Saturday of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

The four books of Samuel and Kings describe the rise and fall of the Hebrew kings. We often think of Saul as the first king but it was David who pulled the disparate tribes together into one country, captured the Canaanite city, renamed it Jerusalem, and established it as the new capital of his united kingdom. Like Washington DC on the Potomac which resides in no state, Jerusalem belonged to no ancient Hebrew tribe. It was David’s city.

After David's death, his son Solomon finished building the temple and consecrated it by installing the Ark of the Covenant there. Thus he completed David’s vision and transformed Jerusalem into “the holy city," the capital of a nation which was unified by one religion. 

Solomon, however, was not as popular or effective as David. His taxes were harsh, and his rule, divisive. When he died the kingdom split into two nations. The larger Israel was the northern part; Judah was smaller but retained impregnable Jerusalem and its Temple.

In today’s story we hear how Jeroboam, king of Israel, tried to maintain his kingdom’s autonomy by erecting shrines to the Hebrew God, using the ancient symbols of golden calves. Before the temple was built and the Ark of the Covenant moved from Shiloh, there had been Hebrew altars and sacred pillars on many northern hilltops. But the prophets, supporting David’s unification, vilified those ancient sites of worship. When Solomon’s kingdom divided, the prophets would not support Israel’s independence, and they condemned Jeroboam’s reestablishment of the ancient shrines. Eventually Israel and its ten tribes would collapse.  Mormons believe the lost tribes emigrated to America.  

People who say religious leaders should have nothing to say about politics cannot build their arguments on the Bible. Kings, prophets and priests are continually mixing it up in Jewish history. Life is never so simple that the mysteries of religion, politics, science, education, sexuality, entertainment, economics and so forth can be divided and subdivided into tightly sealed compartments. Montague's Romeos too often scale the walls to see their Capulet Juliets, and it’s not always to make war.

Perhaps Robert Frost said it best with his dueling aphorisms in his poem, Mending Wall: “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall!” and “Good fences make good neighbors.” Both men are right but they will never agree.