The One Hour Bible by SPCK

Author:SPCK
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: The One Hour Bible
Publisher: SPCK
Published: 2018-07-10T00:00:00+00:00

10

Solomon the sage

As the time of King David’s death approached, he gave this charge to his son Solomon:

‘I am going where everyone on earth must go. Take courage and be a man. Keep the commands written in the Law of Moses. If you do this, then the Lord will keep the promise he made to me. He told me, “If your descendants follow me faithfully, one of them will always sit on the throne of Israel.”’

Then David died and Solomon became king.

The Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream, and said, ‘Ask, and I will give it to you!’ Solomon replied, ‘Give me an understanding heart so that I can govern your people well.’

The Lord was pleased that Solomon had asked for wisdom.

Some time later, two prostitutes came to the king to have an argument settled. ‘Please, my lord,’ one of them began,

‘This woman and I live in the same house. I gave birth to a baby while she was with me in the house. Three days later, this woman also had a baby. But her baby died during the night when she rolled over on it. Then she got up and took my son from beside me while I was asleep. She laid her dead child in my arms and took mine to sleep beside her. And in the morning when I tried to nurse my son, he was dead! But when I looked more closely in the morning light, I saw that it wasn’t my son at all.’

Then the other woman interrupted, ‘It certainly was your son, and the living child is mine.’

The king said, ‘Bring me a sword.’ Then he said, ‘Cut the living child in two, and give half to one woman and half to the other!’

Then the woman who was the real mother of the living child cried out, ‘Oh no, my lord! Give her the child – please do not kill him!’

But the other woman said, ‘All right, he will be neither yours nor mine; divide him between us!’

Then the king said, ‘Do not kill the child, but give him to the woman who wants him to live, for she is his mother!’

When all Israel heard the king’s decision, the people were in awe of the king, for they saw the wisdom God had given him for rendering justice.

During the fourth year of Solomon’s reign, he began to construct the Temple of the Lord. This was 480 years after the people of Israel were rescued from their slavery in Egypt.

It took seven years to build the Temple.

When the queen of Sheba heard of Solomon’s fame, she came to Jerusalem with a large group of attendants and a great caravan of camels laden with spices, large quantities of gold and precious jewels. When she met with Solomon, she exclaimed, ‘Your wisdom and prosperity are far beyond what I was told. How happy your people must be!’

So King Solomon became richer and wiser than any other king on earth. People from every nation came to consult him and to hear the wisdom God had given him.

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