| 1 KINGS |
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| in his life the king had a dramatic downturn. His fall eventually brought the kingdom crashing down around him, and the second half of 1 Kings describes the grim process of dismemberment. What Went Wrong? How did it happen? How could the liveliest, wealthiest, most contented nation of its day slide so disastrously in one generation? As 1 Kings tells it, Solomon seemed unable to control his excesses. Reared in a palace, he loved luxury. When Israel launched its first maritime expeditions, he used them to gather such exotica as gold, ivory, apes, peacocks, and silver. He plated the floor of the temple with gold, wastefully glided over fine cedar and precious ivory, and fashoined militarily useless shields out of gold. First Kings describes the seven-year construction of the temple in elaborate detail. But then it pointedly notes that the construction of Solomon's palace - twice the temple's size - took 13 years (7:1). Solomon showed similar extravagance in his love life. First, he married the daughter of the Egyptian pharaoh (perhaps indicating he was relying on military alliances, not God, for the defense of his country). Then, disobeying God's specific orders, he married the princesses of Moab, Ammon, Edom, Sidon, and other nations. Seven hundred wives in all, and 300 concubines! The entire complexion of the court changed. It became un-Jewish, foreign. To please his wives, Solomon took a final, terrible step: he built altars to all their gods. The one who had built the Israelites' greatest monument to God had fallen to worshiping idols. Rumblings of Discontent in the Land To pay for the building projects, Solomon instituted |