1 Kings 3:16

SOLOMON JUDGED A VERY DIFFICULT CASE

"Then there came two women that were harlots, unto the king, and stood before him. And the one woman said, Oh, my lord, I and this woman dwell in one house; and I was delivered of a child with her in the house. And it came to pass the third day after I was delivered, that this woman was delivered also; and we were together; there was no stranger with us in the house, save we two in the house. And this woman's child died in the night, because she lay upon it. And she arose at midnight, and took my son from beside me, while thy handmaid slept, and laid it in her bosom, and laid her dead child in my bosom. And when I arose in the morning to give my child suck, behold it was dead; but when I had looked at it in the morning, behold, it was not my son which I did bear. And the other woman said, Nay; but the living is my son, and the dead is thy son. And this said, No; but the dead is thy son, and the living is my son. Thus they spake before the king."

This was indeed a difficult case. It resembles other similar instances in antiquity. "A certain Thracian king was asked to choose between three men, each of whom claimed to be the son and heir of the dead Cimmerian king. He ordered the three men to cast a spear into the corpse of the dead king; and when one of them refused to do so, he was chosen."[11]