Rehoboam became king at forty-one and could have held Israel together had he been what God wanted, but pride kept him from maturity. When the people, led by the returned exile Jeroboam, asked him to lighten Solomon's heavy yoke, he rejected the elders' counsel to serve the people and followed the advice of the friends he grew up with, promising to add to the yoke. This turn of affairs was from the Lord, and the kingdom split into Israel and Judah, with war between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all their days. Rehoboam is remembered as a bad king. He could have been good and had flashes of humility, but he followed idolatry, and under him Judah did evil, building high places, sacred pillars, and wooden images and tolerating cult prostitutes, more than their fathers had. Priests and Levites driven out by Jeroboam fled to Judah, and for three years the kingdom was strong because it walked in the way of David and Solomon. Then, once established, Rehoboam forsook the law of the Lord, and all Judah with him. God sent Egypt against Judah, and when the king and leaders humbled themselves, God relented. Rehoboam's pride and the influence of his eighteen wives and sixty concubines, especially his favorite, Maachah, repeatedly diverted him. He chose her son Abijah as his successor, and Abijah saw firsthand the consequences of his father's choices, yet did not learn from them.

Because of Solomon's sins, especially idolatry, God took the nation of Israel, the ten northern tribes, from Solomon's son Rehoboam and gave it to a servant, Jeroboam (I Kings 11:31-37). The ten tribes kept the ancient title of Israel, while the one tribe of Judah, with additions from Benjamin and Levi, remained under Rehoboam and was called Judah or the House of Judah. Rehoboam therefore ruled the new and much smaller Kingdom of Judah, not the Kingdom of Israel. In this way God kept His promise to David. He did not abolish the scepter promises given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but left a son of the promise sitting on the throne over only one tribe, while at the same time punishing Solomon by taking the nation of Israel away. Under Rehoboam the birthright and scepter promises were divided between two nations for the first time. Israel, headed by Ephraim and Manasseh, held the birthright, and Judah held the scepter, in keeping with Jacob's prophecy in Genesis 49:10. The two nations then remained separate, in adjoining territories, each with its own kings.

Rehoboam succeeded Solomon around 975 BC, and his reign was the time of God's chastening. Because Solomon had turned to pagan worship through his foreign wives, God had promised to tear most of the kingdom from his son's hand, yet to leave one tribe for the sake of David, so that David would always have a lamp in Jerusalem and the scepter would not depart from Judah (Genesis 49:10). God's promise to David allowed for chastening any son who sinned (II Samuel 7:14). Solomon's grandiose building projects had made taxation and forced labor a heavy burden, fulfilling Samuel's warning about the cost of a monarchy. Before Rehoboam's coronation, Jeroboam challenged him to lighten the yoke Solomon had laid on the people. After consulting his advisors, Rehoboam answered that he would add to their yoke. He evidently inherited none of his father's wisdom. The northern tribes rebelled against the house of David, crying, "To your tents, O Israel!" Rehoboam was left with the much smaller Kingdom of Judah, made up of three tribes. Judah was his own tribe. Benjamin voluntarily allied with him. Levi came south after Jeroboam expelled the Levites from their priestly positions, and they attached themselves to the Temple service in Jerusalem, which remained his capital. Jeroboam ruled the ten remaining tribes as the Kingdom of Israel. Thus a descendant of Judah will always rule, but only over part of Israel.