In Our Time - King Solomon

Episode Date: June 7, 2012

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the biblical king Solomon, celebrated for his wisdom and as the architect of the First Temple in Jerusalem. According to the Old Testament account of his life, Solomon was chosen as his father David's successor as Israelite king, and instead of praying for long life or wealth asked God for wisdom. In the words of the Authorised Version, "And there came of all people to hear the wisdom of Solomon, from all kings of the earth, which had heard of his wisdom." Solomon is an important figure in Judaism, Islam and Christianity alike, and is also credited with the authorship of several scriptural texts. His name is associated with the tradition of wisdom literature and with a large number of myths and legends. For many centuries Solomon was seen as the archetypal enlightened monarch, and his example influenced notions of kingship from the Middle Ages onwards.With:Martin PalmerDirector of the International Consultancy on Religion, Education, and CulturePhilip AlexanderEmeritus Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of ManchesterKatharine DellSenior Lecturer in Old Testament Studies at the University of Cambridge, and Fellow of St Catherine's College, CambridgeProducer: Thomas Morris.

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. We have Satola is one motto. When I'm parhamillaing lot, is the parliamiavacus is no euro. We can then senderhan to use to see what really wants, which onen and Iloon do. Muwagra, huoletone, coti. Hi, are you,

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Burkering kielkeen Raikas Pancho Lemonade. Burger week, Panso Villazza. Thanks for downloading the In Our Time podcast. For more details about In Our Time and for our terms of use, please go to BBC.co.com.uk forward slash radio four. I hope you enjoy the program. Hello, when George II was crowned in 1727, George Frederick Handel composed an anthem for the occasion.

It's a brief and ecstatic work in praise of wise and enlightened rulers and proved so popular that it's been performed. formed at every British coronation since. It begins, Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet anointed Solomon, King. And all the people rejoiced and said, God save the King, long live the King.

May the King live forever. The ideal monarch, according to the Handel, is a figure from the Old Testament, King Solomon. Fane for his wisdom, Solomon has inspired a wealth of literature and legend, and is revered in Judaism, Christianity and Islam alike. He celebrated as the architect of the first temple of Jerusalem, and in the Middle Ages and Renaissance

was commonly depicted in art as the personification of the just and wise ruler. With me to discuss King Solomon are, Martin Palmer, director of the international consultancy on religion, education and culture, Philip Alexander, Emeritus Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Manchester, and Catherine Dell,

senior lecturer in Old Testament studies at the University of Cambridge and a fellow of St. Catherine's College, Cambridge. Martin Palmer, before we get to Solomon himself, we do tell us a bit about his father, David, the kingdom he ruled and left. I think we need to look at David to start with because he's such a contrast to what we then have with Solomon. David comes to the throne of the united kingdoms of Israel and Judah

around about 10, 20 BC. And he reigns for 40 years, 33 of those years, as king of both combined countries. Because at that time, the 10 tribes in the north formed Israel and the two tribes in the south formed. Judah. And he is an extraordinary figure. He really is our first sort of modern man and modern

biography. We know his angsts. We know his foibles and his weaknesses. We know, of course, the story of his seduction of Bathsheba and the way that he then has her husband, Uriah, killed in order that he can marry her. We know of his anxiousness

about rebellion and about his sons, in particular, his son Absalom, who rebels against him twice and in the end is killed. And this terrible outcry of pain that comes from that. We know about his love for Jonathan, the son of his great opponent, Saul, the first king of United Israel and Judah. And we have a very rounded figure of a flawed, damaged, violent, brilliant, military,

compassionate, devout man who darned. half naked in front of the temple, in front of the ark and so forth. So he is, we know a lot about him as a personality. And so, and then here we go to Solomon. You're building up for a contrast, though, my hand. I think everybody listening is waiting for the contrast to come. You guessed.

And then his tense, his tense son, Solomon, who was the son by Bathsheba, was elevated. told through the machinations about Schipper to be his successor and what is the, how did that happen as I've outlined or was there more to it than that? Well, there is more to that. I mean, we know that he has to put down not so much a rebellion, but an attempt by one of his other brothers, an older brother with a better claim, Adoniah, to the throne. And he pardons this semi-revolt by his older brother, but then has him murdered.

