Kings of Judah, Pt. 3: "All is Vanity" (1 Ki 10)

ALL IS VANITY (1 KINGS 10:23-25, 11:1-13)
A Jewish story tells of Alexander the Great’s presence before the gates of paradise on his journey home after he had conquered the whole world. Seeing that the gates would not open for him, he asked for a token to prove that he was there. All he got was a human eye. Reaching home, he called all his wise men together.

“O King,” replied the wise men, “place the eye in the scales and weigh it.” “What for?” asked Alexander. “I can tell you before hand that it weighs but little.” “Do it just the same!” the wise men urged. “In the other half of the scales place a gold piece. Then we will find out which is heavier.” Alexander did as they asked. To his surprise he found that the eye was heavier than the gold piece. He threw into the scales another gold coin - still the eye was heavier. He then threw a whole handful of coins and ordered that all his gold and silver and jewels be thrown in. Still the eye outweighed the treasure.

“Even were you to take all your chariots and horses and palaces and place them in the scales, the eye will be heavier,” said the wise men. “How do you explain this?” asked the king. “How is such a thing possible?” “Learn a lesson from all this, O king,” said the wise men. “Know that the human eye is never satisfied with what it sees. No matter how much treasure you will show it, it will want more and still more.” “Your explanation doesn’t satisfy me. Give me proof,” insisted Alexander. “Very well,” agreed the wise men. “Have all your gold and treasure removed from the scales. Then place a pinch of dust in their place and observe what happens.”

Barely had Alexander placed a little dust in the scales when they tipped to the other end, for the dust proved heavier than the eye. “Now I understand the meaning of your words and of what was in your minds!” cried Alexander. “So long as man is alive, his eye is never sated, but no sooner does he die when he is as dust! Then his eye loses its impulse and becomes powerless. It can no longer desire.”

People tend to forget where the small pleasures of life and the simple things in life once they make it. Solomon made it big. He was a celebrity, a hit, a showstopper. Traders or spice merchants (1 Ki 10:15), governors of the land (1 Ki 10:15), apes and peacocks (1 Ki 10:22) made its debut in Scriptures and made their way into Israel for the first time. The king lived a life of influence, affluence and opulence. Solomon made a great throne of ivory for himself (1 Ki 10:18) and twelve lions were placed on the six steps leading to the throne. All King Solomon’s goblets were gold and all the household articles in the palace were pure gold. Nothing was made of silver (1 Kings 10:20-21). Solomon had forgotten that people came to hear his wisdom (1 Ki 10:24), not to see his riches.

How can we be rightly related to God, others and self? What safeguards do we need and have against riches and vanities in life?

You Need a Head Exam on Your Big Head
11:1 King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter-Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. 2 They were from nations about which the LORD had told the Israelites, “You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.” Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love. 3 He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. (1 Kings 11:1-3)

A Mormon acquaintance once pushed Mark Twain into an argument on the issue of polygamy. After long and tedious expositions justifying the practice, the Mormon demanded that Twain cite any passage of scripture expressly forbidding polygamy.

“Nothing easier,” Twain replied. “No man can serve two masters.”

It’s been said, “The penalty for polygamy is more mother-in-laws.”

Sixth century Greek philosopher Heraclitus said, “It is not good for all your wishes to be fulfilled. Through sickness you recognize the value of health, through evil the value of good, through hunger satisfaction, through exertion the value of rest.”

Solomon knew the twin threats that come from being dirt poor and being filthy rich. He prayed in Proverbs 30:7-9: “O LORD…give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the LORD?’ Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonor the name of my God.”

The word “love” ( v 1) cleverly tracks Solomon’s rise and fall. His values were bankrupt, his decline was hastening and his collapse was imminent. The barely-enthroned king Solomon loved the Lord (1 Ki 3:3), but the long-entrenched king loved foreign women (11:1). The amorous king couldn’t stop himself from flirting with ladies, playing with fire and courting for trouble. He added wives like winning trophies, change them like new clothes, and collected them like buying stamps. Solomon had the wisdom to deal with things related to others, but not to himself. Further, even the wisest man in the world was not given the ability to deal with more than one woman in his life, never mind 1,000 women.

