40 Minutes In The Old Testament - 1 Kings 11:34-12:11 (Episode 307)

Episode Date: March 7, 2022

Solomon chooses to try to kill Jeroboam instead of repenting. Jeroboam flees to Egypt. Solomon dies and his son is crowned king. But Rehoboam isn't his father and certainly isn't his grandfather. Chad and Daniel discuss all of this. Have a listen! HWSS Regional Conference 1517 Podcast Network 1517 YouTube Donate

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or if we've already met you, we'd like to hang out with you again. Chad, we are in 1 Kings chapter 11. We're sort of left off in the middle of a proclamation by a prophet that we have just been recently sort of introduced to. Yeah, a guy named Ahijah. We did sort of leave off in the middle of his speech to also someone relatively new to the narrative. His name is Jeroboam, but of course, if you know this story, you know that we're going to get to know Jeroboam pretty well. we're just introduced to him here. And I think I noted this in the last episode that when we're first introduced to Jeroboam, I mean, he comes across as a pretty industrious and responsible guy. He's working for Solomon. He is pinpointed as someone who has leadership skills. And so

Solomon puts him in charge of some of the work being done. But while he's away, this guy named Ahijah, this prophet that we're introduced to, comes up to him. And we're told in verse 30 that he engages in one of these prophetic symbolic acts that a lot of the prophets engage in where they'll do something like jeremiah does something ezekiel does things and isaiah does things well this ahijah does something too what he does is he takes a garment and he rips it rips it into 12 pieces and he gives 10 of those basically to jeroboam and says here you go you're going to receive 10 of the tribes of israel and i think we also talked about how the math is a little bit weird there so you've got uh 10 pieces 10 tribes going to jeroboam so you would think oh you got

two left right uh but it really only talks about one talks about the tribe of judah but it's you kind of got to just assume when he's talking about judah he's also also talking about benjamin since they're kind of one two tribes that have merged into one or they're they're located geographically beside each other so sort of when this happens is where you you start you you stop talking about the 12 tribes of israel right and you start talking about northern and southern kingdoms yeah yeah so you got israel in the north you have judah in the south so yeah you're talking about the north the south or sometimes they're called israel and judah so that's the division that is is introduced here and one's one's 10 one's two but they're kind of one and two spots yeah yeah

so i mean we it's kind of like we've we've uh regressed in in israel's history because if you're familiar with Joshua and especially judges, there, there seems to be kind of a loose confederation of the tribes in judges, but they're all kind of doing their own thing. I mean, actually we're told that, you know, everybody does what's right in his own eyes, but also every tribe does what's right in the tribe's own eyes too. So there, there is kind of this more localized, localized government, localized leadership. And it's really only under David and not the whole time David's king, but only in the later years that you have more of a cohesion of the 12 tribes. And then this really reaches its acme in Solomon. He's really the one who throughout his whole reign

has all the tribes of Israel united as Israel. So they're not really talked about as individual tribes, but the nation truly is united. In fact, Solomon even changes up the administrative districts so that it doesn't reflect the old tribal allegiances. So he's really, Solomon is really trying to take all of these tribes and make them see themselves not as just the tribe of Benjamin, the tribe of Zebulun, but instead they're all Israelites, they're all part of this unity. And that's why I said we're regressing because now we're breaking this down. And from this point onward, it will never recover. So never will you have any kind of cohesion like you do, like you did under Solomon. It's about to break into two different parts, and those two different

parts never really, at times they get along, at times they're warring with each other, but you never have another Solomon who provides that kind of unity, unless you want to jump to the new and the better Solomon, Christ, who he really is the one who is not going to provide unity for the Israelites, whatever tribe they come from, but also is going to break down that barrier between Jew and Gentile, so that you really do have, finally, the kind of peace and cohesion and unity in him, and even greater unity and cohesion, of course, than you ever had under Solomon. But for now, anyway, we're at that point in history where things are breaking down. So in Ahijah's speech to Jeroboam, he's basically talking about what he's going to do. He's going

