2 Chronicles 9 · a question people ask
Why doesn't 2 Chronicles tell of Solomon's heart turning away?
2 Chronicles goes from Solomon's horses (9:28) straight to the records of his acts (9:29), his forty years (9:30) and his burial (9:31). 1 Kings, between the same horses (1 Kings 10:28-29) and the same death (1 Kings 11:41-43), tells what 2 Chronicles doesn't: "When Solomon was old, his wives turned away his heart after other gods" (1 Kings 11:4), "The LORD was angry with Solomon" (1 Kings 11:9), and when Jeroboam went out of Jerusalem, "the prophet Ahijah the Shilonite found him on the way" (1 Kings 11:29), and "Ahijah took the new garment that was on him, and tore it in twelve pieces" (1 Kings 11:30). 2 Chronicles names Ahijah among the records of Solomon's acts (9:29), and in the next chapter it speaks of the LORD's "word, which he spoke by Ahijah the Shilonite to Jeroboam the son of Nebat" (10:15), and says Jeroboam "had fled from the presence of King Solomon" (10:2). Nehemiah speaks of Solomon's sin as well: "Nevertheless foreign women caused even him to sin" (Nehemiah 13:26). 2 Chronicles doesn't say why it leaves out what 1 Kings 11 tells, and these notes don't guess.
The verses
“They brought horses for Solomon out of Egypt and out of all lands. Now the rest of the acts of Solomon, first and last, aren’t they written in the history of Nathan the prophet, and in the prophecy of Ahijah the Shilonite, and in the visions of Iddo the seer concerning Jeroboam the son of Nebat? Solomon reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel forty years. Solomon slept with his fathers, and he was buried in his father David’s city; and Rehoboam his son reigned in his place.”
“The horses which Solomon had were brought out of Egypt. The king’s merchants received them in droves, each drove at a price. A chariot was imported from Egypt for six hundred shekels of silver, and a horse for one hundred fifty shekels; and so they exported them to all the kings of the Hittites and to the kings of Syria.”
“When Solomon was old, his wives turned away his heart after other gods; and his heart was not perfect with the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father was.”
“The LORD was angry with Solomon, because his heart was turned away from the LORD, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice,”