Solomon not only loved many foreign women (v 1); he held fast to them in love (v 2). The word “held fast” is the traditional word in marriage for leaving one’s parents and “cleaving” to one’s wife. It means cling, attach, paste, glue, bond - the very thing Ruth did when she clung to her mother-in-law and refused to leave Naomi (Ruth 1:14). This is also the “holding fast” relationship that Moses and Joshua admonished Israel to have with God when they enter the Promised Land (Deut 11:22, Josh 23:8). Besides, whether loving God or others, a person can only hold fast or cleave to no more than one person; human or divine love is that exclusive. Solomon not only added one wife, ten loves or one hundred spouses, but 1,000families! The aging Solomon had become a ladies’ man, a playboy king and a sex maniac in his old age. He couldn’t keep his hands to himself, take his eyes off the ladies or last a day without company. Forget the 7-year or 7-month itch; the king couldn’t wait for 17 days. He reigned for 40 years (v 42), which is 14,600 days (40 years x 365 days), so he averaged a wife or a concubine once every 14.6 days. Not even the wisest man in the world could remember all his wives, concubines or children’s names, their anniversaries or birthdays.

You Need a Heart Operation on Your Cheating Heart
4 As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been. 5 He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molech the detestable god of the Ammonites. 6 So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the LORD; he did not follow the LORD completely, as David his father had done. 7 On a hill east of Jerusalem, Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the detestable god of Moab, and for Molech the detestable god of the Ammonites. 8 He did the same for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and offered sacrifices to their gods. 9 The LORD became angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the LORD, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice. 10 Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods, Solomon did not keep the LORD’s command. (1 Kings 11:4-10)

In a 1995 Forbes magazine released an interesting survey of the chances of a person having an extramarital affair with the income level he or she is making. The higher the income bracket you are in, the higher the infidelity level you will face.

If a person makes $10,000-20,000 in 1995, the chance of a person’s unfaithfulness to his spouse is 33%. If the person makes $20,000-30,000, the percentage is 45%. If the income is $30,000-40,000, it rises to 55%. If income is $40,000-50,000, it is 66% - twice that of the lowest $20,000-30,000. If $60,000 and above, the likelihood is a dramatic 70%. (Forbes FYI 1995)

The king took a wrong turn and U-turn with interfaith and polygamous marriage. The word “turn” in verses 2, 3, 4 and 9 poignantly captures the course Solomon took. God warned that heathen wives will surely turn one’s heart after their gods (v 2), but Solomon ignored and snubbed the warning. Then his seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines led him astray, or “turned away his heart” in Hebrew (v 3). His heart had changed and he became another person. More was to come. Next, his wives turned the aging king’s heart after other gods (v 4). Still, the blame did not completely lie with the wives; the buck stopped with Solomon, because his heart had turned away from the LORD (v 9).

This Hebrew word “turn” is linked to oneself or people when it is used of other parts of the body. One can bend/turn the “shoulder” (Gen 49:15) or stretch/turn the “arm” (Ex 6:6, Deut 4:34, Deut 5:15, Deut 9:29, Deut 11:2, Deut 26:8) or stretch/turn one’s “hand” (Ex 7:5, 7:19, 8:5, 8:6, 8:17, 9:22, 10:12, 10:21, 10:22, 14:16, 14:21, 14:26, 14:27, 15:12), or give//turn the “ear” in the Psalms (Ps 17:6, 31:2, 45:10, 71:2, 88:2, 102:2, 116:2), but “turning” of the heart is used of one’s relationship with God and one’s faithfulness to His word. Nine Hebrew references to “turning of one’s heart” are recorded in the Bible, but half of them refer to Solomon’s apostasy (vv 2, 3, 4, 9, Josh 24:23, 1 Kings 8:61, Ps 119:112, Ps 141:4).

The indictment against Solomon was justified, pointed and blunt. The text not only records Solomon’s downfall but also his free fall. The active verbs categorizing his sins were fast and furious: (1) Solomon LOVED many foreign women besides Pharaoh’s daughter (v 1), (2) he HELD FAST to them in love (v 2), (3) he FOLLOWED Ashtoreth and Molech (v 5), (4) he DID EVIL in the eyes of the LORD (v 6), (5) he BUILT a high place for Chemosh and for Molech (v 7), (6) he BUILT high places for his foreign wives (v 8), (7) his heart had TURNED AWAY from the LORD (v 9), and (8) he did not KEEP the Lord’s command (v 10).