to tear the kingdom away from Solomon. He's going to give him 10 tribes, but he's going to preserve that one tribe or the one as two tribes for the sake of David, my servant, and for the sake of Jerusalem. And then he goes on in verse 33, which is where we left off last time to talk about all of the various false gods to which Solomon has been leaning because he's been building sanctuaries for them and keeping all his wives happy. Now, picking up here with verse 34, he says nevertheless i will not take the whole kingdom out of his hand but i will make him ruler all the days of his life for the sake of david my servant whom i chose who kept my commandments and my statutes so this is all done for the sake of david and for the sake of

jerusalem and david is described as one who kept my commandments and my statutes and before we started recording we noted how strange that sounds because yeah if if you've been a long time listening to the podcast and you walked with us through first and second samuel you know how many times david did not keep god's commandments and his statutes and if you're not a long time listening to the podcast but have a you know fairly decent knowledge of the scriptures you also know that when you think of david you don't think of someone who oh man yeah that guy commandment keeper rule keeper statute keeper because uh repeatedly most infamously in the case of Bathsheba and Uriah, but repeatedly David did not do that. But that's what he's described

here. And described here, and what's wild about it is that this is being said about Solomon. And if you know who Solomon is and how he came to be, Solomon is the product of David not keeping rules and statutes and commandments. And Solomon's mom is Bathsheba. Yeah, it does, it hits a little oddly. Solomon doesn't exist apart from, well, he's not the son of the initial meeting of David and Bathsheba. He is a product of that meeting in the sense that David has Bathsheba's husband killed and then marries her, and then you end up with Solomon. So yeah, it's a wild thing, and I was telling Chad beforehand, it really does reveal that when God says that he's put away someone's sin and he's not going to remember it anymore that he really means it so he can say

of david even when he's talking about solomon what a great commandment keeper yeah which is i mean it is it is shocking at the same time it's it's uh it's comforting oh yeah you think of yeah when you think of god looking at us the same way yeah chad and dan they are commandment keepers they're rule keepers because of course when uh when god forgives he he forgets yeah so that's the way that that's the way that he views it that's the beauty of forgiveness is that uh you have a god who looks at you through the the perfect righteousness of christ and i i know that we've made this connection before but and it's not and it's something i hadn't thought about until recently, is that the one thing that David doesn't do is, of course, the most important thing

to God, which is David never went and worshipped false gods, which means that David never was in a position where he didn't have a place to take his sin. And so these things are directly connected, whereas God can refer to David as commandment keeper extraordinaire simply because he never worshiped other gods therefore he had the one true god who is a god that wants to forgive sin and iniquity so because david not perfectly keeps the first commandment but doesn't overtly go and serve other gods david's sin becomes something that is not remembered but if you do go worship other gods then you don't have that you don't you don't have any absolution and now it's just you your sins yeah that's the that's a true horror of idolatry in that you have no place to receive

forgiveness correct because false gods cannot provide absolution yeah so for for david uh because he did repent because he did believe in the one true god therefore he uh has kept the commandments and has kept the kept the statutes it all boils down to to that yeah and i think that's probably i don't i mean i don't know but that's not a point i've heard made often of that hey, the wonderful thing about not worshiping other gods is that you have somewhere to take your sin, and then you will be declared righteous. Yeah, I mean, and that really does get right to the heart of it.

And you know what fits with when God gave the Ten Words, the Ten Commandments, how does He introduce them in Exodus 20? I'm the Lord your God who did this good and gracious thing for you. I'm the one who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. So He's the God of love and liberation. And because of that, He says, don't have any other gods. yeah because none of them none of them are going to love you and liberate you because they're all

just empty they're lies so stick with me not just because not just kind of some abstract reason or because because god is just coming to something a crazy uh jealous husband who's wanting to lord it over his wife no it's because if you go from him you've lost everything yeah you have no hope so it's out of law that god says you shall have no other gods because he actually cares about us he wants us to stick with him because he knows that apart from him we have lost all hope in the world yeah he wants you to stick with him because he describes himself as one who has endless steadfast love and desires to forgive sin so why like why would you ever leave that yeah so uh that's why that's why david is described in this way so verse 35 goes on to say but i will