This is Solomon. This is Solomon. Solomon's reign begins, as pretty much all the rains around that time, begin with the putting down of any other claimants. But he also has put to death David's great military commander, a brutal, brilliant man, Joab. And yes, I mean, I think the trouble with the Solomon figure, as we get him in the Bible, is that we get flashes of a personality. So, for example, the whole incident where his mother actually promotes him Bashiba, pushes him forward. Nathan, the prophet, Zadok the priest, support his case. We hear also at the end of his reign as how he loses the favour of God, because he's married so many foreign wives and set up so many temples for them, that he's essentially abandoned his worship of God.

But for the rest of it, the contrast is rather like, with David we've got a sort of Churchillian figure, where we know him warts and all. an awful lot of Solomon is like trying to read about Kim Il-sung. He's so elevated into the status of this semi-deified being that actually the rounded personality that we get of David, or of Saul, the first king, disappears. And we get glimpses of the real man at the beginning and the end of his reign. But for the rest of it, it is a bit of a hagiography,

a bit of a kind of makeover, sort of sun king. Yes, this is a great end crustacea. of legend, but we'll go into that in a while. Catherine Del, can you tell us the main biblical sources for our knowledge of Solomon? Yes, well there are two main accounts. The first one is in one Kings, one to 12, and the second in two chronicles, one to nine.

Both in the Old Testament. Both in the Old Testament. And interestingly, they both cover the same material, but the chronicler feels that he needs to rewrite it, so we get differences between the accounts. But the main account is, in the Kings, account and we're introduced to Solomon, his accession, his consolidation of his reign. There are these violent put-downs of enemies, but after that it's very much a peaceful reign and

he gets on with the administration and with being wise and this, of course, is something that he's particularly noted for, and then the main task is actually building the temple, and there's a huge emphasis on that in the king's account with great detail. then he's also building his own palace and he's doing other works across his estate. So really building works takes up a great deal of his time. And then the passage ends actually in 1 Kings 11 with the only real criticism of Solomon, which is this liking for foreign women and then sort of condemnation for following after other cults. And then the chronicler sort of takes this up and repeats a great deal.

of it, but he actually irons out any suggestion of any hostility in the rain. And he portrays the handover between David and Solomon as absolutely meant to be and very, very natural and very God-blessed. And then any other signs of hostility and the bit about the foreign wives, that's all absent. He plays down the wisdom aspect in favour of the temple, because that's what he wants to stress that at his own time the temple was of key importance and this is after in fact the destruction of the temple after the exile so he's wanting to lavishly portrayed solomon's temple as a kind of retrospect and this is where both accounts are very much idealized and perhaps we have to take them with a slight historical pinch of salt can we just say even more about that first temple you've

mentioned it two or three times. So people who don't know as much as you three do about that first novel, why is it given such essential significance? Well, I think it's because the narrative tells us that there is the Ark of the Covenant where in dwells the presence of God, and of course it contains the tablets of stone, which Moses supposedly brought down from Mount Sinai, the Ten Commandments. and this Ark needs a permanent home. And this is something that David was exercised by,

but he didn't actually get to building a temple. He was very much concerned with military matters, really. And so Solomon is designated as the one who's going to build the temple. And so a resting place for the Ark is the prime concern. Also, I think there's a political agenda because there is an issue about centralisation of worship. There were lots of high places and lots of different pagan practices going on, mixed sometimes with Israelite practices.

And there was a bit of a concern, particularly by the time the account was being written up. And of course we have to distinguish between the original era of Solomon and the time of writing. And that, again, is when it's a prime concern, really, to consolidate and make the faith centered on the temple. Am I right to say that there was a time when different peoples, different tribes even, each had their own gods and as it were got on with it, and the notion that this one god should be universally recognised was still in the shadows? There's a whole debate about how the ideas about one god developed, but yes, there are certainly variant practices at different shrines, and arguably there were people worshipping a Yahweh of Saman. or Yahweh of Bethel, and whether this was one of them the same, is slightly debated.

So, yes, there was a danger, really, of a kind of breakup of the religion. So there was this concern to centralise it. And the building of the temple itself is described in very lavish terms. And it's supposed to be made of cedar wood and cypress, stone, with elaborate carvings of angels and lions and lions and... flowers and all overlaid with gold. I mean, it just sounds the most splendid construction ever. Can you tell us briefly what these texts have to say about Solomon's wisdom,

which is most highly regarded? Well, the first introduction to that is when Solomon has a dream at Ghibeah, and basically he requests in this dream of God to give him discernment, to give him wisdom. but he doesn't ask for anything more. And God then replies and says, because you haven't asked for more, I'm going to give you more. It's often the way, isn't it?

