God Hates You, Hate Him Back: Making Sense of The Bible (22 page)

Whilst the phony mum, horrifically, demanded Solomon continue with his one-half is better than none ruling. As such, Solomon knew that the real mother was the one who was prepared to forfeit her child, in preference to losing him to the sword and the baby was given to the rightful mother.

Further, the Bible claims that with his wisdom came fame throughout all nations. His brilliance exemplified in his ability to know three thousand proverbs and five thousand songs. Which suggests that should we transplant your everyday teenage radio junkie 3,000 years back in time, then their brilliance would be admired too. However, today we do set a higher standard for revering human endeavor.

In the four hundred and eightieth year after the Israelites had come out of Egypt and in the fourth year of Solomon’s leadership, Solomon began to build a temple for the Lord after the prodding from a friend named Hiram from Tyre. Entirely constructed out of slave labor, the Temple is certainly the most lavish monument ever dedicated to God by the Israelites to date. The Book of Kings specifies the dimensions, furnishings, materials in lengthy detail and also includes a narrative from God to Solomon:

The above is just another example of God moving the goal-posts for servitude and obedience, as he already had several covenants with Israel and one in place with Solomon, but now he has to tie it to this newly built temple too. Must be part of his divine plan to keep us jumping from foot to foot, so we never become fat and content. Evidently, God didn’t anticipate cruise ship buffets 3000 years down the track.

At the same time he was building this Temple for the Lord, he had also begun construction of his palace. A palace so vast and opulent that it would take thirteen years to complete.

The Ark of Covenant was moved to the Temple upon its completion, which kick started a month long festival for all of Israel. The celebration included an absurd and perverse number of animal sacrifices and it states in the Bible:

The Temple is Judeo-Christianity’s first ever church or synagogue.

At this gruesome opening ceremony, Solomon stood before the assembly and gave a long winded ribbon-cutting speech, a speech that nevertheless lays the foundation for the first ever official place where people can come to pray to God, therefore establishing the Temple as the first ever synagogue. Solomon’s prayer of dedication to God, read before Israel:

At the conclusion of Solomon’s opening address for the Temple and the completion of the Palace, God appeared to Solomon in a dream, like he had appeared to him at Gideon earlier. God’s words to Solomon:

God continued with a warning to Solomon, a warning that would come back to haunt Solomon in the next chapter:

Solomon’s empire stretched from the Euphrates River to Egypt, and with this great land annex came the usual symbols of success, ‘bling-bling’ and girls. His annual revenue in gold alone was more than twenty two metric tons. A phenomenal income, but more impressive was his accumulation of bed-mates. Solomon had over seven hundred wives and more than three hundred concubines. Numbers that would make even Julio Iglesias blush.

The fall of man is blamed once again on women, as the author explains that Solomon’s wives were responsible for leading him astray in the worship of other gods and idols. His disobedience doesn’t sneak past the always-vigilant God, and he summons Solomon for a little face-time to work things out:

Now, just as you and I are bracing for God’s predictable merciless ass-whipping as penance for Solomon’s straying, God shows a soft-heart, although with delayed comeuppance forewarned, as he continues:

Regardless, Solomon died shortly after anyway, cause of death is not listed, but it says he ruled over Israel for forty years. And if I had a penny for every time the number forty appeared in the Bible just to this point, then I’d have quite a few pennies.

Rehoboam succeeded his father Solomon and judging by the scriptures he was a rebellious little shit that took no notice of older and wiser men than himself, rejecting their counsel for that of his much younger peers. His foolhardiness led him to one or two poor judgements and the Israelites soon denounced him as their king:

This seemingly innocuous poetical call of mutiny resulted in a nation rising up against their new commander and he was chased down by the unruly mob, but once cornered, King Rehoboam managed to escape the lynching by fleeing on chariot. Israel, however, was not in rebellion against the house of David and they promptly sought a new king. The Israelites wasted no time in anointing Jeroboam the new king of Israel. Jeroboam is identified as the son of Nebat and had once rebelled against Rehoboam’s father, Solomon.