You Need a Hearing Aid on Your Dull Hearing
9 The LORD became angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the LORD, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice. 10 Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods, Solomon did not keep the LORD’s command. 11 So the LORD said to Solomon, “Since this is your attitude and you have not kept my covenant and my decrees, which I commanded you, I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates. 12 Nevertheless, for the sake of David your father, I will not do it during your lifetime. I will tear it out of the hand of your son. 13 Yet I will not tear the whole kingdom from him, but will give him one tribe for the sake of David my servant and for the sake of Jerusalem, which I have chosen.” 14 Then the LORD raised up against Solomon an adversary, Hadad the Edomite, from the royal line of Edom. (1 Kings 11:9-14)

Sometimes things are best thrown away, but my wife does not like to waste things. She keeps used plastic bags, old IKEA catalogues, free home buying guide and empty tin containers. On the other hand, I like to get rid of clutter as soon as I can, especially junk mail, supermarket advertisements and order catalogues.

Once I spotted a mug without handle or ears on the table. Before throwing it I was curious why it was not disposed of, since we have more than twenty mugs! My wife said, “Don’t throw it. I can use it to sharpen knives.” Sure enough, blunt knives became sharp again when she thrust the blade on the broken ends of the ears. Her ingenuity solved a big headache: how to sharpen knives overseas. My old method was to throw blunt knives and buy new knives, but now we can sharpen our own knives and keep them far longer.

Solomon’s sharp ears were presently dull of hearing. He became the only king God was said to be angry with (v 9), for a reason. No king – not even David - had twice witnessed God’s up-close self-revelation and disclosure (v 7). The idols in his life had taken him from God. The course he took enslaved and gripped the nation in idolatry for generations until 16 kings later, when good king Josiah tore down the high places Solomon built (2 Ki 23:13). Note: the abominable or detestable (vv 5, 7, 7) worship of Ashteroth, Molech, and Chemosh made inroads into Israel during Solomon’s reign.

Solomon was in over his head with his latest adversaries. His rivals to the throne were no longer his siblings, but himself, idolatry and, inevitably, foreigners. They turned into his sworn enemies, bitter foes and biggest headaches and they rose up from near and far, from right under his nose and from out of nowhere. The first one, Hadad the Edomite, was raised and nurtured in his in-laws’ own backyard, since Solomon’s first wife was Pharaoh’s daughter (1 Ki 11:1). My guess is that Pharaoh did not look too kindly at the way Solomon treated their Egyptian princess, whose fortunes and popularity had plummeted from first lady to aging queen, former favorite and has-been.

Pharaoh not only gave Hadad a house and land and provided him with food, but also his sister-in-law in marriage to Hadad. Hadad’s son was raised by her aunt, Pharoah’s wife herself, and the child lived and grew up with Pharaoh’s own children (vv 18-20). Another adversary, Rezon, seized control of Aram, creating a powerful alliance with Hadad in Syria, causing a big headache to Solomon inside and outside his borders.

What happened outside Israel’s borders was not as dramatic as what happened within that would divide the people and splinter the country in two. An Ephramite Jew by the name of Jeroboam caused more trouble than any Gentiles could. Jeroboam was the unwitting beneficiary of Ahijah’s pronouncement and the unproven contender to the throne. He was granted the kingship of the northern kingdom, and more, if he would follow and obey God. A dynasty as enduring as David’s dynasty was promised Jeroboam if he was faithful to God. When Solomon tried to kill his rival, Jeroboam fled to Egypt. Again, Egypt was more than happy to provide cover and refuge.

Conclusion: The saying is true: “Those who ignore history are doomed to repeat its mistakes.” It should not be a surprise that polytheism led to syncretism, and syncretism led to apostasy. Apostasy is not a sudden change, but stubbornness to change. God does not tolerate or suffer or share competition for His glory, worship and work. Have you gone ahead of yourself? Have you gotten too big for your shoes? Too big for your own good? Are you low in commitment to God and hot in pursuit of materialism?