take the kingdom out of his son's hand he's talking here of course about solomon or excuse me about red bow and solomon's son i will take the kingdom out of out of solomon's hand and give give it solomon's son's hand and give it to you the 10 tribes yet to his son i will give one tribe that David, my servant, may always have a lamp before me in Jerusalem. That's kind of an odd phrase, but we've seen that before. This was spoken back in 2 Samuel 21, 17. It's going to be used at other times as well. And it's the idea that the king is serving as a point of illumination for the rest of the nation. And this fits with what we know about the centrality of the kings in Israel. As the king goes, so the nation goes. So the king is, as it were, not the source of the

light, but a light through which God shines to the rest of the nation. And that also means that if the light is darkened, that also is going to affect the rest of Israel. And kind of a cool thing here, by the way, when I checked out the Greek translation, the Septuagint, to see how they treated this, the Septuagint translated that word for lamp in Hebrew as luknos. Now, that is the same word that we have in Revelation 21, 23, and then Revelation 22, 5. Revelation 21, 23 says, the city, it's talking about the new Jerusalem, has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its luknos, its lamp, is the Lamb. So Revelation is using that same language to talk about another king, who here is the Lamb, who is Christ,

who is in that new Jerusalem that comes down from heaven. So this metaphor of the king as a lamp in Jerusalem in the Old Testament works its way all the way into Revelation 21 and 22 as well. And of course, this preserving of the kingdom has everything to do with the promise. So he's going to rip part of the ten of the tribes away, give them to someone else, but God has still made a promise, and he's going to keep that promise. And when you think about the light, I mean, the light is going to come out of there. Yeah, the light will come from that promise, specifically from the tribe of Judah.

So the promise which we had back in 2 Samuel 7, as we've mentioned repeatedly, that promise is a reason that God sticks with his promise here to keep that lamp in Jerusalem. And then verse 37, he says, I will take you, again, this is still Ahijah talking to Jeroboam, i will take you and you shall reign over all that your soul desires and you shall be king over israel it's a pretty remarkable statement so you're going to be you jeroboam are going to be king but even more remarkable listen to this this is verse 38 and if you will listen to all that i command you and will walk in my ways and do what is right in my eyes by keeping my statutes and my commandments as david my servant did so in other words if you will if you jeroboam will be

like David, I will be with you and will build you a sure house as I built for David, and I will give Israel to you. That's amazing. I mean, he's basically saying, listen, I did these fantastic things for David. I gave him these promises that I was going to build him a sure house, a faithful house. That sure or faithful is the same root as amen. So it's this idea of stability, of trustworthiness. I'm going to build you a trustworthy, sure, an amen house, if you will, just like I did for David. So the promise that God gives to Jeroboam is astonishing. He's basically saying, what I did for David, I'm going to do for you. All I'm saying is that keep my statutes, keep my commandments like David did. So be faithful to me. Don't be going

whoring after other gods, but remain faithful to me. And I'm going to do for you the same thing that i did that i did for david astonishing promise now i'm accenting that because we're going to see as the story of jeroboam um evolves or devolves that if he had stuck by that word then the whole history of the old testament would have been different but as we'll see he he did not but that's a promise that god gives to him it's a it's a sure promise to to jeroboam yeah it is interesting that that it always it always qualifies the keep your my commandments and my statues with as david did it's almost like god is saying if you want an example of what this looks like you just go examine david and then you'll know then you'll know what i mean when i say that and if

you go examine david and and he could easily do that well what does it mean uh it means don't worship other gods and when you sin repent that's all it means that's it yeah if you want to be like david don't go worshiping other gods and when you sin repent there you go that's what i mean and that's that is what that is the sort of person he is asking him to be that's all you have to man after god's own heart yeah it's it's not it's not extremely uh difficult you know you say oh man keep all your commandments and all your statutes well no he wants you to do it the way david did it which is don't worship other gods repent when you sin any of the kings of israel If they simply did that, we'd have lots of good kings.

