Saturday, November 29, 2014

Moses' "Anticipation" of King Solomon (and Ptolemy II)

Deuteronomy is presented as a set of sermons or speeches made by Moses to the people before they enter the Promised Land.  As discussed previously, Prof. Calum Carmichael argues that the laws found in Deuteronomy "respond" to the narratives of future events found in later books of the Primary History and, therefore, must have been written with knowledge of those narratives.   I have presented evidence showing that the narratives regarding Saul, David and Solomon are based on the biographies of Alexander, Ptolemy I, and Ptolemy II, respectively, which necessarily pushes the date Deuteronomy could have been written to some time after 246 B.C.E., the year Ptolemy II died.

One set of Deuteronomic laws of interest to me are those regarding kingship found in Deuteronomy 17:14-20:

14 When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you and have taken possession of it and settled in it, and you say, “Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us,”15 be sure to appoint over you a king the Lord your God chooses. He must be from among your fellow Israelites. Do not place a foreigner over you, one who is not an Israelite.16 The king, moreover, must not acquire great numbers of horses for himself or make the people return to Egypt to get more of them, for the Lord has told you, “You are not to go back that way again.” 17 He must not take many wives, or his heart will be led astray. He must not accumulate large amounts of silver and gold.

18 When he takes the throne of his kingdom, he is to write for himself on a scroll a copy of this law, taken from that of the Levitical priests. 19 It is to be with him, and he is to read it all the days of his life so that he may learn to revere the Lord his God and follow carefully all the words of this law and these decrees 20 and not consider himself better than his fellow Israelites and turn from the law to the right or to the left. Then he and his descendants will reign a long time over his kingdom in Israel.
As shown in the table below, the laws found at Deuteronomy 17:16-20 (boldface type, above) clearly anticipate the narrative of King Solomon as found in 1 Kings 10:14 to 11:13.  Combined, the laws and narrative establish that King Solomon was unworthy of being king and that his descendants' loss of Israel was due to his failure to follow the laws.  Indeed, it was Yahweh's will that Solomon's descendants would lose the kingdom David had established.

Given the parallels between the lives of Solomon and Ptolemy II,  Deuteronomy's criticisms of Solomon apply equally as well to Ptolemy II and similarly explain the Ptolemies' ultimate loss of Israel to Antiochus III (which, then, must have occurred prior to the writing of Deuteronomy).  Given the Primary History authors' fascination with history repeating itself, it should come as no surprise that the Primary History, in the guise of transmitting history, originally acted to present commentary on current events.

Although Solomon did not violate the law of Deuteronomy 17:15, it is worthwhile noting that David did when he, not Yahweh, chose Solomon as King in violation of the law of primogeniture, and that the people of Israel continuing to accept the foreign rule of the Ptolemies would violate Deuteronomy 17:15, as well.  I will argue there are many other laws of the Primary History that appear to have been written such that the known actions of the Ptolemies violated them, making them unworthy rulers of Israel.  Moreover, I will argue that in many cases the known actions of the Seleucids followed the laws the Ptolemies violated.
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14 When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you and have taken possession of it and settled in it, and you say, “Let us set a king over us like all the nations around us,”
[This verse anticipates the story of Saul.] 
15 be sure to appoint over you a king the Lord your God chooses. He must be from among your fellow Israelites. Do not place a foreigner over you, one who is not an Israelite.
 [While Yahweh chose both Saul and David to be king, it was David's choice for Solomon to be king, and David's choice itself was a violation of the law of primogeniture found in Deuteronomy 21:15-17.]
16 The king, moreover, must not acquire great numbers of horses for himself or make the people return to Egypt to get more of them, for the Lord has told you, “You are not to go back that way again.” 
26 Solomon accumulated chariots and horses. He had 1,400 chariots and 12,000 horses. He kept them in assigned cities and in Jerusalem.

28 Solomon acquired his horses from Egypt and from Que; the king’s traders purchased them from Que. 29 They paid 600 silver pieces for each chariot from Egypt and 150 silver pieces for each horse. They also sold chariots and horses to all the kings of the Hittites and to the kings of Syria.
17 He must not take many wives, or his heart will be led astray. .
He had 700 royal wives and 300 concubines; his wives had a powerful influence over him. When Solomon became old, his wives shifted his allegiance to other gods; he was not wholeheartedly devoted to the Lord his God, as his father David had been. 
He must not accumulate large amounts of silver and gold
14 Solomon received 666 talents of gold per year, 15 besides what he collected from the merchants, traders, Arabian kings, and governors of the land. 16 King Solomon made two hundred large shields of hammered gold; 600 measures of gold were used for each shield. 17 He also made three hundred small shields of hammered gold; three minas of gold were used for each of these shields. The king placed them in the Palace of the Lebanon Forest.
18 The king made a large throne decorated with ivory and overlaid it with pure gold.19 There were six steps leading up to the throne, and the back of it was rounded on top. The throne had two armrests with a statue of a lion standing on each side. 20 There were twelve statues of lions on the six steps, one lion at each end of each step. There was nothing like it in any other kingdom.
21 All of King Solomon’s cups were made of gold, and all the household items in the Palace of the Lebanon Forest were made of pure gold. There were no silver items, for silver was not considered very valuable in Solomon’s time. 22 Along with Hiram’s fleet, the king had a fleet of large merchant ships that sailed the sea. Once every three years the fleet came into port with cargoes of gold, silver, ivory, apes, and peacocks.
23 King Solomon was wealthier and wiser than any of the kings of the earth. 24 Everyone in the world wanted to visit Solomon to see him display his God-given wisdom. 25 Year after year visitors brought their gifts, which included items of silver, items of gold, clothes, perfume, spices, horses, and mules.

18 When he takes the throne of his kingdom, he is to write for himself on a scroll a copy of this law, taken from that of the Levitical priests. 
[1 Kings does not describe King Solomon as having done this.]
19 It is to be with him, and he is to read it all the days of his life so that he may learn to revere the Lord his God and follow carefully all the words of this law and these decrees 
[1 Kings does not describe King Solomon as having done this.]
20 and not consider himself better than his fellow Israelites and turn from the law to the right or to the left. Then he and his descendants will reign a long time over his kingdom in Israel.
When Solomon became old, his wives shifted his allegiance to other gods; he was not wholeheartedly devoted to the Lord his God, as his father David had been. Solomon worshiped the Sidonian goddess Astarte and the detestable Ammonite god Milcom.Solomon did evil in the Lord’s sight; he did not remain loyal to the Lord, like his father David had. Furthermore, on the hill east of Jerusalem Solomon built a high place for the detestable Moabite god Chemosh and for the detestable Ammonite god Milcom. He built high places for all his foreign wives so they could burn incense and make sacrifices to their gods.
The Lord was angry with Solomon because he had shifted his allegiance away from theLord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him on two occasions 10 and had warned him about this very thing, so that he would not follow other gods. But he did not obey theLord’s command.  11 So the Lord said to Solomon, “Because you insist on doing these things and have not kept the covenantal rules I gave you, I will surely tear the kingdom away from you and give it to your servant. 12 However, for your father David’s sake I will not do this while you are alive. I will tear it away from your son’s hand instead. 13 But I will not tear away the entire kingdom; I will leave your son one tribe for my servant David’s sake and for the sake of my chosen city Jerusalem.”




1 comment:

  1. Assuming Solomon was based on Ptolemy II, this makes a pretty persuasive case that either or both Deuteronomy and Kings were modified by the Seleucids to portray the Ptolemies, especially Ptolemy II, as unworthy rulers of the kingdom. Fascinating stuff!

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