King Jeroboam was now the king of all Israel, excluding Judah, which remained loyal to the house of David and thus Rehoboam. But this meant that the kingdom was now divided against itself.

Jeroboam led the Israelites, excluding Judah of course, down a slippery slope away from the word of God and towards paganism in fear that his subjects would one day realize they had made a mistake in overthrowing Rehoboam and ultimately the house of David. His logic being that if he could lead them to a new and improved religious doctrine then the Israelites would remain loyal to him. The scripture confirms this with a conversation between Jeroboam and himself:

Taking his own advice, he went out and constructed two golden calves, then set out to convince the Israelites that it was far easier and much closer to home to worship at the altar of the golden calves as opposed to travelling all the way to Jerusalem to pray at the Temple. Jeroboam then placed one golden calf in a town called Bethel and the other in Dan. And many Israelites travelled far and wide to worship these new idols. Jeroboam didn’t stop here with this quest to construct new religious infrastructure, as he set out building shrines on all surrounding mountain tops and made priests out of anyone that was willing. Would it be too silly a joke to say that God was being ‘calved’ up by Jeroboam’s self-serving antics? [Editor’s note: Yes!]

Obviously, God was not pleased and hatched a scheme to cause the downfall of Jeroboam, a God-led coup that would be telegraphed to Jeroboam via a prophet named Ahijah, a prophet who also moonlighted as a medical practitioner. At this time, Jeroboam’s son became ill and Jeroboam ordered his wife to take their son to see Doctor Ahijah in a nearby town. Prior to the arrival of Jeroboam’s son, God made a call to Ahijah and forewarned him of his soon-to-be visitor, as Jeroboam had instructed his wife to conceal her identity. As Jeroboam’s wife knocked on the door to appear before Ahijah, Ahijah answered:

Forthwith is God’s punishment for Jeroboam:

God is not done yet, as he clears his throat for the treatment of Jeroboam’s innocent child, and using the prophet as his microphone says to Jeroboam’s wife:

God was truly furious with not just Jeroboam alone, but also with Israel in its entirety and he decided to turn his back on Israel for now.

Jeroboam passed away after he reigned over Israel for twenty two years, and Nadab, his son, succeeded him as king. Two years into Nadab’s term as king of Israel, Asa was king of Judah. Nadab, like his father Jeroboam, also did evil in the eyes of the Lord. God wasted no time in interceding with the current course of events and had a man by the name of Baasha step forward and slay Nadab in a Philistine town called Gibbethon. God was pleased with the thuggish work of Baasha and duly crowned him the new king of Israel, whilst Asa was in his third year as king of Judah – with the two houses of Israel still divided.

As soon as Baasha took the throne, he butchered Jeroboam’s entire family, according to God’s orders:

During the reigns of Baasha as king of Israel and Asa as king of Judah – the two houses waged war on each other. It is written that Baasha’s reign lasted twenty four years and was ended by God. The Lord choosing to smite Baasha for following the same idol worshipping as his predecessors Jeroboam, which is a little hard to believe, isn’t it? I mean c’mon, Baasha watched on as God destroyed Jeroboam’s kingdom and assumed the position of Dear Leader as the direct beneficiary of God’s wrath and fury. So, why on earth would Baasha cease to believe and worship in the God of Abraham, whom he obviously had a good working relationship with up to now, to toddle off to praise the feet of competitor gods. This is just cocky-pop, as my Grandfather would say. To add a further dollop of crap to this unbelievable story – God, in all his wisdom, decides to appoint Baasha’s son as the new king of Israel. What? Surely, Baasha’s son was worshipping the same alternative God as his father, as this does normally occur in families, for example children of Jewish parents, are unlikely to become Islamic, in the most part. And furthermore, this probability had already been proven true with the appointment of Jeroboam’s son, Nadab, as king. This is one dim-witted God we are talking about; no doubt the same God that thought it necessary to design men with nipples.