So he says, well, I will give you riches and longevity and all these blessings because you haven't asked for them. But this reputation for wisdom then goes on. There's a scene in Kings when Solomon is asked to judge between the claims of two women to a baby, and he suggests cutting the baby in half

in order to settle the claim. And so, of course, the real mother jumps up and says, no, you can't possibly do that. Let the other woman have the baby. I'd rather see him live. And the false mother agrees to the pact. And so Solomon says, this is the way he's discovered the truth of the issue.

Philip Alexander, can you first give us some idea of when the, texts that Catherine's been talking about were written down? Well, the general impression among scholars is that these texts were written very long after the events

that they're supposed to describe. 300 years, that sort of thing? Well, if you think Solomon is sort of 970 to 930 BC, these texts were written during probably the Babylonian exile, which is from 586 to 538, so do the maths yourself.

It's quite a long time. And they're part of what scholars call the Deuteronomistic history, Deuteronomic history. And they're written from a very, very strong ideological perspective of the worship of the one true God. And really they trace, they judge everything that happens in history

according to whether the king or the person is doing the right thing. They're very pure. botanical texts. And this is one of the themes, I think, of the biblical account. It's a kind of Puritan view of King Solomon. So they're hugely ideological and very, very difficult to get behind to the real historical Solomon.

What's your assessment of what was happening in the region during Solomon's reign? If you want to understand anything about the history of ancient Israel, you've really got to know something of its geography. Ancient Israel lies in the little land bridge between the desert in the east and the Mediterranean Sea in the west, a narrow, fertile strip. A bridge, a land bridge which connects the great river valleys of the Tigris Euphrates, i.e. Iraq and Egypt, the Nile Valley. Now, the Tigris Euphrates Valley and the Nile Valley can sustain great empires. They have the fertility, they have the resources, and that's where you find the big power blocks in antiquity.

In the time of Solomon in Iraq, it was Assyria. Egypt was Egypt. Now, this was a period of weakness in both those great centres of power, for all sorts of complicated reasons. was a time of movement of peoples. There were peoples pressing in from the west, from the east, from the desert area, called Arameans. There were people coming from the west. And it was a bit like the Viking period in Europe.

It caused chaos, it caused disaster, it caused problems, and political weakness. Now that gave a little window of opportunity for the little statelets of Syria-Palestine to rise to some prominence. And this is why I think under Solomon you have for the one period in history a mini ancient Israelite empire is because of the great weaknesses

of the two great power blocks to the north and the south. He seems to have got hold of from three major trade routes and made money from that. Yes, I mean the main one I think was probably the spice route up from the size route up from the south, and this links in with the Queen of Sheba, who will probably say more about later,

that she was on the spice route. The tradition has it that he founded a port at Etzion Gever, which is on the Gulf of Eilat, near modern Eilat, and that was to try and exploit that eastern trade by sea. So that was the main trade route running up through Jordan, and up to Damascus and that kind of area. And he was sitting across it, and he made money out of that probably. And he had an alliance with the Phoenicians, which took him into the Mediterranean,

he kept in west. Yeah. I mean, his alliance with the Phoenicians is very interesting. They were clearly, if you read the narrative carefully, the more powerful state. They wouldn't have let him actually impinge on their westward trade. They wouldn't let him muscle in on that. But they helped him set up an eastward trading

connection. According to the biblical narrative, he used Phoenician sailors. They were great sailors. So the picture in the Bible is of a very amicable relationship with Hiram, the King of Tyre. But if you read it very carefully, clearly Solomon ran up debts with Hiram. There was an imbalance of payments, if you like.

And according to the biblical narrative, he had to see 20 villages in the northern part of his kingdom to hire him. And this may be because he'd run up such debts that he couldn't pay them off. Martin Palmer, what challenges did Solomon face? I mean, Philip has indicated that this was an opportunity for him. The great empires were in a period of subsided in some way and he could open up. Well, we've heard what he said. What challenges did he face?

And we get to wealth later, right. Well, I think, as Phillips indicated, First and foremost, he overspent, dramatically overspent. And as Catherine was saying, he spent seven years building the temple. He spent 13 years building his own palace, and he didn't stint himself on that score. Not only did he run up these huge debts and this immense obligation to Hiram at Tyat, but he also put his own people into effectively servitude. He did what his father David had never done.

