²⁸ After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves.^(A) He said to the people, “It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.”^{(B) 29} One he set up in Bethel,^(C) and the other in Dan.^{(D) 30} And this thing became a sin;^(E) the people came to worship the one at Bethel and went as far as Dan to worship the other.^[a]

³¹ Jeroboam built shrines^(F) on high places and appointed priests^(G) from all sorts of people, even though they were not Levites. ³² He instituted a festival on the fifteenth day of the eighth^(H) month, like the festival held in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar. This he did in Bethel,^(I) 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.^(J) So he instituted the festival for the Israelites and went up to the altar to make offerings.

²¹ When he tore^(A) Israel away from the house of David, they made Jeroboam son of Nebat their king.^(B) Jeroboam enticed Israel away from following the Lord and caused them to commit a great sin.^{(C) 22} The Israelites persisted in all the sins of Jeroboam and did not turn away from them ²³ until the Lord removed them from his presence,^(D) as he had warned^(E) through all his servants the prophets. So the people of Israel were taken from their homeland^(F) into exile in Assyria, and they are still there.