Yeah, yeah. The first set of kings would be much less colorful. Yes. If that had happened, yeah, it'd be much more, actually much shorter books as well. Man, this is kind of all God is after from you as a Christian, too. He's like, hey, have me as your God, repent when you sin, that's all I'm after here.

Yeah. Basically, in other words, faith and repentance. Mm-hmm. Yeah. believe in me and listen we all know that we're going to to fail in major minor ways and when that happens we'll then repent do the whole psalm 51 thing and trust in my absolution and that's it so seems simple it's amazing that there's so few guys that are doing this yeah all right when you when you want to boil it down to to our christian life then it's i mean

it's not that complicated no it's a pretty simple straightforward theology this is what god is calling calling us to idolatry is a is a heavy temptation yeah it is it is i mean and we'll see in jeroboam's case uh just how much of a temptation it it was okay to wrap up this section which is 39 through 40 god goes on to say i will afflict the offspring of david that's what he said he would do back in second samuel 7 he said if they abandon me then i will afflict them uh he says when he commits this is second samuel 7 14 i believe when he commits an iniquity i will discipline him with the rod of men and with the stripes of the son of men so he said he would do this and he and he will do this but he says not forever so this is a temporary temporary affliction

Now, that's the end of the speech. We don't know how Solomon found out about this, but he evidently did, because we're told in the very next verse that Solomon sought, therefore, to kill Jeroboam. Not the right reaction to this. This is so not what you want to do. So if you're Solomon and you hear this,

the thing that you want to do is to start repenting. Yeah, get your sackcloth and ashes out. Maybe start tearing down some monuments to other gods. Maybe do some of that. Nope. instead he's like well god said that to him i guess i'll kill him that's that's not the right decision no which uh which just shows the extent to which the the false gods had hardened the heart of solomon that he would whether he would react in this way in this very uh non-davidic sort of way

what did david do when he was exposed to his sin by the prophet nathan well he said i have sinned against the lord so that is the that's the appropriate response not this attempt to to take out the very guy that god has just made these promises to so what does jeroboam do well he takes off he says he arose and fled into egypt to shishak king of egypt and he was in egypt until the death of solomon now that's important because as we'll see in the rest as the narrative unfolds from here jeroboam is presented as sort of a moses-like character when uh when his life is in danger, he flees. Now, when the life of Moses was in danger, he fled from Egypt and only to return to Egypt later to liberate Israel. In this case, this guy, Jeroboam, is going to flee

into Egypt. So they both went where they thought they were safe. And they're both then going to come out later in order to provide liberation for their people. So Jeroboam is going to be a a Moses-like character. Now, to skip ahead a little bit, what we will see is this Moses-like character becomes an Aaron-like character. So he was called to be Moses. He was called to be faithful to God. He was called to lead the people of Israel, to lead them out from underneath a Pharaoh-like character, which is exactly what Rehoboam is going to turn out to be. He's going to be an oppressor of Israel. In fact, he's going to be worse than Solomon. He's going to be one who hardens his heart, who rebels against the words of God. And so Jeroboam is pictured here

as a liberating Moses-like character whom God is going to use to provide liberty to his people from underneath a cruel bondage. Now, if he would have continued to be that, that would have been great. But as we'll see, instead of remaining a Moses-like character, he actually engages in activities similar to what moses brother aaron did but just want to kind of set that up set the stage for what's going to what's going to be coming next but we have to bury solomon first this is the end of chapter 11 now the rest of the acts of solomon and all that he did and his wisdom are they not written in the book of the acts of solomon which uh we don't have so i'm assuming that was probably some sort of book kept in the royal archives where they recorded everything that

that Solomon did, just like happens still today, of course, with any kind of government. But there was this book or scroll where it recorded more of the Acts of Solomon, which is probably part of the source for 1 and 2 Kings, and no doubt 1 and 2 Chronicles, too. This was just some kind of royal archive

