The Expositor's Bible: The First Book of Kings

160

Emerson.

161

The phrase "a little child" (comp. Jer. i. 6) hardly bears on his actual age. See Gen. xliii. 8; Exod. xxxiii. 11. It is proverbial like the subsequent phrase, for which see Deut. xxviii. 6; Psalm cxxi. 8, etc.

162

Heb., "A hearing heart." LXX., "A heart to hear and judge Thy people in righteousness." In 2 Chron. i. 10, "Wisdom and knowledge."

163

Matt. vi. 33.

164

Josephus (Antt., VIII. vii. 8) makes him die at ninety-four, and become king at fourteen. Perhaps he mistook μ' for π' in the LXX.

165

Psalm cxxvii. 2 (uncertain).

166

1 Sam. viii. 6, 20; 2 Sam. xv. 4. "To rule was with the ancients the synonym of to judge." Artemidorus, Oneirocr., ii. 14. (Bähr, ad loc.).

167

Compare the Phœnician's Suffetes (Liv.).

168

As instances of the lower sense in which the term "wisdom" was applied, see 2 Sam. xiii. 3 (Jonadab); xiv. 2 (the woman of Tekoa); xx. 16 (the woman of Abel of Beth-maachah).

169

The Rabbis call them "innkeepers," as they call Rahab.

170

I follow the not improbable additional details given by Josephus from tradition.

171

יֵלֶד. LXX., παιδίον.

172

So the Greek version, which represents the clause rightly. Tradition narrates a yet earlier specimen of Solomon's wisdom. Some sheep had strayed into a pasture. The owner of the land demanded reparation. David said that to repay his loss he might keep the sheep. "No," said Solomon, who was but eleven years old, "let him keep them only till their wool, milk, and lambs have repaid the damage; then let him restore them to their owner." David admitted that this was the more equitable judgment, and he adopted it. See The Qur'an, Sura xxi. 79 (Palmer's Qur'an, ii. 52).

173

The parallel is adduced by Grotius.

174

Quoted by Bähr.

175

Suet., Claud., 15.

176

For references to animals, etc., see Prov. vi. 6, xxiv. 30-34, xxx. 15-19, 24-31; Josephus, Antt., VIII. ii. 5; Ecclus. xlvii. 17.

177

See Isa. xix. 11, xxxi. 2; Acts vii. 22; Herod., ii. 160; Josephus, Antt., VIII. ii. 5 (Keil).

178

See 1 Chron. ii. 6, vi. 44, xv. 17, 19, xxv. 5. Titles of Psalms xviii., lxxxviii., lxxxix. "Ezrahite," perhaps, is a transposition of Zerahite.

179

1 Chron. ii. 6. In Seder Olam they are called "prophets who prophesied in Egypt."

180

"Sons of Mahol" (comp. Eccles. xii. 4).

181

Psalms lxxii., cxxvii. The so-called "Psalms of Solomon," fifteen in number, are of the Maccabean age; Josephus calls his songs βίβλια περὶ ὠδῶν καὶ μελῶν, and his proverbs βίβλους παραβολῶν καὶ εἰκόνων.

182

See Euseb., Præp. Evang., ix. 34, § 19.

183

Prov. xi. 22, xxiv. 30-34, xxv. 25, xxvi. 8, xxx. 15.

184

E.g., Prov. vi. 10.

185

1 Kings x. 1; LXX., ἐν αἰνίγμασι. See Wünsche, Die Räthselweisheit, 1883; Grätz, Hist. of the Jews, i. 162. For specimens of her traditional puzzles see the author's Solomon, p. 135 (Men of the Bible).

186

"And Solomon was David's heir, and said, Ye folk! we have been taught the speech of birds, and we have been given everything: verily this is a Divine grace" (Qur'an, Sura xxvii. 15). For the legend of Solomon and the hoopoes, see Sura 27.

187

According to Suidas (s.v., Ἐζεκίας) Hezekiah found his (magic?) formulæ for the cure of diseases engraved on the posts of the Temple. See Targum on Esth. i. 2; Eccles. ii. 8.

188

Job xxviii. 23, 28.

189

Prov. i. 7.

190

Ecclus. xlvii. 13-18.

191

Josephus, Antt., VIII. vii. 8. According to one tradition he lived to fifty-three (Ewald, iii. 208), and was only twelve when he succeeded David.