His father David had made the foreigners, the conquered people, into levies of enforced labour for the building of the fortifications. Slaves, effectively, yes, exactly. And he imposed upon his own people, and this was a great crime, certainly as far as the Deuteronic historian is concerned. He made his own people into slave labour for a period of time each year. He also taxed them very heavily, so much so that when he dies, the tribes come to his successor, Rehoboam,

and say, will you lift this terrible burden that your father has placed upon us? And Rehaboam, not one of nature's brightest, I think, goes away and consults with the elders who say, yes, lift it. And then talks to his young men who've grown up in the court of this oriental despot, and they say, no, make it even harder. And he comes back with this famous phrase,

My father scourged you with whips, I will scourge you with scorpion. So he is sitting on a rebellion, and that's what actually breaks out. But then he's also got actual rebels like Jeroboam, who rebels against him in the northern kingdom, flees to Egypt, is given sanctuary there and then comes back. He loses land to Haddad the Edomite, who comes in and invades and takes back land.

He loses Damascus. So his empire is crumbling and is rotten within. the main challenges are therefore from within and we again we're relying on a narrative that we will explore later in the programme within and comes a few centuries later and has got its own inner purpose right the way down

Catherine Dell you've talked a little bit about what you've told us all about the building of the first temple we see we learn of a building program he had was this to glorify himself to glorify God or to establish his rule Is there any sense whatsoever of the motivation there? Well, obviously it's all presented as if it's to glorify God,

but I'm sure there must have been an element of self-aggrandizement on his part, on Solomon's part. One gets the impression of someone with a bit of an ego, really, and just the lavishness of the whole temple operation. And then the palace operation, as Martin said, that took 13 years, even longer than the temple. took, so it must have been even more lavish. And we're told about, you know, the gold cups that he uses.

And no expense is spared. But I think a lot of this is about show, you know, it's almost glass and mirrors, really. Somebody likened Solomon to the Wizard of Oz. And I thought that was quite an amusing comparison. You know, that there's a lot of show and perhaps a slightly passive man behind it, actually, I think, in some ways. When you think of how he came to the throne and how he's a bit of a pawn, in the game of the accession and how he's a peacemaker. I think actually I get this impression of a, okay, yes, he did do the forced labour,

and he had some aspects of his character, which were not so great. But I think in general, you know, he has a more passive stance than people have sometimes recognised. Can we take this building on, Philip Alexander? I think people would like to know these great buildings, the jewels, the wealth. again insofar as we know from the scriptures really. Was this out of kilter at the time? This wise man, this man who had a certain spirituality. David, we were talking.

David had hardly anything. He was a soldier. He kept the stay together. The idea of living for the spirit was more important. And here's this man building palaces, temples, jewels, and all the rest of it. Well, if he wanted to be a great king, he had to build. there had to be this element of display. But I think there's an even more fundamental question

as to whether there's any historical accuracy to this. And this really brings us to one of the big debates of modern archaeology of ancient Israel. The biblical record says that he not only built the temple, he built his house, which as Catherine said took almost twice as long as the temple, but he built also chariot cities. And he built some sort of

structure in Jerusalem called the Milo. And this has caused a lot of debate as exactly what this is. So as part of his splendor as an Oriental monarch, he had to have big buildings behind him. But the question is, is there any historical accuracy to any of this? Now, four of the sites that are mentioned in the biblical narrative, Jerusalem itself, the city of David, McGiddo, Gezer and Hatzor have all been very thoroughly dug, or at least reasonably thoroughly dug. And the big question is whether there is any of the structures

that the archaeologists have discovered out of anything whatever to do with Solomon. And the minimalist interpretation is that there is absolutely nothing to do with Solomon in any of the structures discovered. For example, at McGidow, in the 1920s, I think it was, they discovered what they thought were stables. And they carefully calculated that there was something like 400 horses could have been stabled in these stables.

And this would have been quite remarkable because David didn't use chariots. The implication seemed to be that it was Solomon introduced chariots into ancient Israel. There was also a particular form of fortified gate to the city, which was also found at two of the other sites, Gezer and Khatsur, and this was identified as Solomonic. The trouble is other archaeologists say, A, the stables weren't stables, and B, they weren't from the time of King Solomon.

