However, I will not tear the whole kingdom away from you. I will give your son one tribe for my servant David’s sake and for the sake of Jerusalem, ⌞the city⌟ that I chose.”
When all Israel heard that Jeroboam had returned, they sent men to invite him to the assembly. They made him king of all Israel. Only the tribe of Judah remained loyal to David’s dynasty.
“They may sin against you. (No one is sinless.) You may become angry with them and hand them over to an enemy who takes them to ⌞another⌟ country as captives, ⌞whether it is⌟ far or near.
But the Lord was kind and merciful to the Israelites because of his promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He didn’t want to destroy the Israelites, and even now he hasn’t turned away from them.
In Hoshea’s ninth year as king of Israel, the king of Assyria captured Samaria and took the Israelites to Assyria as captives. He settled them in Halah, along the Habor River in Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes.
The Lord had said, “I will put Judah out of my sight as I put Israel out of my sight. I will reject Jerusalem, the city that I chose, and I will reject the temple where I said my name would be.”
Without a doubt, this happened to Judah because the Lord had commanded it to happen. He wanted to remove the people of Judah from his sight because of Manasseh’s sins—everything he had done,
Then the Lord said to me, “Even if Moses and Samuel were standing in front of me, I would not feel sorry for these people. Send them away from me, and let them go.
then you should know that the Lord your God will never again force these people out of your way. Instead, they will be a snare and a trap for you, a whip laid to your sides, and thorns in your eyes until none of you are left in this good land that the Lord your God has given you.
“Every good word the Lord your God has promised you has come true for you. In the same way the Lord will bring about every evil curse until he has destroyed you from this good land that he has given you.
The people of Dan set up the carved idol for themselves. Jonathan (son of Gershom and grandson of Moses) and his descendants were priests for Dan’s tribe until the people living in that land were taken captive.