned with him to his home and ate some food and drank some water with him.
So the man of God went back with him, and ate and drank in his house.
20 While they were sitting at the table, Yahweh spoke to the old man.
As they were sitting at the table, a message from the Lord came to the prophet who had brought him back.
21 Then he cried out to the prophet from Judah, “This is what Yahweh says: ‘You have disobeyed him, and you have not done what he commanded you to do.
He called out to the man of God who had come from Judah, “This is what the Lord says: Because you have disobeyed the word of the Lord and have not followed the orders that the Lord your God gave you,
22 Instead, you have come back here and had things to eat and drink in a place where he commanded you not to do that. As a result, you will be killed, and your body will not be buried in the grave where your ancestors are buried.’”
instead you went back and ate and drank in the place where he told you not to, your body will not be buried in the tomb of your fathers.”
23 When they had finished eating, the old man put a saddle on the donkey for the prophet from Judah, [and the prophet from Judah left].
After the man of God had finished eating and drinking, the prophet who had brought him back saddled his own donkey for him.
24 But as he was going, a lion met him and killed him. The prophet’s corpse was lying on the road, and the donkey was standing beside it, and the lion was also standing beside the corpse.
But as he went on his way a lion came across him on the road and killed him. His body was left lying in the road, with both the donkey and the lion standing beside it.
25 Some men passed by and were surprised to see the corpse on the road and the lion standing next to the corpse. So they went into Bethel and reported what they had seen.
Some passers-by saw the body lying in the road with the lion standing beside it, so they went and let people know about it in the town where the old prophet lived.
26 When the old man who had brought the prophet from Judah to his home heard about it, he said, “That is the prophet who disobeyed what Yahweh told him to do! That is why Yahweh allowed the lion to attack him and kill him. That is what Yahweh said would happen!”
When the old prophet who had led the other astray heard what had happened, he said, “It's the man of God who disobeyed the Lord's orders. That's why the Lord put him in the path of the lion, and it has mauled him and killed him, just as the Lord told him would happen.”
27 Then he said to his sons, “Put a saddle on my donkey.” So they did that.
The prophet told his sons, “Saddle up a donkey for me.” So they saddled a donkey,
28 Then he rode on the donkey and found the prophet’s corpse on the road, and his donkey and the lion were still standing there alongside the corpse. But the lion had not eaten any of the flesh of the prophet and had not attacked the donkey.
and he went and found the body. It was still lying in the road, with the donkey and the lion standing beside it. The lion had not eaten the body or attacked the donkey.
29 The old man picked up the corpse of the prophet and put it on his donkey and brought it back to Bethel, in order to mourn for him and to bury his corpse.
The prophet picked up the body of the man of God, placed it on the donkey, and brought it back to his own town to mourn over him and bury him.
30 He buried the prophet’s corpse in the grave where other people in his family [had been buried]. Then he and his sons mourned for him, saying, “[We are very sorry], my brother!”
He laid the body in his own tomb, and they mourned over him, crying, “My poor brother!”
31 After they had buried him, the old man said to his sons, “When I die, bury my corpse in the grave where we buried the prophet from Judah. Lay my corpse next to his corpse.
After he'd buried him, he told his sons, “When I die, bury me in the grave where the man of God is buried. Lay my bones beside his bones.
32 [And do not forget what he said, because] the things that Yahweh told him to say about the altar in Bethel, and about the shrines on the hills in the towns in Samaria, will surely happen.”
For the message from the Lord that he gave in condemnation against the altar in Bethel, and against all the shrines on the high places in the towns of Samaria, will definitely happen.”
33 But King Jeroboam still did not turn away from continuing to do evil things. Instead, he appointed more priests [who were not descended from Levi]. Anyone who wanted to be a priest, he appointed to be a priest, in order that he could offer sacrifices on the hills.
But even after all this, Jeroboam did not change his evil ways. He went on choosing priests from all kinds of people. He appointed anyone who wanted to be a priest of the high places.
34 Because he committed that sin, [a few years later] God got rid of most of Jeroboam’s descendants and did not allow them to become kings of Israel.
This was because of this sin that the house of Jeroboam was wiped out, completely destroyed from the face of the earth.