The gates were not from the time of King Solomon probably a hundred or so years later. The really interesting one is Jerusalem itself, where people think they have found this structure called the Milo. and it's a kind of stepped terrace within the city which may well have supported a considerable palatial building on top but it's hugely debated as to whether this has anything to do with Solomon at all. Some people say yes, some people say no. You've discussed the minimalist position, there's also the maximalist position

I don't know whether Catherine wants to come in on there. Well I think I would be more maximalist and minimalist on this, But, yes, basically, there was a lot of confidence when these structures were uncovered at Hatzor, Meghido in places. There was actually some kind of unified mind behind these structures, that they had a certain similarity. And I think that's one of the key points, is that this looks like some kind of structured program of building.

In the 20th century, you know, archaeologists were very much positive, about this. But it just seems, you know, in the last 10 or 15 years that there's been this kind of undercutting of that evidence. There was also an accompanying move in scholarship towards thinking of a Solomonic Enlightenment,

particularly looking at parallels with Egypt, looking at Solomon's large administration, and how he may well have had models of administration from Egypt. Of course, he married a Pharaoh's daughter, so he had Egyptian connections there. But this big theory of a

Alamoic Enlightenment has also been downgraded in the last 15 years or so in the scholarship. So, you know, you feel at one point in time we seem to have a lot of evidence and we were being very positive about the whole thing and now we're being very negative about the whole thing. And I'd quite like to retain some sense of that more maximalist. Yes, I mean, I think I would too. I gave the minimalist position because most people start from a maximalist position. We've been rolling along maximalism, namely quite a pretty, pleasantly,

I think that's the important point, the minimalism punctures this big bubble. We like punctures. As long as we bring our cycle kit withs. All right, Martin Palmer, talking about extravagance, we are told he had a surprisingly rounded number

of 300 wives and 700 concubines. No, the other way round. The other way round. I just put 300,700. All legitimate than illegit. Either way. It's rather a lot. And it's very neat, isn't it?

Yes. And so that raises perhaps a suspicion of two about the authenticity of these figures. Well, I think the interesting thing about Solomon is that his significance, I think, is not actually about being a historical figure. I think it is about being this figure onto whom a huge number of myths and aspirations and ideals were projected. I mean, as Philip said, most of the material that we have which tell us about him was written some 500 years, 400 years, 400. years after he actually lived. And to some extent, we have a son king. We have a figure onto whom you project everything that you would like to see,

everything that you would like to feel had once been there. We do the same sort of thing with our own history, Richard the Lionheart, who was basically a fairly thuggish chap. We elevated into the status of this model of chivalry, but we only did that quite a few centuries afterwards when memory of what he'd actually done had faced. did. So there is, I think, the significance in a sense, within both the biblical and in the post-biblical, within the Christian, Jewish and Muslim literature, is not whether we can prove

that he built all these things, but that we want him to have been that kind of ruler. And have had that relationship with wealth, with women, with wisdom, and with God. I think just to be a little bit maximalist, I mean, the figures are clearly rounded, 700 and 300. But Oriental monarchs at that time did have big harimes and they were extremely important. Many of them were dynastic alliances.

So there is a core of plausibility that if Solomon existed, if he had some kind of status as a regional king, he would have had a big harim. Catherine, I want to go to the Queen of Sheba unless you, while we're in the women thing, the Queen of Shiba is a specific example

of a woman who, a well, and the ruler in her own down in the Yemen, she came to see him, we're told to visit this magnificent king. That's right. And can you tell us a little about that? Well, in the accounts in kings and in chronicles,

it's fairly straight in that she just comes to visit King Solomon because she had heard of his renown and his wisdom and his wealth. And she is not disappointed. When she arrives, she gets the full impression of this, wise king and in fact she enjoys riddling with him.

So one has a sort of picture of the two of them bantering and riddling and setting puzzles for each other. And I know that was taken up also in Jewish tradition. But then there are no sexual overtones. Since then, you know, people have said that there were and of course there's an Ethiopic tradition of her having a son by Solomon. But in the biblical text itself, that isn't hinted at. The only thing that might be a hint is that it says that Solomon fulfilled her every desire.