where they kept track of everything that Solomon did, everything Solomon said. So everything else not included here, well, referred to that book, which, unfortunately, we no longer have in our possession. And then wrapping everything up, the time Solomon reigned in Jerusalem. Overall, Israel was 40 years. That's kind of your stereotypical time period for a king to reign a generation. And Solomon slept with his fathers

and was buried in the city of David, his father. And Rehoboam, this is the end of the chapter and then the segue to the next chapter, Rehoboam, his son, reigned in his place. So that's Solomon. I I mean, we spent several chapters on him because, of course, the Bible spends several chapters on him. And he's one of those complex characters. I mean, Solomon ended his life very poorly. But just think about the fact that we have multiple books in the Bible that were at least traditionally said to be authored by him. Most of Proverbs is attributed to Solomon. We've got Ecclesiastes attributed to him.

We've got the Song of Songs or Song of Solomon, whatever you want to call it. So this guy who ended terribly by loving his wives more than he loved the Lord and thus forsaking the first commandment and doing all of this terrible idolatrous stuff. Nevertheless, at the same time, he is the author of three books in the Old Testament. Yeah, that is a wild thing that you would read this and you'd be like, well, this is a guy that ultimately blew it and God was probably very disappointed in it and had him write three books of the Old Testament. That is something else.

Yeah, which is why I had not heard this until recently. More than one person on social media have commented or asked something about is, do I think that Solomon is an antichrist figure? I don't know if you've ever heard that. I have not. But two people in recent history have asked me about that. And the answer is no, I do not think that at all. And I think it would be extremely strange to have an Antichrist figure be the author of three books of the Scriptures.

I mean, I can understand, I guess, partially why someone might try to make that argument, but it falls apart on multiple levels. I think if we decide, if you have the opinion that Solomon penned Ecclesiastes, which there's some debate over, but let's say if he did, I think there was even reason to believe at the end of Solomon's life that he figured it out. It was late, and everything else had already been put into motion, but it does seem that he figured out that at the end of all things, what you really wanted to do was fear God. Yeah, yeah. I mean, we're told a lot of what happened toward the end of his life, And we're not told like what happened the very last days or even the last year. I mean, there's a lot of things that could happen in a person's life when, especially when they see that the end is fast approaching.

So he is described as someone who slept with his fathers, buried in the city of David, his father. And we have three biblical books which testify to his ongoing contribution, not just to Israel's life. But I mean, those books are central to the church's life still today. So that is that Solomon. that takes us to the end of chapter 11 chapter 12 begins the story of Solomon's successor this son named Rehoboam so what what do we find out about him well we find out a bunch right away as to what kind of king that he at least aspires to be we're told first of all kind of strange location here Rehoboam of course as the son of Solomon is living in Jerusalem David is the one

who founded jerusalem as the capital city so where would you think he would become king yeah you think a coronation would take place in jerusalem yeah i mean you think it'd take place in jerusalem i mean that's where solomon was was crowned king that's where david was for for most of the the latter years of his reign but that's not where it happens we're told that he went to the city of shechem which we've encountered multiple times uh it's about 40 miles from jerusalem 40 miles north of jerusalem shechem is if you go all the way back to genesis that's the first place that that abram stopped when they get to the promised land and uh jacob abraham's grandson he went there and he he bought a plot of ground um and then in joshua 24 they have a you

know the big covenant renewal that they did where they got everybody together and joshua said basically, don't abandon Yahweh for other gods. That took place at Shechem. So maybe for that reason, because it has this connection to covenant renewal and to the patriarchs, maybe for that reason Rehoboam thought, you know what, I'm not going to do this in Jerusalem. I'm going to go to another place that kind of has these ancient roots, and maybe I can provide some unity or get the people rallied behind me there. We're not told. I mean, just kind of guessing as to why it was Shechem and not Jerusalem, but that's where they go. All Israel had come to Shechem to make him king. Now, when Jeroboam heard about this somehow, remember he's in Egypt. So as soon as