192

2 Chron. viii. 3. Ewald thinks it is confirmed by 2 Kings xiv. 28, where, however, the Hebrew is obscure.

193

1 Kings x. 26.

194

1 Kings ix. 18. Here the "Q'rî," the marginal, or "read" text, has Tadmor (i. e., Palmyra), as also in 2 Chron. viii. 4. But this Tamar (Ezek. xlvii. 19, xlviii. 28) is "in the land" on the south border. In the Chronicles Tadmor is the right reading, for the chronicler is speaking of Hamath-Zobah and the north. It is not at all unlikely that Solomon also built Tadmor (Josephus, Antt., VIII. vi. 1) to protect his commerce on the route to the Euphrates.

195

The forty-fifth psalm is supposed by old interpreters to have been an epithalamium on this occasion, but was probably much later. Perhaps notices like 1 Kings iii. 1-3 (the Egyptian alliance), the admonition in 1 Kings ix. 1-9 and the luxury described in x. 14-29, are meant as warning notes of what follows in xi. 1-8 (the apostasy), 9-13 (the prophecy of disruption), and 14-43 (the concluding disaster).

196

Gezer is Abu-Shusheh, or Tell-el-Gezer, between Ramleh and Jerusalem (Oliphant, Haifa, p. 253), on the lower border of Ephraim. Ewald identifies it with Geshur, the town of Talmai, Absalom's grandfather. See Lenormant, Hist. anc. de l'Orient., i. 337-43. The genealogy of this dynasty is thus given by Brugsch-Bey (Gen. Table iv.), Hist. of Egypt, vol. ii.: —

197

See Deut. xxiii. 7, 8.

198

Schwab's Berakhoth, p. 252; Hershon, Treasures of the Talmud, p. 25. In Sanhedrin, ff. 21, 22, there is another trace of the dislike with which the marriage (though not forbidden, Deut. xxiii. 7, 8) was regarded: "When Solomon married the daughter of Pharaoh, Gabriel descended and fixed a reed in the sea. A sandbank formed around it on which Rome was subsequently built." In Shabbath, ff. 51, 52, we are told that "the princess brought with her one thousand different kinds of musical instruments, and taught Solomon the chants to his various idols."

199

No trace of any such misgiving is found in the Book of Kings.

200

"Seine Liebhaberei sind kostbare Bauten, fremde Weiber, reiche Prachtentfaltung" (Kittel, ii. 160).

201

Perhaps rather "the grandson." He was the son of Ahimaaz (comp. Gen. xxix. 5; Ezra v. 1, where son = grandson).

202

Shisha and Shavsha are perhaps corruptions of Seraiah (2 Sam. viii. 17).

203

Comp. Esth. vi. 1. LXX., Isa. xxxvi. 3, ὁ ὑπομνηματογράφος 2 Sam. viii. 17, ὁ ἐπὶ τῶν ὑπομνημάτων. Jerome, "a commentariis." Comp. Suet., Aug. 79, "qui e memoria Augusti."

204

It is a somewhat ominous fact that netsib means properly an ἐπιτειχισμός, a garrison in a hostile country.

205

The king's friend (2 Sam. xv. 37) seems to have been a sort of confidential privy councillor (Prov. xxii. 11).

206

Isa. xxii. 21.

207

2 Sam. xx. 24.

208

Possibly this clause is an interpolation.

209

2 Sam. viii. 18. Even "Ira the Jairite" is called "a priest" (2 Sam. xx. 26). An attempt has been made to explain the word away because it obviously clashes with Levitic ordinances; but the word "priest" could not be used in two different senses in two consecutive lines. Dogmatic considerations have tampered with the obvious meaning of the word. The LXX. omits it, and in the case of David's sons calls them αὐλάρχαι. The A.V. renders it "chief officer." The Vulgate wrongly refers it to Zadok (filius Sadoc sacerdotis). Movers (Krit. Unters., 301 ff.) renders it "court chaplains." Already in 1 Chron. xviii. 17 we find that the title gave offence, and we read instead, "And the sons of David were at the hand of the king" (see Ewald, Alterthumsk, p. 276). Compare the title "Bishop of Osnaburg," borne by Frederick, Duke of York, son of George III.

210

2 Sam. v. 14; Zech. xii. 12; Luke iii. 31.

211

The degraded and ominous apparitions of Sarisim (eunuchs) probably began at the court of Solomon on a large scale, though the name occurs in the days of David (1 Sam. viii. 15; 1 Chron. xxviii. 1). In the Northern Kingdom we first hear of them in the harem of the polygamous Ahab.

212

2 Kings xviii. 18; Isa. xxii. 15.