3 Solomon made a marriage alliance with Pharaoh king of Egypt. He took Pharaoh’s daughter and brought her into the city of David until he had finished building his own house and the house of the Lord and the wall around Jerusalem. 2 3:2The people were sacrificing at the high places, however, because no house had yet been built for the name of the Lord.
3 3:3Solomon loved the Lord, walking in the statutes of David his father, only he sacrificed and made offerings at the high places. 4 3:4And the king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there, for that was the great high place. Solomon used to offer a thousand burnt offerings on that altar. 5 3:5At Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream by night, and God said, “Ask what I shall give you.” 6 3:6And Solomon said, “You have shown great and steadfast love to your servant David my father, because he walked before you in faithfulness, in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart toward you. And you have kept for him this great and steadfast love and have given him a son to sit on his throne this day. 7 3:7And now, O Lord my God, you have made your servant king in place of David my father, although I am but a little child. I do not know how to go out or come in. 8 3:8And your servant is in the midst of your people whom you have chosen, a great people, too many to be numbered or counted for multitude. 9 3:9Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, that I may discern between good and evil, for who is able to govern this your great people?”
10 3:10It pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this. 11 3:11And God said to him, “Because you have asked this, and have not asked for yourself long life or riches or the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself understanding to discern what is right, 12 3:12behold, I now do according to your word. Behold, I give you a wise and discerning mind, so that none like you has been before you and none like you shall arise after you. 13 3:13I give you also what you have not asked, both riches and honor, so that no other king shall compare with you, all your days. 14 3:14And if you will walk in my ways, keeping my statutes and my commandments, as your father David walked, then I will lengthen your days.”
15 3:15And Solomon awoke, and behold, it was a dream. Then he came to Jerusalem and stood before the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and offered up burnt offerings and peace offerings, and made a feast for all his servants.
16 3:16Then two prostitutes came to the king and stood before him. 17 3:17The one woman said, “Oh, my lord, this woman and I live in the same house, and I gave birth to a child while she was in the house. 18 3:18Then on the third day after I gave birth, this woman also gave birth. And we were alone. There was no one else with us in the house; only we two were in the house. 19 3:19And this woman’s son died in the night, because she lay on him. 20 3:20And she arose at midnight and took my son from beside me, while your servant slept, and laid him at her breast, and laid her dead son at my breast. 21 3:21When I rose in the morning to nurse my child, behold, he was dead. But when I looked at him closely in the morning, behold, he was not the child that I had borne.” 22 3:22But the other woman said, “No, the living child is mine, and the dead child is yours.” The first said, “No, the dead child is yours, and the living child is mine.” Thus they spoke before the king.
23 3:23Then the king said, “The one says, ‘This is my son that is alive, and your son is dead’; and the other says, ‘No; but your son is dead, and my son is the living one.’” 24 3:24And the king said, “Bring me a sword.” So a sword was brought before the king. 25 3:25And the king said, “Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one and half to the other.” 26 3:26Then the woman whose son was alive said to the king, because her heart yearned for her son, “Oh, my lord, give her the living child, and by no means put him to death.” But the other said, “He shall be neither mine nor yours; divide him.” 27 3:27Then the king answered and said, “Give the living child to the first woman, and by no means put him to death; she is his mother.” 28 3:28And all Israel heard of the judgment that the king had rendered, and they stood in awe of the king, because they perceived that the wisdom of God was in him to do justice.
The narrative of Solomon’s dream encounter with God and his ensuing request for wisdom when offered any gift he desires from the Lord portrays the king as humble, godly, and wise (even if there is a suggestion that his theology may be slightly lacking, as we shall see). In addition to the writer’s unparalleled commendation of Solomon as one who “loved the Lord” (1 Kings 3:3), God himself is delighted with his king (3:10–13) and promises unprecedented blessings should Solomon “walk in [his] ways” (3:14).
Response
The hallmark of this chapter is inconsistency. Solomon does have some genuine high moments. In 3:3 we read, “Solomon loved [Yahweh], walking in the statutes of David his father.” Commendations do not come any better than this. In fact, in the whole of the OT, no one else is described in quite these terms. Caleb followed Yahweh wholeheartedly. David was a man who cared deeply about Yahweh’s agenda. But Solomon? He loved Yahweh and obeyed him. And this is clearly a very good thing. In the NT we are told repeatedly that the utterly lovely God has loved us in the Lord Jesus Christ, and that his people ought to love God back with a love that is at least as real, and lasting, and deliberate, and passionate as our love for our spouse. Solomon actually gets this one spectacularly right!