So what exactly her every desire was is left open. Do we... Shall we move on from that, the concubines? We think that that could be right. We're in this very nice territory, really, of where is truth and where's scholarship. It's very enjoyable that you lot are just as puzzled as we are, but still. Does the buildings give us more evidence now that archaeology has put its trowel in

than the scriptures, the sort of evidence that you would take to be more certain evidence? I don't really think so because there are huge questions about the dating of the actual archaeological, the buildings. I think we really have to go on the written text themselves. And I feel contrary to, you know, the minimalist position, that if this is totally made up,

then there's an awful lot of very puzzling detail in there that's totally irrelevant to any kind of fictional character. So, for example, Solomon to me must be much more rooted in history than King Arthur, because there are lists of officials, there are lists of administrative districts, all sorts of kind of irrelevant stuff, which doesn't make any sense of it's pure fiction. So I think there is some kind of historical core

But you get it from the written record Rather than really relying on the archaeology If we'd just the archaeology We'd know nothing about Solomon How did this kingdom come to an end, Catherine? Well, in fact his own son was set to inherit And but because of We're told it the king's account

Of all these foreign wives And then the foreign cults Solomon is to be punished after his death with the division of his kingdom. God rejected him, we tell him, yes, God rejects him, but he doesn't do it before his death. The division is made after his death.

And this is where we've got then the challenge that I think Martin mentioned earlier from Jeroboam and the plea that Rehoboam, I'm getting muddled with all these non-names. There's Jeroboam to come. That Rehaboam, which is Solomon's son, be more merciful to his people and give up this forced labour.

And of course he says that he won't do that. And so the people of Israel, which then becomes the northern kingdom, the ten tribes of the north, break away. So Rehoboam is really left with very little, a sort of runt of a state really in the south. That's what we're told in the account. So he narrates from the great King David, and he builds on that.

I'm just as to summarise, we've got trade routes, We've got wealth, we've got buildings. Let's take the maximum of this position. We've got jewels who've got visits from the Queen of Shiva and so on and so forth. Then it falls away and diminishes almost back to what it was before David. Geraboam actually worships two golden calves. We're immediately into paganism.

Martin Palmer, so let's develop an idea which you've already taken on. Why was his reign was, and still is, by a lot of people, thought of us the greater golden age of priests, prosperity and wisdom. Why is it so illuminatingly outstanding? Well, I think Catherine made a very good point earlier, which is that Solomon's reign was, by the standards of the rest of the history of the kings of Israel and Judah, a peaceful time. He did actually rule over a country in which for 40 years, yes, there were odd rebellions, there were incursions, there were problems, but he wasn't facing, as Philip said, he wasn't facing the nutcracker impact of Assyria from the north and Egypt from the south, invading

and trying to take over his kingdom. So at one level, we do have a period, which is pretty much unique in Israelite history, of a settled time without too many invaders in incursions. Saul and David has seen off the Philistines to a great degree, and so it was a time of success. It was obviously also a time of wealth because of the trade routes. So there is this kernel of truth that historically it was a period in which it was possible to be relatively wealthy and relatively peaceful. And then out of that comes this image of this very wise king. And I think again, Catherine's point is a fascinating one about him being

really quite passive figure. He's not out to invade. He's not out to create a great empire. He's basically making the best of what he's got. But then there grows this, there is this sense of casting back on this one figure who has flaws, he kills off the opposition, he does lose God's favour. But somehow he retains this sense that here is the model of what we would like to have a king. It's as though he's the West Wing president of Israel. Can we come to you, Philip Alexander, to talk a bit more about this wisdom.

There was a tradition of wisdom literature, Egyptian, Assyrian. Is there evidence that he took it on and developed it or what happened there? Well, certainly he's very much associated with wisdom texts. And in fact, three of the biblical texts that are thought of as wisdom were attributed to him, the book of proverbs, the Song of Songs, and the... Ecclesiastes, thank you, Kohelet. Keep thinking the Hebrew title for Kohelet, Ecclesiasties.

The scholarly opinion clearly is he'd nothing to do with those. Some people think he may have something to do with proverbs, but it shows he was linked with wisdom. Now this wisdom really begins with the scribal movement, which the scribes were kind of administrators of large states, and these people were kind of international in their outlook. Scrabble movement were, where are we talking about? Israel, Egypt.

Any large state would have had to have had some, So back in Egyptian history and the Syrian history, back in the Syrian Babylonia. Any large state which was dealing with foreign countries needed very educated people who knew foreign languages and could deal in correspondence with foreign kings and so on. And that brought them into contact with ideas and other countries. So for example, if you were a scribe in Israel, you would know the Akkadian language which was the international language. It meant you could read Acadian literature.