Jeroboam, the son of Dabot, heard of it, being still in Egypt where he had fled from King Solomon, then Jeroboam comes back. So here we have kind of this idea of a Moses figure. He's coming back to his homeland, just like Moses went back to Egypt. They sent and called him, and Jeroboam and all the assembly of Israel came and said to Rehoboam. So I'm assuming that Jeroboam is kind of the spokesman of this entire group. They're going to come to Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, and they're going to make a request, which is not, first of all, it's not unusual, not an unusual request, and not a request that was an illegitimate request. What they say is this, your father, referring to Solomon, of course, your father made our yoke heavy, literally Hebrew

hard, but it's the idea of, you know, it's, it's uncomfortable. It's too much. It's hard or it's heavy. So your father made our yoke hard or heavy. So therefore lighten the hard service of your father and his heavy yoke on us and we will serve you. So that's a request. His response, let me think about it, basically. He says, go away for three days and then come again to me so the people go away. First of all, this isn't unusual. There's plenty of other instances in ancient Near Eastern history where you have a new king coming into power and the people basically ask, hey, all these taxes that your predecessor had and all this manual labor and basically all these these rough things that he did to us would you lighten that you know this is this is not

terribly unusual even today you know you have a new leader in office or what's a new leader wanting to do he's wanting to make sure that his constituents are happy yeah so you know maybe he'll he'll change this program or he'll take away these taxes or whatever it is he's basically you know he's a new guy or a new gal and what are they trying to do they're trying to make you know curry some favor and you know make sure everybody's everybody's happy well that's basically what the people are saying, listen, you know, Solomon, he might've been a wise guy, but he also made our life kind of rough. He raised taxes. He made us work on, you know, this building project and that building project. Cause Solomon was building, building buildings. You don't build, build,

build unless you have a lot of money coming in and a lot of people to do the labor. And so the people are saying, listen, you know, things are kind of rough. This yoke that your dad put on us, it's hard it's heavy so if you will lighten that a bit we'll serve you this shine of leaders wears off so quickly uh so you know as you're reading the story of Solomon you're like lots of peace every everything is made of gold everywhere silver doesn't matter at all everything's prosperous seems great and we talked about that like man this guy's approval rating is probably really high people coming from all over the earth uh to come witness this but now that he's gone people are like okay like those taxes were kind of high and we're getting kind of tired of building things

and you start thinking about the things you want changed and uh and so that's that's how that goes right uh like what what are you going to do differently to make my life easier you can imagine a situation where solomon puts forth some kind of crazy building plan and then he says to people like i'm gonna raise taxes but this is what we're gonna get and we still do this today like here's all the things we're gonna get and here's how we're gonna pay for them and maybe initially everyone's on board uh but now the stuff is built and they've been doing this for a while now they're like okay the buildings are built we're kind of tired of building buildings and we're definitely tired of having these taxes so we're gonna want that changed this is completely

understandable yeah yeah it's like the toll roads that the government will build be like as soon as it's paid for, we'll make it free. And like 50 years later, you're still paying tolls on it. Correct. So yeah, that's, that's the way this works. Uh, so nothing, nothing new under the sun to, to quote Solomon. And, you know, I, when I was reading through this, I, uh, uh, I wondered if maybe this, this was in the back of Jesus' mind when he uses that same similar, same kind of language, right? Yeah. Come unto me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest and take my yoke upon you uh for it's easy you know so i'm not going to be in other words like solomon i am a new and a better solomon but my yoke is is not going to be like that by the

way this is metaphor for yoke it's pretty common in the old testament so it wasn't something original that jesus is is coming up with the idea of you know like dock your oxen have a yoke and it's on their necks and the other when it's on their necks i know they got to work hard so that became a common metaphor that was used in other parts of the old testament as well so jesus was drawing on that and he's basically if he if he did have this in mind he's saying hey i'm not that kind of king right my yoke is easy my burden is is is light yeah you almost have this you don't even have to ask me for it that's what i'm giving to you yeah you almost have this idea that jesus is saying hey you know that when they asked the grandson of david well he didn't

