"Give me, O Lord, a
sound mind, and a good understanding, whereby I may speak and judge the people
according to truth and righteousness."
With these petitions God was
well pleased; and promised to give him all those things that he had not
mentioned in his option, riches, glory, victory over his enemies; and, in the
first place, understanding and wisdom, and this in such a degree as no other
mortal man, neither kings nor ordinary persons, ever had. He also promised to
preserve the kingdom to his posterity for a very long time, if he continued
righteous and obedient to him, and imitated his father in those things wherein
he excelled. When Solomon heard this from God, he presently leaped out of his
bed; and when he had worshipped him, he returned to Jerusalem; and after he had
offered great sacrifices before the tabernacle, he feasted all his own family.
2. In these days a hard cause came before him in
judgment, which it was very difficult to find any end of; and I think it
necessary to explain the fact about which the contest was, that such as light
upon my writings may know what a difficult cause Solomon was to determine, and
those that are concerned in such matters may take this sagacity of the king for
a pattern, that they may the more easily give sentence about such questions.
There were two women, who were harlots in the course of their lives, that came
to him; of whom she that seemed to be injured began to speak first, and said,
"O king, I and this
other woman dwell together in one room. Now it came to pass that we both bore a
son at the same hour of the same day; and on the third day this woman overlaid
her son, and killed it, and then took my son out of my bosom, and removed him
to herself, and as I was asleep she laid her dead son in my arms. Now, when in
the morning I was desirous to give the breast to the child, I did not find my
own, but saw the woman's dead child lying by me; for I considered it exactly,
and found it so to be. Hence it was that I demanded my son, and when I could
not obtain him, I have recourse, my lord, to thy assistance; for since we were
alone, and there was nobody there that could convict her, she cares for
nothing, but perseveres in the stout denial of the fact."
When this woman had told this
her story, the king asked the other woman what she had to say in contradiction
to that story. But when she denied that she had done what was charged upon her,
and said that it was her child that was living, and that it was her
antagonist's child that was dead, and when no one could devise what judgment
could be given, and the whole court were blind in their understanding, and
could not tell how to find out this riddle, the king alone invented the
following way how to discover it. He bade them bring in both the dead child and
the living child; and sent one of his guards, and commanded him to fetch a
sword, and draw it, and to cut both the children into two pieces, that each of
the women might have half the living and half the dead child.
Hereupon all the people
privately laughed at the king, as no more than a youth. But, in the mean time,
she that was the real mother of the living child cried out that he should not
do so, but deliver that child to the other woman as her own, for she would be
satisfied with the life of the child, and with the sight of it, although it
were esteemed the other's child; but the other woman was ready to see the child
divided, and was desirous, moreover, that the first woman should be tormented.
When the king understood that both their words proceeded from the truth of
their passions, he adjudged the child to her that cried out to save it, for
that she was the real mother of it; and he condemned the other as a wicked
woman, who had not only killed her own child, but was endeavoring to see her
friend's child destroyed also. Now the multitude looked on this determination
as a great sign and demonstration of the king's sagacity and wisdom, and after
that day attended to him as to one that had a divine mind.
3. Now the captains of
his armies, and officers appointed over the whole country, were these: over the
lot of Ephraim was Ures; over the toparchy of Bethlehem was Dioclerus;
Abinadab, who married Solomon's daughter, had the region of Dora and the
sea-coast under him; the Great Plain was under Benaiah, the son of Achilus; he
also governed all the country as far as Jordan; Gabaris ruled over Gilead and
Gaulanitis, and had under him the sixty great and fenced cities [of Og];
Achinadab managed the affairs of all Galilee as far as Sidon, and had himself
also married a daughter of Solomon's, whose name was Basima; Banacates had the
seacoast about Arce; as had Shaphat Mount Tabor, and Carmel, and [the Lower]
Galilee, as far as the river Jordan; one man was appointed over all this
country; Shimei was intrusted with the lot of Benjamin; and Gabares had the
country beyond Jordan, over whom there was again one governor appointed. Now
the people of the Hebrews, and particularly the tribe of Judah, received a
wonderful increase when they betook themselves to husbandry, and the
cultivation of their grounds; for as they enjoyed peace, and were not
distracted with wars and troubles, and having, besides, an abundant fruition of
the most desirable liberty, every one was busy in augmenting the product of
their own lands, and making them worth more than they had formerly been.
