Ahijah the Shilonite אחיה השילוני
tore a new garment into twelve pieces and gave ten of them to Jeroboam
He met Jeroboam son of Nebat on the road as he came out of Jerusalem — the two of them alone in the open field. Ahijah took off the new garment he was wearing, tore it into twelve pieces and said: take ten for yourself. So the division of the kingdom was announced — not in words but in a gesture that cannot be asked to repeat itself.
The second appearance comes years later and in reverse. Jeroboam's son fell ill. The king sent his wife in disguise to Ahijah, by then blind with age, with ten loaves and a jar of honey: let him say what will become of the child without knowing who is asking. Ahijah heard her steps at the door and called her by name: "come in, wife of Jeroboam; why do you pretend to be another?" Then he delivered the sentence on the house: the line will be cut off to the last, and the child will die the moment she crosses the threshold of the city — and he alone of the whole house will be mourned and buried, because in him alone something good was found.
That sentence was carried out under Baasha, and the book of Kings refers to it explicitly as "the word of the LORD spoken through His servant Ahijah of Shiloh."
On the timeline
Sources
Tanakh
- Melachim I 11:29–31 — the new garment torn into twelve pieces; ten given to Yarovam
- Melachim I 14:1–18 — the blind prophet knows Yarovam's disguised wife and sentences the house
- Melachim I 15:29 — the sentence carried out under Baasha
Basis: stated in the Tanakh.