“A Biblical History of Israel” by Iain Provan: An Extended Book Analysis–Part 9: The Reign of King Solomon

Chapter 9 of Provan, Long, and Longman’s book, A Biblical History of Israel, focuses on the reign of Solomon, covering I Kings 1-11, as well as the corresponding chapters in II Chronicles 1-9. Before he specifically discusses Solomon, though, Provan gives a brief discussion regarding the difference between Kings and Chronicles, as well as a historical feature in Kings itself. As mentioned in an early post, I-II Kings was composed during the exile and was written to answer the question as to why the Jews ended up in Exile. Provan sums up that answer in the following way: “The focus of 1-2 Kings in particular is overall upon the failure of the Israelite monarchy to govern the people justly and in accordance with the divine will, with the ultimate consequence that Israel is absorbed into foreign empires.” Simply put, you’re in Exile because you failed to keep YHWH’s covenant.

By contrast, I-II Chronicles was written after the return from Exile, when the Jews were having a tough time of it among the peoples of the land and were struggling to rebuild the Temple. I-II Chronicles, therefore, is essentially a pep-talk that focuses on the good things past kings have done, and therefore serves as an encouragement for the returning exiles to do those good things again. Not surprisingly, given the historical circumstances of the returning exiles, a major focus in II Chronicles is that of the Temple and Temple worship in Jerusalem.

The Question of History
When it comes to the historical nature of I-II Kings, Provan points to what is called the regnal formula throughout the work. If you’ve read I-II Kings, you’re familiar with it. With every king, this refrain shows up, with the relevant information regarding that particular king: So and So, the son of ________, began to reign over Judah/Israel in the ______ year of _______ of Israel/Judah. So and So was ____ years old when he began to reign, and he reign for ____ years in Jerusalem/Samaria. His mother’s name was ________. He walked/did not walk in the ways of YHWH/the kings of Israel. Now the rest of the acts of So and So, are they not written in the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah/Israel?

That formula roots the reigns of both the kings of Israel and Judah within a clear historical context and timeline. Still, that doesn’t mean I-II Kings is attempting to give some sort of objective, political history. It is quite clear that I-II Kings has an obvious religious agenda—to highlight their failure to keep YHWH’s covenant and to provide an answer as to why the Jews were in exile. Simply put, in I-II Kings, politics and religion are intertwined.

Fortunately, there is enough overlap between I-II Kings and the records of Assyria that make it possible for us to figure out an approximate chronological timeline for the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. As mentioned in the previous post, we know that King Jehu must have been on the throne of Israel by 841 BC, in order to give tribute to the Assyrian king Shalmaneser III in that year. In addition, we know that King Ahab must have been on the throne of Israel in 853 BC, in order to fight alongside the king of Damascus against Shalmaneser III. From these two certain dates, we can look at the regnal formulas throughout I-II Kings and come up with an approximate timeline for the kings of Israel and Judah.

That being said, it is only an approximate timeline. We can use Jehu and Ahab to illustrate the problem scholars face with all the kings of Israel and Judah. Provan notes that there is about a 12-13-year span between Ahab’s fighting in 853 BC and Jehu’s tribute payment in 841 BC. Yet according biblical chronology, the reigns of the two kings between Ahab and Jehu (Ahaziah and Jehoram) total 14 years. That obviously doesn’t make sense. Of course, this isn’t that big of a problem, once one considers the possible explanations.

• (1) Postdating/Ascension year system: This means that the writer of I-II Kings ignores any year that preceded the first New Year of the new king’s reign, thus making the king’s reign appear shorter. So, if a king came to the throne in August of a year, the writer would only count his “first year” as beginning the following January. Thus, if we are told a king reigned for 16 years, in reality, it may have been 16 ½ years for all we know.
• (2) Antedating: This means that the writer might include the year preceding the first New Year of the new king’s reign, thus making the king’s reign appear longer. So, if a king came to the throne in August, the writer would count that entire year as his first year.
• (3) Co-regency: Then there is the occasionally occurrence of co-regency, where a father is getting too old to reign, so his son takes the throne, thus technically there are two kings reigning at the same time.

For these reasons, we have to acknowledge that that our chronology of the reigns of the kings of Israel and Judah are ultimately just approximate dates that provide us with the general dates for each king’s reign. And although most instances are not significant, there are, nevertheless a few that are problematic. I’ll touch upon one regarding the reigns of Ahaz and Hezekiah in the next post.