4. The king had also
other rulers, who were over the land of Syria and of the Philistines, which
reached from the river Euphrates to Egypt, and these collected his tributes of
the nations. Now these contributed to the king's table, and to his supper every
day (3) thirty cori of fine flour, and
sixty of meal; as also ten fat oxen, and twenty oxen out of the pastures, and a
hundred fat lambs; all these were besides what were taken by hunting harts and
buffaloes, and birds and fishes, which were brought to the king by foreigners
day by day. Solomon had also so great a number of chariots, that the stalls of
his horses for those chariots were forty thousand; and besides these he had
twelve thousand horsemen, the one half of which waited upon the king in
Jerusalem, and the rest were dispersed abroad, and dwelt in the royal villages;
but the same officer who provided for the king's expenses supplied also the
fodder for the horses, and still carried it to the place where the king abode
at that time.
5. Now the sagacity and
wisdom which God had bestowed on Solomon was so great, that he exceeded the
ancients; insomuch that he was no way inferior to the Egyptians, who are said
to have been beyond all men in understanding; nay, indeed, it is evident that
their sagacity was very much inferior to that of the king's. He also excelled
and distinguished himself in wisdom above those who were most eminent among the
Hebrews at that time for shrewdness; those I mean were Ethan, and Heman, and
Chalcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol. He also composed books of odes and songs
a thousand and five, of parables and similitudes three thousand; for he spake a
parable upon every sort of tree, from the hyssop to the cedar; and in like
manner also about beasts, about all sorts of living creatures, whether upon the
earth, or in the seas, or in the air; for he was not unacquainted with any of
their natures, nor omitted inquiries about them, but described them all like a
philosopher, and demonstrated his exquisite knowledge of their several
properties.
God also enabled him to learn
that skill which expels demons, (4)
which is a science useful and sanative to men. He composed such incantations
also by which distempers are alleviated. And he left behind him the manner of
using exorcisms, by which they drive away demons, so that they never return;
and this method of cure is of great force unto this day; for I have seen a
certain man of my own country, whose name was Eleazar, releasing people that
were demoniacal in the presence of Vespasian, and his sons, and his captains,
and the whole multitude of his soldiers. The manner of the cure was this: He
put a ring that had a Foot of one of those sorts mentioned by Solomon to the
nostrils of the demoniac, after which he drew out the demon through his
nostrils; and when the man fell down immediately, he abjured him to return into
him no more, making still mention of Solomon, and reciting the incantations
which he composed.
And when Eleazar would
persuade and demonstrate to the spectators that he had such a power, he set a
little way off a cup or basin full of water, and commanded the demon, as he
went out of the man, to overturn it, and thereby to let the spectators know
that he had left the man; and when this was done, the skill and wisdom of
Solomon was shown very manifestly: for which reason it is, that all men may
know the vastness of Solomon's abilities, and how he was beloved of God, and
that the extraordinary virtues of every kind with which this king was endowed
may not be unknown to any people under the sun for this reason, I say, it is
that we have proceeded to speak so largely of these matters.
6. Moreover Hiram, king
of Tyre, when he had heard that Solonion succeeded to his father's kingdom, was
very glad of it, for he was a friend of David's. So he sent ambassadors to him,
and saluted him, and congratulated him on the present happy state of his
affairs. Upon which Solomon sent him an epistle, the contents of which here
follow:
SOLOMON TO KING HIRAM.
"(5)Know thou that my father would have built a temple to God,
but was hindered by wars, and continual expeditions; for he did not leave off
to overthrow his enemies till he made them all subject to tribute. But I give
thanks to God for the peace I at present enjoy, and on that account I am at
leisure, and design to build a house to God, for God foretold to my father that
such a house should he built by me; wherefore I desire thee to send some of thy
subjects with mine to Mount Lebanon to cut down timber, for the Sidonians are
more skillful than our people in cutting of wood. As for wages to the hewers of
wood, I will pay whatsoever price thou shalt determine."
