Who ruled Israel after Solomon?

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Accepted Answer

Two kings at once. Solomon's son Rehoboam kept Judah and Benjamin and the throne in Jerusalem, and Jeroboam the son of Nebat, a former officer of Solomon who had fled to Egypt, was made king by the ten northern tribes at Shechem, where the map point stands, about 49 km north of Jerusalem in a straight line. The usual date is 931 BC, on Thiele's chronology; 930, 928 and 922 are also held. Thereafter there were two kingdoms: Israel in the north, until Assyria took Samaria in 722 BC, and Judah in the south, until Babylon destroyed Jerusalem in 586. The split had been foretold. For Solomon's idolatry the Lord said, “I will surely rend the kingdom from thee, and will give it to thy servant”, keeping one tribe for David's sake; the prophet Ahijah of Shiloh tore a new garment into twelve pieces and gave Jeroboam ten. Solomon tried to kill him, and he fled to Shishak of Egypt. When Rehoboam came to Shechem to be made king, the people asked him to lighten “the grievous service of thy father”; he answered on the advice of the young men, “my father also chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with scorpions”, and Israel cried, “What portion have we in David?… to your tents, O Israel: now see to thine own house, David.” Rehoboam gathered 180,000 men to win them back, but the prophet Shemaiah stopped him: “this thing is from me.” Jeroboam fortified Shechem and Penuel and set golden calves at Bethel and Dan so that his people need not go up to Jerusalem; “there was war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all their days”, and in Rehoboam's fifth year Shishak came up against Jerusalem and took the Temple treasures, a campaign his relief at Karnak records. Judah had twenty rulers, all of David's line but Athaliah, until Zedekiah was blinded and carried to Babylon. Israel had nineteen kings of nine houses: Jeroboam's son was murdered by Baasha, who ruled from Tirzah; Omri bought the hill of Samaria about 880 BC and built the capital that stood until the end, and his house is named on the Mesha Stele and in Assyrian records; Jehu's line lasted a century; Hoshea was the last. “For he rent Israel from the house of David”, Kings sums up, “and they made Jeroboam the son of Nebat king”. Outside the Bible, the Tel Dan stele found in 1993 names “the house of David” in the words of a ninth-century Aramean king. The chronology rests on Thiele's reconciling of the two kingdoms' regnal years, with co-regencies and two calendars; others, such as Galil, shift some reigns by a year or more.