As he does when God appears to him in a dream. Solomon admits to God that he is out of his depth and then asks God for a “listening heart.” This is a superb request, a godly request—and in the next verse it receives God’s stamp of approval. Solomon acknowledges the covenant God made with his own father. He shows deep personal humility and asks for a discerning mind to do the humanly impossible task of leading God’s people well, which he does beautifully in resolving a dispute between two prostitutes. Top marks, Solomon!
But Solomon also makes some tragic mistakes. Nowhere in the OT is going to Egypt, hanging out with Egyptians, or marrying Egyptians a good thing—and Solomon, the king, is supposed to be a model Israelite. Then there is the fact that in the same verse he seems to be concerned more with building his own house than with building the house of Yahweh. Add to that the fact that, according to 3:3, the man who loves Yahweh also has a weakness for worshiping him at the high places—the old Canaanite shrines. Foreign wives, now foreign worship places. This is not good.
Why has God provided us so much material through which to wade concerning the inconsistencies of Solomon? It is simple: God asks us to look at Solomon—the wisest man who ever lived—and recognize that even he cannot live consistently for God. The implication is worryingly clear: if Solomon is unable to pull it off, it is hardly likely that we will be able to manage it!
The recognition of this kind of inconsistency is exactly what James has in mind when he writes these words in chapter 3 of his letter:
This is the reality: we are inconsistent. Like Solomon, we have our moments: we are not as unwise as we could be. We are not as evil and selfish as we could be. But, no matter how hard we try, we muck it up sooner or later. This is why James speaks of the “meekness of wisdom”—the paradox is that the secret of wisdom is realizing that we do not always act wisely; we do not have it in us to pull it off. Wisdom starts with accepting that sometimes we are fools! This admission does not come easily, which is why God devotes such a huge proportion of the Bible to the fact that, like every character who steps onto these pages, we are messed up. We get it wrong. We make terrible choices. We may be wise, but we are also fools. It is time to face the fact that this is who we are: like Solomon, we are deeply inconsistent people. Thank God that in Jesus Christ—who is greater than Solomon—one has come who is utterly consistent, utterly obedient, utterly pure. By his Spirit he will strengthen us to walk with him in his wise ways, so let us pursue him with the meekness that true wisdom requires.
3:3 In the light of the ambiguous terms in which Solomon has been described up to this point in the book, the glowing accolade of this verse comes as something of a relief (and perhaps even a shock): “Solomon loved the Lord.” There are several OT figures who receive striking commendations (e.g., Caleb, who “wholly followed the Lord”; Deut. 1:36), but none are praised quite like this. Solomon alone is commended for his love of God, which reveals itself in his “walking in the statutes of David his father.” This covenantal love is both affective and practical. Along with Asa, Hezekiah, and Josiah (1 Kings 15:11; 2 Kings 18:3; 22:2; see also 2 Kings 14:3), Solomon follows in the footsteps of David, which, in the eyes of our writer, is the definitive mark of a godly king. However, even here the picture is not entirely positive, for he also “sacrificed and made offerings at the high places.” The Hebrew construction makes it clear that this is a troubling contradiction, which maintains the tension so carefully established in the opening chapters of the Solomon narratives.
3:4 “Gibeon” is described as “the great high place.” A few miles northwest of Jerusalem, Gibeon is a Canaanite city that skillfully evaded destruction in the conquest. It was the location of a bloody encounter between David’s supporters and the family of Saul in 2 Samuel 2. By this stage, however, it has emerged as the primary cultic site in Israel. It may be that Solomon has encouraged its rise to prominence as a gesture to the tribe of Benjamin (Saul’s tribe), although the text is silent on this and on how his frequenting of Gibeon helps or hinders the establishment of the Jerusalem temple. What is clear is that Solomon’s piety, as well as his wisdom, is legendary: “Solomon used to offer a thousand burnt offerings on that altar.” By any standard, this is a staggering act of devotion (which Solomon apparently repeats multiple times). This is part of the enigma of these chapters: at points Solomon’s piety is exemplary, while at other times his behavior leaves us scratching our heads.
