1 Kings 3:1-3

Solomon’s attitudes 3:1-3

Should Solomon have married Pharaoh’s daughter? In view of 1 Kings 11:1-2 and 2 Chronicles 8:11 there is no way we can say yes. Furthermore, Solomon already had a wife when he married Pharaoh’s daughter (1 Kings 14:21; cf. Genesis 2:24). Why then did the writer not point out this sin here? He may have not done so because his purpose in this part of his history was to show the greatness of Solomon. In chapter 11 he emphasized Solomon’s failures. Here it is the fact that he could marry such a person as an Egyptian princess, that shows the social and political height to which God had elevated him. A descendant of former Egyptian slaves now became Pharaoh’s son-in-law!

"Under Solomon, the relationship between Egypt and Israel reached an apex with the marriage alliance between the two nations (1 Kings 3:1)." [Note: James K. Hoffmeier, "Egypt As an Arm of Flesh: A Prophetic Response," in Israel’s Apostasy and Restoration: Essays in Honor of Roland K. Harrison, p. 81.]

"This illustrates both the relative importance of Israel and the low estate to which Egypt had sunk: Pharaohs of the Empire did not give their daughters even to kings of Babylon or Mitanni!" [Note: John Bright, A History of Israel, p. 191.]

At this time Israel was stronger than Egypt.

"That this is the case is clear from his [Pharaoh Siamun’s, 978-959 B.C.] willingness to provide his own daughter as a wife for Solomon, a concession almost without parallel in Egyptian history since it was a candid admission to the world of Egypt’s weakness and conciliation. Normally Egyptian kings took foreign princesses but did not give up their own daughters to foreign kings." [Note: Eugene H. Merrill, Kingdom of Priests, p. 292. Cf. Alan Schulman, "Diplomatic Marriage in the Egyptian New Kingdom," Journal of Near Eastern Studies 38 (1979):190-91.]

There is much evidence of the immense influence and prestige that Solomon enjoyed in his day. [Note: See Alberto Green, "Israelite Influence at Shishak’s Court?" Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 233 (1979):59-62.] Solomon housed his bride in the City of David until he completed a special palace for her nearby (1 Kings 7:8).

The Israelites were offering sacrifices to Yahweh on the "high places" that the Ras Shamra tablets describe as open-air sanctuaries throughout the land. The Ras Shamra tables are important inscriptions that archaeologists discovered at the Canaanite site of Ugarit, just east of Cyprus on the Mediterranean coast. They contain much helpful information about Canaanite life and culture. These sacrificial sites were normally on hilltops. The Israelites evidently took them over from the Canaanites and converted them into centers of Yahweh worship. Before the giving of the Mosaic Law, worship on high places was not evil (cf. Genesis 12:7-8; Genesis 22:2-4; Genesis 31:54). However, the Law forbade offering sacrifices at places other than those God approved, and especially at sites of Canaanite altars, after Israel built the temple in Jerusalem (Deuteronomy 12:1-21; 2 Chronicles 7:12). Evidently at this time the people justified their disobedience on the ground that they did not have a permanent palace where Yahweh could dwell (i.e., a temple). Another possibility is that they did not consider worship at high places wrong until the king reunited the ark and a tabernacle in a central sanctuary (i.e., the temple; cf. 1 Samuel 9:11-25). [Note: Patterson and Austel, p. 44.]

The only deviation from the Law that the writer ascribed to Solomon at this early time in his reign was his worship at the high places (1 Kings 3:3). Otherwise Solomon followed God faithfully, except for his polygamy.

"Silently, invisibly, like an incubating virus, sin was at work throughout Solomon’s reign and in the end broke out in violent, destructive force. Such is the nature of sin." [Note: Rice, p. 31.]

Love here (1 Kings 3:3) does not express a feeling only but more fundamentally a commitment to Yahweh that manifests itself in obedience to His Word (cf. 1 John 5:3). Solomon’s commitment, like David’s, accounted for much of the blessing that came on the king and through him to the people.