7. When Hiram had read
this epistle, he was pleased with it; and wrote back this answer to Solomon.
HIRAM TO KING SOLOMON.
"It is fit to bless God that
he hath committed thy father's government to thee, who art a wise man, and
endowed with all virtues. As for myself, I rejoice at the condition thou art
in, and will be subservient to thee in all that thou sendest to me about; for
when by my subjects I have cut down many and large trees of cedar and cypress
wood, I will send them to sea, and will order my subjects to make floats of
them, and to sail to what place soever of thy country thou shalt desire, and
leave them there, after which thy subjects may carry them to Jerusalem. But do
thou take care to procure us corn for this timber, which we stand in need of,
because we inhabit in an island." (6)
8. The copies of these
epistles remain at this day, and are preserved not only in our books, but among
the Tyrians also; insomuch that if any one would know the certainty about them,
he may desire of the keepers of the public records of Tyre to show him them,
and he will find what is there set down to agree with what we have said. I have
said so much out of a desire that my readers may know that we speak nothing but
the truth, and do not compose a history out of some plausible relations, which
deceive men and please them at the same time, nor attempt to avoid examination,
nor desire men to believe us immediately; nor are we at liberty to depart from
speaking truth, which is the proper commendation of an historian, and yet be
blameless: but we insist upon no admission of what we say, unless we be able to
manifest its truth by demonstration, and the strongest vouchers.
9. Now king Solomon, as
soon as this epistle of the king of Tyre was brought him, commended the
readiness and good-will he declared therein, and repaid him in what he desired,
and sent him yearly twenty thousand cori of wheat, and as many baths of oil:
now the bath is able to contain seventy-two sextaries. He also sent him the
same measure of wine. So the friendship between Hiram and Solomon hereby
increased more and more; and they swore to continue it for ever. And the king
appointed a tribute to be laid on all the people, of thirty thousand laborers,
whose work he rendered easy to them by prudently dividing it among them; for he
made ten thousand cut timber in Mount Lebanon for one month; and then to come
home, and rest two months, until the time when the other twenty thousand had
finished their task at the appointed time; and so afterward it came to pass
that the first ten thousand returned to their work every fourth month: and it
was Adoram who was over this tribute. There were also of the strangers who were
left by David, who were to carry the stones and other materials, seventy
thousand; and of those that cut the stones, eighty thousand. Of these three
thousand and three hundred were rulers over the rest. He also enjoined them to
cut out large stones for the foundations of the temple, and that they should
fit them and unite them together in the mountain, and so bring them to the
city. This was done not only by our own country workmen, but by those workmen
whom Hiram sent also.
Footnotes
(2) This building of the walls of Jerusalem, soon after
David's death, illustrates the conclusion of the 51st Psalm, where David prays,
"Build thou the walls of Jerusalem; "
they being, it seems,
unfinished or imperfect at that time. See Ch. 6. Sect.
1; and Ch. 1. Sect. 7; also 1 Kings 9:15.
(3) It may not be amiss to compare the daily furniture of king
Solomon's table, here set down, and 1 Kings 4:22, 23, with the like daily
furniture of Nehemiah the governor's table, after the Jews were come back from
Babylon; and to remember withal, that Nehemiah was now building the walls of
Jerusalem, and maintained, more than usual, above a hundred and fifty
considerable men every day, and that, because the nation was then very poor, at
his own charges also, without laying any burden upon the people at all.
"Now that which
was prepared for me daily was one ox and six choice sheep; also fowls were
prepared for me, and once in ten days store of all sorts of wine; and yet for
all this required not the bread of the governor, because the bondage was heavy
upon this people," (Nehemiah 5:18)
see the whole context, ver.