3:5–9 What is very clear is that, despite any inconsistency in Solomon’s worship practices, God blesses the king who loves him, which sets Solomon apart from almost all other kings of Judah or Israel. “At Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream by night.” It was relatively common for ancient kings to attribute great revelations to dreams, but, as is usually the case, the events recounted in Scripture are significantly different. Although there are earlier precedents for this occurrence (cf. God appearing to Abimelech in Gen. 20:3 and to Jacob in 28:12; 31:11, 24), it is unusual for Yahweh to deal with his servants in such a direct fashion. The statement God makes is particularly striking: “Ask what I shall give you.” It appears that Solomon’s extravagant piety is regarded by God as essentially good. The inherent tension in these chapters flows from the fact that the narrative oscillates between Solomon’s godliness and his ungodliness, often without warning. To make matters still more complex, even Solomon’s godly acts (like ours) are often tinged with ungodliness, and vice versa!
In 1 Kings 3:6, Solomon speaks for the first time about his understanding of his own position as a Davidic king: “You have shown great and steadfast love to your servant David my father, because he walked before you in faithfulness, in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart toward you.” Solomon has grasped the reality at the heart of the covenant God made with his father: for the king (and, by extension, the people) to enjoy the blessings of the covenant, covenant faithfulness as spelled out here is required. One of the puzzles of this text (and other texts with a similarly high view of David and Solomon) is how the king can be spoken of in such glowing terms (in the light of, in David’s case, the Bathsheba incident of 2 Samuel 11 and, in Solomon’s, his marriage to Pharaoh’s daughter, among other failures). This enigma is ultimately resolved only by God’s short-term grace in using flawed kings, which meets its fulfillment in the embodied grace and truth of the Lord Jesus Christ.
At this point, Solomon’s interactions with God are exemplary as they are marked by humility: “And now, O Lord my God, you have made your servant king in place of David my father, although I am but a little child. I do not know how to go out or come in.” Solomon’s self-deprecation is metaphorical—by this stage he is well beyond adolescence (according to 1 Kings 11:42 and 14:21 he must have at least one child himself by this stage). Not knowing how to “go out or come in” is probably a reference to his lack of military experience (cf. Deut. 28:6; 31:2; Josh. 14:11; 1 Sam. 18:13). In 1 Kings 3:8 his focus shifts to the fact that he is very aware that the Lord is entrusting him with the supervision of the next stage of the fulfillment of his covenant promises, in particular those made to Abraham (cf. Gen. 17:2): “And your servant is in the midst of your people whom you have chosen, a great people, too many to be numbered or counted for multitude.” The fact that Solomon describes himself as “one of the people” may also contain a healthy allusion to Deuteronomy 17:14–20 (the passage that provides the backdrop for much of the critical assessment of Solomon in the succeeding chapters).
It is Solomon’s request, however, that is the most impressive feature of this section. The king asks God for “an understanding mind” to enable him to lead God’s people well and in particular to allow him to “discern between good and evil.” One of the marks of the messianic reign is justice (an idea prominent particularly in Isaiah; cf. Isa. 9:7; 10:2; 16:3, 5; 32:1; 42:1, 3, 4; 51:4), and Solomon asks for the wherewithal to rule in this fashion. The Hebrew phrase is “a listening heart,” which may refer back to 1 Samuel 13:14 (although the translation of this verse is disputed) or, more likely, 1 Samuel 16:7. In any case, in light of verse 6 the connection with his father, David, is strong (1 Kings 9:4). Solomon is asking for the ability to rule in the way David did.
3:10–15 God’s verdict on this request is unequivocal: “It pleased the Lord that Solomon had asked this.” The relative rarity of such unambiguous commendation highlights the significance of Solomon’s actions and Yahweh’s gracious response, as does the language of verses 11–12, particularly God’s statement: “Behold, I now do according to your word.” It is much more usual to read of events unfolding according to the word of the Lord (one of the key phrases in the book of Kings), but here God acts in line with the words of his servant (cf. Num. 14:20; Josh. 2:21). It is also worth noting that Solomon’s riches and long life are also gifts of God. The fact that the king becomes preoccupied with his wealth and enjoyment of life without reference to God is less a condemnation of wealth or satisfaction per se and more a statement of the condition of Solomon’s own heart (cf. comments on 1 Kings 9:1–11:43).
Solomon’s request for “an understanding mind” is met by God’s agreement to give him a “wise and discerning” heart so that he might “discern what is right.” This is not simply knowing things but is acting with wise justice (as the following narrative will go on to demonstrate). This is a unique gift of God, one that will set Solomon apart from all other human kings either before or after (“none like you has been before you and none like you shall arise after you”).
