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31 He also built temples on the high places and made priests from among the common people who were not Levites.

Divine Disapproval.[a] 32 Jeroboam established a feast in the eighth month on the fifteenth day of the month like the pilgrimage feast in Judah, and he went up to the altar. He did this in Bethel, sacrificing to the calves he had made. He stationed in Bethel the priests of the high places he had built. 33 Jeroboam went up to the altar he built in Bethel on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, the month he arbitrarily chose. He established a feast for the Israelites, and he went up to the altar to burn incense.

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Footnotes

  1. 12:32–13:10 This unit of the Jeroboam story corresponds to 12:21–25. Before Jeroboam’s cultic innovations, a man of God from Judah proclaimed the Lord’s approval of the political separation of the kingdoms. After Jeroboam’s cultic innovations, a man of God from Judah proclaims the Lord’s disapproval of Israel’s religious separatism. The unit begins with a long, detailed introduction about the dedication festival Jeroboam holds at Bethel (12:32–33); then follows the scene of the ceremony disrupted by the oracle of the man of God (13:1–10).

31 Jeroboam built shrines(A) on high places and appointed priests(B) from all sorts of people, even though they were not Levites. 32 He instituted a festival on the fifteenth day of the eighth(C) month, like the festival held in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar. This he did in Bethel,(D) sacrificing to the calves he had made. And at Bethel he also installed priests at the high places he had made. 33 On the fifteenth day of the eighth month, a month of his own choosing, he offered sacrifices on the altar he had built at Bethel.(E) So he instituted the festival for the Israelites and went up to the altar to make offerings.

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