So they began this sort of wisdom literature to deal with how you live your life, how you are a good administrator at court and so on. And then gradually these scribes took on a more religious aspect. And they began to deal with laws, with religious practices. And they came into conflict with the priests who were seen as the traditional guardian. of that knowledge.

So Solomon was very much seen as the patron saint, if you like, of this kind of international wisdom. And it stands in some opposition to the priestly tradition. But Catherine is a great expert on this. I would defer to Catherine on this. Well, I just wanted to be maximalist again and disagree with the point when you said that Solomon himself doesn't have a huge amount

perhaps to do with the actual wisdom books. because although the attribution to him often would be honorary, I do think particularly in Proverbs, you know, there are lots of individual Proverbs in the Book of Proverbs and they're all mostly attributed to Solomon. And then we read in One Kings that actually, you know, he uttered 3,000 Proverbs and 1,05 songs. And I think there is this connection.

I find it hard to believe that not one proverb in the Book of Proverbs came from Solomon's mouth, if you see what I mean. And then there's the song of songs or song of Solomon Where there are actually five references to Solomon There's references the curtains of Solomon, the litter of Solomon, Solomon's wedding There's a number of overtones of Solomon And also there's a sort of kingly roleplay, King and Queen roleplay between the lovers

That's also reminiscent of the king And just one more thing is that Ecclesiastes Also takes on a persona of Solomon and although it's described as being taught the teacher who presents this, or the preacher, who was author of this work, in fact, it is said that he is the son of David King in Jerusalem. So there's another close link with Solomon, so I'd want to stress that aspect of it.

Christ quotes Solomon, even Solomon in all this blur, is not a read like one of these, the lilies of the field, but I'd like to talk, Martin, a little about how Solomon's seen in Islam. Well, you have both in Judaism and Islam, a whole collection of fabulous stories. and I use that word quite advisedly. Solomon becomes not only the great ruler of Israel, he becomes the ruler of all creatures,

he can speak the language of all animals and birds, he can even command and control the devils. And the stories are fascinating because they are totally over the top, but very often what they contain within them is a seed of the humiliation or the humbling of Solomon. So he has this power, but every so often, for example, the ant humbles him by saying,

well, you may be the greatest, but I'm the smallest, and actually I've humbled you. In Islam, there is no humbling. In the Islamic versions of these stories, he is only ever the great and the wise and the achiever. And he is considered one of the prophets of Islam, along with David. He is seen as the embodiment of the wise ruler, which is why the Ottomans had so many Suleiman rulers. Suleiman being the Islamic word for Solomon. So in Islam, he is absolutely the model of the ruler.

And this fits very well with Islamic theology, because in Islamic theology, the caliph is the appointed one of God who has been given the role of Gadifa, of vice-regent for God, to rule over the whole of creation, over everything, over human life, over animal life, over everything, and is on trial before God for maintaining the pure, of that role, so that the notion of a wise ruler was so fundamental to Islam's own sense of its importance that Solomon cannot have feet of clay. In Judaism, very often there is just that moment

where this great ruler is just that little bit humbled. Can I come to you, Philip? Where would you say the scholarly perception of Solomon? sits now today? Well, I think it's very conflicted, and we've seen this in our discussion between maximalists and minimalists. Has legend over taking history, in a way? I think it has,

but I think there's a kind of consensus emerging between me and Catherine that there is a core of history. But he's a very, very plastic figure, and Martin sort of alluded to this. You can mould him into all sorts of shapes and each generation has projected onto him its own views of kingship, its own views of wisdom, and try to legitimate its own views of kingship and wisdom from the figure of Solomon.

But he's not infinitely plastic, you know, he can't be totally infinitely molded. At the centre is this series of legends which tend to stress wisdom and tend to stress wisdom and connection with righteous rule and effective rule, effective kingship. And you think there's enough radioactivity emanating from these legends to give it a historical significance that can't yet be proved? Well, I would say so. I mean, obviously the accounts are highly idealised

and you have to cut through that to a certain extent. But I think I would agree with Philip that there must be a historical core underneath. And in fact, his reign is very well documented compared to many other reigns. We've got more information about Solomon in the Bible than many other kings of Israel. Well, thank you all very much indeed. Thank you, Catherine Dell,

Martin Palmer and Philip Alexander. And next week we will be talking about James Joyce's novel Ulysses. Thank you very much for listening. If you've enjoyed this BBC podcast, why not try others such as the Forum, the discussion programme about global ideas? To find out more, visit BBCworldservice.com slash forum.