14-19. Nor did the governor's usual allowance of forty shekels of silver a-day,
ver. 15, amount to 45 a day, nor to 1800 a-year. Nor does it indeed appear
that, under the judges, or under Samuel the prophet, there was any such public
allowance to those governors at all. Those great charges upon the public for
maintaining courts came in with kings, as God foretold they would, 1 Samuel
8:11-18.
(4) Some pretended fragments of these books of conjuration of
Solomon are still extant in Fabricius's Cod. Pseudepigr. Vet. Test, page 1054,
though I entirely differ from Josephus in this his supposal, that such books
and arts of Solomon were parts of that wisdom which was imparted to him by God
in his younger days; they must rather have belonged to such profane but curious
arts as we find mentioned Acts 19:13-20, and had been derived from the idolatry
and superstition of his heathen wives and concubines in his old age, when he
had forsaken God, and God had forsaken him, and given him up to demoniacal
delusions. Nor does Josephus's strange account of the root Baara (Of the
War, B. VIII. Ch. 6. Sect. 3) seem to be other than that of its magical
use in such conjurations. As for the following history, it confirms what Christ
says,
"If I by Beelzebub
cast out demons, by whom do your Sons cast them out?" (Matthew
12:27)
(5) These epistles of Solomon and Hiram are those in 1 Kings
5:3-9, and, as enlarged, in 2 Chronicles 2:3-16, but here given us by Josephus
in his own words.
(6) What Josephus here puts into his copy of Hiram's epistle
to Solomon, and repeats afterwards, Ch. 5. Sect. 3, that Tyre was now an
island, is not in any of the three other copies, viz. that of the Kings,
Chronicles, or Eusebius; nor is it any other, I suppose, than his own
conjectural paraphrase; for when I, many years ago, inquired into this matter,
I found the state of this famous city, and of the island whereupon it stood, to
have been very different at different times. The result of my inquiries in this
matter, with the addition of some later improvements, stands thus:
That the best testimonies
hereto relating, imply, that Paketyrus, or Oldest Tyre, was no other than that
most ancient smaller fort or city Tyre, situated on the continent, and
mentioned in Joshua 19:29, out of which the Canaanite or Phoenician inhabitants
were driven into a large island, that lay not far off in the sea, by Joshua:
that this island was then joined to the continent at the present remains of
Paketyrus, by a neck of land over against Solomon's cisterns, still so called;
and the city's fresh water, probably, was carried along in pipes by that neck
of land; and that this island was therefore, in strictness, no other than a
peninsula, having villages in its fields, Ezekiel 26:6, and a wall about it,
Amos 1:10, and the city was not of so great reputation as Sitlon for some ages:
that it was attacked both by sea and land by Salmanasser, as Josephus informs
us, Antiq. B. IX. Ch. 14. Sect. 2, and afterwards
came to be the metropolis of Phoenicia; and was afterwards taken and destroyed
by Nebuchadnezzar, according to the numerous Scripture prophecies thereto
relating, Isaiah 23; Jeremiah 25:22; 27:3; 47:4; Ezekiel 26-28: that seventy
years after that destruction by Nebuchadnezzar, this city was in some measure
revived and rebuilt, Isaiah 23:17, 18, but that, as the prophet Ezekiel had
foretold, chap. 26:3-5, 14; 27:34, the sea arose higher than before, till at
last it over flowed, not only the neck of land, but the main island or
peninsula itself, and destroyed that old and famous city for ever: that,
however, there still remained an adjoining smaller island, once connected to
Old Tyre itself by Hiram, which was afterwards inhabited; to which Alexander
the Great, with incredible pains, raised a new bank or causeway: and that it
plainly appears from Ifaundreh, a most authentic eye-witness, that the old
large and famous city, on the original large island, is now laid so generally
under water, that scarce more than forty acres of it, or rather of that
adjoining small island remain at this day; so that, perhaps, not above a
hundredth part of the first island and city is now above water. This was
foretold in the same prophecies of Ezekiel; and according to them, as Mr.
Maundrell distinctly observes, these poor remains of Old Tyre are now
"become like the top
of a rock, a place for the spreading of nets in the midst of the
sea."
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