It is also clear that God is the source of both Solomon’s wealth and his burgeoning worldwide reputation. In verse 13, anticipating both the visit of the queen of Sheba in 1 Kings 10 and the ever-expanding influence of Solomon on the ancient Near East, God states, “No other king shall compare with you, all your days.” He also assures Solomon that following in his father David’s footsteps will result in covenantal blessing, which will prolong his reign. On the strength of this verse, the future of the kingdom, ruled by a wise and godly Davidic king, seems bright.
The unit concludes in verse 15 with Solomon’s response to the kindness of the Lord, which is, once more, a model of piety: “Then he came to Jerusalem and stood before the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and offered up burnt offerings and peace offerings, and made a feast for all his servants.” This time the emphasis falls not on the quantity of Solomon’s offerings but on their nature. It is striking that on this occasion his sacrificial practice is in line with Deuteronomy, taking place at the site of the future temple. His concern to serve the Lord wholeheartedly (the burnt offering) and to ensure that he and the people are in a right relationship with Yahweh (the peace offering) is evidence of his understanding mind. With these actions the king is held up as a model of how to respond to divine grace.
3:16 An instant test of Solomon’s God-given wisdom comes in verses 16–28. Immediately, “two prostitutes came to the king and stood before him.” We should not miss the implications of this jarring note. After the prohibition of Leviticus 19:29, the only prostitutes mentioned in the story of Israel are Jephthah’s mother (Judg. 11:1) and the woman visited by Samson (in Gaza; Judg. 16:1). The matter-of-fact introduction of these two prostitutes who are not only present in Israel but free even to petition the king comes as something of a shock.
3:17–21 As it happens, these two women “live in the same house.” There is no biblical precedent for women sharing a house like this (let alone pregnant women); add to that the absence of any immediate or extended family members to intercede on their behalf (the women state in vv. 18–19, “We were alone. There was no one else with us in the house; only we two were in the house”) and the fact that they are prostitutes, it is almost certain that they live in a brothel. The explanation given by the first woman of the tragic death is entirely plausible—“This woman’s son died in the night, because she lay on him”—as is the scenario she paints of the alleged switch: “And she arose at midnight and took my son from beside me, while your servant slept, and laid him at her breast, and laid her dead son at my breast.” The scene is set: a crime with no witnesses, and the only people who know the truth each maintaining that her version of events is the correct one.
3:22 The second woman’s testimony beautifully highlights the need for Solomon the Discerning to intervene. Her claim reduces the discussion to the level of “Oh yes I did. . . . Oh no you did not!” Stalemate is reached. Who could possibly work out this conundrum? “Thus they spoke before the king.”
3:23–27 After succinctly summing up the arguments (v. 23), Solomon proposes a shocking solution: “The king said, ‘Bring me a sword.’” The fact that Solomon’s “wisdom” has already led him to wield the sword (cf. 2:9, 25) casts some doubt over how this narrative might end. Solomon’s words in verse 25 are shocking in the extreme: “Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one and half to the other.” In a context in which any suggestion of human sacrifice is abhorrent (although see 1 Kings 11:7, 33), this is unthinkable. And yet, Solomon’s wise and discerning heart has found a way to settle the dispute. The mother of the boy says straightaway, “Oh, my lord, give her the living child, and by no means put him to death.” But the other says, “He shall be neither mine nor yours; divide him.” The latter response is so callous that it clarifies the situation, so in verse 27 Solomon gives the child to his true mother.
3:28 The summary statement makes clear that the reign of Solomon, God’s wise and anointed king, is marked by “justice.” His prayer has been answered. The response of the people leaves us in no doubt that Solomon, like Moses, Joshua, and David before him (Josh. 4:14; 1 Sam. 18:15), enjoys the favor of God: “All Israel heard of the judgment that the king had rendered, and they stood in awe of the king, because they perceived that the wisdom of God was in him to do justice.” Not only does Solomon show the discerning mind he asked for; he acts with real integrity, seeking justice even for the disadvantaged and stigmatized members of society. This is Messiah territory, as Isaiah 11:3–4 declares concerning the “shoot from the stump of Jesse” (Isa. 11:1): “His delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide disputes by what his ears hear, but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth.”
1 Choon-Leong Seow, “The Syro-Palestinian Context of Solomon’s Dream,” HTR 77 (1984): 141–152.