do that. We're going to find out he doesn't do that. But the great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandson of David, he is going to do that. Yeah, yeah, precisely. So he says, well, let me think about it, right? Give me three days, and then I'll answer your question. So what does he do? Verse 6 says that he talked to two different groups of people, basically he first of all took counsel with the older more experienced guys so he took counsel with the the translated here the old men who had stood before solomon his father while he was yet alive and he asked them these these you know a little more experienced veterans of policy and whatnot what do you uh what do you think i should do well here's what they said they said and this

this is good advice he says if you will be a servant to this people today and serve them and speak good words to them when you answer them then they will be your servants forever yeah pretty good advice right i mean so just like jesus came not to be served but to serve give his life as their answer for many modeling that that uh the gift of others gift to others of yourself so be a servant so if if that's kind of if you only want to be a leader of the people well then be their servant if you'll serve them and then speak good words to them then they will be your servants wise words verse eight says that he abandoned that council that the old men gave him and instead he took counsel with the young men this is kind of a uh this i think basically

this is throwing shade on the young men because i think so i think it's just throwing shade on youth in general they're saying like hey if you got a big decision and you ask you got a big decision you ask a bunch of seasoned guys what they would do and then you ask a bunch of young guys what they would do go with the seasoned guys advice yeah well even the hebrew that's used here and so uh i mean there's there's various words that could have been chosen but the hebrew word is chosen as yellowed now yellowed is is typically used not of young men but of kids i mean even babies can be called yellowed so i was trying to think of how we might translate be like he took counsel with the kids the boys the immature huh yeah the immature and uh those who had grown up

with him so he's a guy you know they grew up with red bull and you know they're just a bunch of guys that grew up together they know each other they've been you know doing all their the stuff the guys do when they're growing up they're pumped for their bro to be king yeah they're all excited probably probably thinking man this is great because he's going to give us some you know positions and leadership and whatnot so what do they do well they just stroke his ego more or less so they advise him uh he said well he says what you know what should i say what do you advise me to answer this people who have said to me lighten the yoke that your father's put upon us and these guys oh they say here's what you should say to the people your father made our yoke heavy

but you lighten us thus you shall say to them well i'll just i'll read what the sv has my little finger is thicker than my father's thighs so in hebrew uh it it's not little finger i mean that is a common way this translate literally it's my little one and when it's talking about thighs the loin areas i'm not going to spell this out for you i think you get the the metaphor that's being used here here's what here's what you should say to those yeah here's what you need to tell those guys listen my little one well it's thicker than my dad's thighs so that that's what i've got and goes on my father laid on you a heavy yoke i'm going to add to your yoke my father disciplined you with whips but i'm going to discipline you

with scorpions you could this is terrible you can just oh yeah it's terrible advice i mean this is always always terrible political advice but it's certainly terrible advice in this situation more or less this is just youthful immature bravado saying listen you just do what i say because i'm bigger and i'm badder and i'm better than my dad ever was you just don't know who you're messing with here and if you think life was hard under him well unless you get behind me i'm gonna make life three times as hard harder for you than what my dad did yeah that basically the old men are like are proposing a sort of a type of servant leadership the young guys are appointing a very authoritarian form of leadership yeah yeah that's exactly so uh uh we're we're out of time

but you can probably guess how this is gonna go we'll see we'll see what he does i think we probably let let the scorpion out of the bag how this is gonna go but uh i guess we'll see how the people respond to what you can inevitably you can imagine is uh inevitably the decision that Ray Boehm's going to make. Yeah. We'll pick it up there next time. We'll give Ray Boehm three days

to think about it. Weigh the two different options, the old experience guys and the boys, what they say he should do. And three days later, we'll come back and we'll tell you what he chose to do. All right. Well, we will be back

next week, and we will examine that. Chad, I'll see you then. All right. See you then. We'll see you next time.