What was God's purpose in dividing the nation of Israel?

Answer 1

The Scripture indicates that God never wanted the Kingdom of Israel to be split in two - He is not a divider of men. But due to the long apostasy of King Solomon, God divided the Kingdom in two as follows:

1 Kings 11:31-33New International Version (NIV)

31 Then he said to Jeroboam, "Take ten pieces for yourself, for this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: 'See, I am going to tear the kingdom out of Solomon's hand and give you ten tribes. 32 But for the sake of my servant David and the city of Jerusalem, which I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, he will have one tribe. 33 I will do this because they have forsaken me and worshiped Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, Chemosh the god of the Moabites, and Molek the god of the Ammonites, and have not walked in obedience to me, nor done what is right in my eyes, nor kept my decrees and laws as David, Solomon's father, did.

Even in this disarray, God's Plan for Mankind continued. Judah, which was David's tribe and the holder of the Scepter Promise of a future savior - manifested in Jesus Christ a descendant of David - would transpire as planned.

Eventually, many of the tribes of Benjamin with some of Levi and finally Simeon, became the nucleus of the nation of the Southern Kingdom of Judah. These are the descendants living today in the Modern Nation-State of Israel (perhaps better called Judah).

Answer 2

It was a punishment against Solomon. Rehoboam's father, King Solomon, had levied relatively heavy taxes, which had been used for such large-scale endeavors as building the First Temple. After Solomon's death, the people approached his son Rehav'am (Rehoboam) and asked that he lower the taxes. He ignored the counsel of his elder advisers and refused the people's request. This led the Ten Tribes to turn away from him (1 Kings ch.12).The background reason was because King Solomon had been less than perfectly righteous. This led God to punish him by diminishing his dynasty in the lifetime of his son (Rehoboam). 1 Kings ch.11.

A deeper reason is that God wanted the more righteous people of Judah to be influenced by the Ten Tribes as little as possible.

See also:

Solomon's errors

Jewish history timeline

Answer 3

According to The Bible, the people of Israel rebelled against the rule of Rehoboam because of the swingeing taxes Rehoboam had inherited from his father Solomon, and because of his arrogant disregard for thei plight. On this view, it was the people themselves who created the northern kingdom of Israel, separating it from Judah in the south.

On the other hand, Israel Finkelstein and many other achaeologists and scholars say that there is no evidence the two nations were ever united, and that they had different cultures and always spoke their own dialects of the Hebrew language. On this view, there was no dividing of the nations, as they were always separate.

Answer 4

Israel was God's Temporal Kingdom. However, the people desired to be like other peoples in the area and asked for a human King to rule over them. God warned them of what would happen in 1 Samuel 8:10-18, but in the end, gave the people what they wanted.

There was a major apostasy during the reign of Israel's 3rd King Solomon which led God to tell Jeroboam in 1 Kings 11:31-33 that He would give him 10 tribes and these would split from the Kingdom, maintain the name Israel and becoming known as the Northern Kingdom (circa 930 AD).

When Rehoboam became king being the son of Solomon, he wanted to keep Solomon's affluent Kingdom intact. The people requested Rehoboam relax the heavy tax burden, but against his advisors, Rehoboam laid even a heavier burden (see 1 Kings 12:11) on them which caused the 10 tribes to leave under Jehoboam as earlier told.

Both Kingdoms continued to spiral downward in following God's laws. God sent prophets like Elijah and Amos etc. to warn them to come back to Him or suffer the consequences. The Northern Kingdom did not and in 722-721 BC was conquered and relocated by the Assyrians. They became known as the 'lost Ten Tribes' as they would never return to the land en masse. This history has been recorded by the last of the Assyrian Kings Ashurbanipal (circa 669-627 BC) in his vast library on cuneiform tablets (bas-relief). In particular the Northern Kingdom line from King Omri was so well known that the land of Israel was called the 'land of Omri.'

"The reputation of Omri won by his achievements, says The Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible, is evidenced by the fact that for over a century after his death, Samaria was called in the Assyrian records 'House of Omri' and the land of Israel the 'land of Omri' "(Abingdon Press, Nashville, 1962, p. 601).