The Reign of Solomon
I Kings tells us that Solomon reigned for 40 years, and according to most timelines, he reigned from roughly 970-930 BC. Despite the typical Sunday school version of Solomon we all have heard (i.e. Solomon was a great, wise, and rich king until the end of his life when he “went bad” with foreign wives), the actual account in I Kings 1-11 is a whole lot more problematic. First, the account of his rise to power in I Kings 1-2 is, as Provan puts it, “A plausible story of political intrigue of political intrigue and plotting” (330), in which are subtly raised a number of questions regarding Solomon’s (and Bathsheba’s) innocence in his ascension to the throne. Simply put, it looks like a rather sordid and bloody affair.

Second, there is the fact that the first thing Solomon does, once he is established on the throne, is to marry Pharaoh’s daughter. He then reorganizes his kingdom into twelve regions, with each one having a district officer who was responsible for providing for the king and the royal household on an annual payment. Thus, not only is Solomon portrayed as almost Pharaoh-like (not a good thing!), but he also obliterates the traditional tribal boundaries.

Thirdly, there is the reality of his extensive building projects, most notably the Temple and his royal palace (as well as the Millo, the wall of Jerusalem, and projects throughout Israel).Such building projects obviously require a labor force. So, where did Solomon get his labor force? I Kings 9:15-23 tells us that Solomon conscripted workers from the Canaanite population of Israel: 30,000 Canaanites, supervised by 550 officials. Yet in addition, I Kings 5:15-18 tells us that he also had 150,000 Israelites supervised by 3,300 foremen. Ironically, the richest and wisest king in Israel’s history proved himself to be rather Pharaoh-like in his reigns—a rather harsh slap in the face to the Jews in exile: “We are in exile because even our greatest king wasn’t fully committed to YHWH.”

Finally, the facts that Solomon’s foreign marriages brought in numerous foreign gods into Jerusalem and his kingdom immediately split apart shortly after his death also points to the harsh reality that his reign was deeply problematic, and not a wonderful and great as the official narrative claimed. Thus, what we see the writer of I Kings 1-11 doing is mouthing the official narrative that Solomon was a great king (and in some ways, he was), but then showing the various things he did that weren’t so great, leaving the reader to ponder the complexities and contradictions of Solomon’s reign.

Solomon’s Power and Problematic Reign
How great and expansive was Solomon’s kingdom? Provan argues that it wasn’t a great as we tend to assume it was. In terms of world powers, it still was a fairly minor kingdom. Provan points out that scholars have long-noticed how “Solomon’s sphere of influence…corresponds to the ideal of Genesis 15:18,” and have thus questioned the historical reliability of I Kings 1-11. Provan responds by saying just because Solomon’s reign is portrayed as a “golden age” that conforms to the ideal of Genesis 15:18 (i.e. a bit of ideology at work in the narrative), that doesn’t mean that the whole thing is an unhistorical fabrication.

In regard to Solomon’s relationship with King Hiram of Tyre, Provan argues that although II Chronicles 8:2 suggests Hiram might have been a vassal to Solomon, in reality we don’t know. But it does seem that Solomon was able to exercise a certain level of economic/political dominance over Palestine for a short time. In reality, though, the biblical text doesn’t suggest Solomon held the military might of a major world power.

One final thing I Kings 1-11 emphasizes about Solomon was that his turn to the worship of other gods had the devastating effect of solidifying Israel’s tendencies to religious syncretism. Anyone who knows anything about Old Testament Israel know that Israel always had problems with worshipping other gods. So, Solomon did not introduce religious syncretism, but he certainly normalized it. In addition, I Kings 1-11 also shows that Solomon’s apostacy coincided with the rise of opposition to him.

All in all, there were three main enemies of Solomon: (1) Hadad, who was a victim of David’s wars (II Sam. 8:3-14), a refugee in Egypt, and who then returned to Edom; (2) Rezon, a survivor of the battle in II Sam. 8:3-4 who was unwilling to submit to imperial rule in Jerusalem. His private army took control of Damascus for a time; and then there was (3) Jeroboam, who was first approached by the prophet Ahijah outside of Jerusalem. Solomon tried to kill him, but he escaped to Egypt. Later on, after Solomon’s death, Jeroboam returned, confronted Solomon’s son Rehoboam, and eventually became the king of the ten northern tribes, known at the kingdom of Israel.

Conclusion
I have provided a few points about Solomon’s reign that Provan did not discuss in his chapter on Solomon in order to flesh out a few items that show how the writer of I Kings 1-11 depicts Solomon as almost Pharaoh-like in many ways. Nevertheless, what Provan emphasizes about the chronology in I-II Kings in an important thing to realize. It is also important to get a clearer picture about the extent of Solomon’s kingdom and the power he actually held. Simply put, despite the ideal “official picture” given in I Kings 1-11, in reality, Solomon’s kingdom was a rather minor kingdom that was easily dwarfed by the major surrounding world powers.