Queen of Sheba (25 page)

Despite Solomon’s periods of depression, his interest in the gods of his many wives never seemed to slacken. At first it had been out of curiosity that he spent time talking with their priests. Then he had found some of the ceremonies and the potions taken mysteriously stimulating. When his brother Nathan had warned him against such practices, he had explained, “If we understand their gods and know their secrets, then we can control them and use their power for ourselves.”

He saw no conflict with his own beliefs, since he went regularly to the temple for morning and evening prayer. He boasted that he had as yet found nothing in the pagan religions that could not be explained by some trick of magic or a natural phenomenon twisted to appear new and different. In fact, he enjoyed the reputation he had gained for being able to
control both the good and evil forces abroad in the world.

Quite often now Nathan and Nathan’s son, Mattatha, went with him to the temple for the morning sacrifice. On the occasions when Rehoboam was with them, Solomon was acutely aware of the vast difference between the two young men. At such times his depression became almost unbearable as he saw that his son had none of the leadership qualities or the spiritual strength that Mattatha had in abundance.

On this morning Solomon joined Nathan, Mattatha, and Rehoboam at the great arched doorway of the palace, where the standard-bearers, swordsmen, and thirty of Israel’s Mighty Men stood waiting to escort him to the temple. At sight of the king, the signal was given, and trumpeters on the wall raised their silver instruments for the high, stirring salute to the house of Judah.

The king’s entourage moved like shadows up the marble steps to the large courtyard called Solomon’s Porch. Here and there bits of light flashed out from lanterns carried by serving men, and small squares of polished marble became visible and then were again lost in the darkness.

Solomon loved this time of day and enjoyed the gradual lifting of the mist as light came from behind Olivet to transform the dark, shrouded marble edifice into a flashing jewel of tiered splendor. Slowly the great golden doors of the eastern gate, those doors that took twenty priests to open, reflected the first light. The marble pillars around the Court of the Women emerged out of the darkness and the fifteen steps up through the great golden Nicanor Gate were highlighted.

Later, after the sacrifice and after the incense, the priests would stand on these steps and sing. The hauntingly beautiful half tones of their chant would rise and fall until suddenly, high and clear, a bell-like voice would rise on the luminous air of the morning straight up to the gates of heaven.

Now as the king arrived to take his place on the porch of the temple the crisp, bright blast of the trumpets sounded once more, letting the people know they were free to flock into the large, open Court of the Women.

As Solomon watched them come, he felt a sudden surge of joy such as he had not felt in weeks. They were his people, his sheep coming into the fold. A splendid, marble and gold, gem-encrusted fold. Their garments and headpieces of every color were like jewels spread out across the Court of the Women.

Some of the priests had been awake and on duty for the past hour, washing both hands and feet at the laver, tending the fire, and checking the sheep that were to be sacrificed. Still others were at this very moment in the Hall of Polished Stones drawing lots to determine their position for the day.

It was still dark enough that the eternal fire glowed on the altar, warm and golden. Solomon wished the altar could have been made of finer stuff than the rude, unpolished stones, but that was how it had to be. That was one of the instructions that had been very clear and impossible to change.

Slowly the light had increased until with a sudden flourish the sun rose over Olivet. It glinted and danced on the golden doors, highlighted the pillars of the porch with their capitals of a hundred flowers set in a delicately carved network, while the symbol of Israel, a great golden vine with huge clusters of grapes above the doors was almost blinding in its brilliance.

Solomon saw all this with delight. “Surely,” he thought, “this temple I have built will last as long as the pyramids in Egypt. What could destroy so fine a work of art? Certainly not an army. It is God’s holy precinct, His dwelling place, the place where He chose to put His name.”

He squared his shoulders as a feeling of pride enveloped him. The God of Israel wasn’t like other gods that could be taken captive by an enemy. No, that was one thing Israel didn’t have to worry about. Their God would never be humiliated in that way. It was equally certain that He’d never let this lovely house built with such care and precision be destroyed.

He had hardly noticed that the priest had taken coals from the altar until he heard a dull resonance as the Magrephah was struck. Soundlessly the priest passed close beside him and went inside the Holy Place to put the coals on the altar of incense.

This summoned the Levites to move to their places on the steps for the morning hymn. All was now ready. The sacrifice had been laid on the altar and the salt sprinkled on it. The priest in the Holy Place waited for the signal to commence the burning of the incense. At last the signal was given and with one accord the people fell on their faces before the Lord like waves of ripe grain falling before the scythe. Solomon and his whole company had turned toward the great doors of the Holy Place and with the rest of the people had fallen to their faces before the Lord.

It was then a strange thing happened. Solomon heard clearly the voice
of the Lord. He heard it as though it came from a great distance somewhere above the pillars and the flashing brilliance of the golden vine above the temple door. “Solomon,” the voice said quite clearly. It was the same voice he had heard twice before. The voice that had commissioned him and warned him. He felt heat at the back of his neck and his hands on the cool paving stones of marble began to sweat.

“Solomon, you have not kept my covenant or my statutes which I commanded thee. For this I will surely rend the kingdom from thee and give it to thy servant.”

With a cry of anguish Solomon fell prostrate along the floor and hid his face in his hands. “I am to be like Saul?” he cried in a torment.

Now almost gently the voice continued, “For David thy father’s sake I will not do it now, but I will rend it out of thy son’s hand.”

“The whole kingdom lost?” Solomon pled.

“Not all the kingdom. I will give one tribe to thy son for David my servant’s sake and for Jerusalem’s sake which I have chosen.”

There was the rustle and surge of the huge assembly getting to its feet. A cough here and there. No one else seemed to have heard the voice or Solomon’s answers. Solomon let Nathan and Rehoboam help him to his feet. He felt weak, smitten with a terrible wound someplace deep inside where no balm could reach. He tried to hold his head high and control the trembling and the weakness in his knees as he struggled to concentrate on the familiar chant of the Levites at the Nicanor Gate.

Automatically he walked down the steps and out the southern gate toward the Hall of Judgment. His head reeled with the message he had heard. He tried to calm himself with the reassuring words that none of this would happen in his time.

Settled on his throne in the Hall of Judgment, he found himself unable to concentrate on the cases brought before him. Instead he pondered the strangeness of it all. His father, David, had sinned grievously taking another man’s wife and having the man killed. He, Solomon, had always been careful never to commit such an outrage, but now he was being judged, put out, disowned in a way his father never had been.

He knew he’d taken foreign wives and this had been forbidden. But then without the wives and the treaties they brought with them, he would have been involved in as many wars as David had been. David had not
been able to build the temple because his hands were covered with blood. “I built the temple because I was a man of peace.”

Quickly his mind ran on to that other sin. He had been forced to let his wives build temples to their gods. First Naamah. She had insisted on the temple to appease the ugly Moloch. It had seemed at the time the life of Rehoboam was in mortal danger. Then the Egyptian had pouted and pled until he let her have her way. It seemed so harmless at the time. Others had followed until the Olivet especially was dotted with forbidden grottoes, sacred gardens, and heathen shrines.

He pushed his crown back on his head and ran his fingers through his short, well-trimmed beard. He waved away the counselors and petition seekers. He wanted to think. He wanted to be alone, and that was almost impossible.

There was something else in the message that his mind now settled on that sent a cold chill down his spine and made him wince with sudden alarm. “‘My servant!’ The voice said that the kingdom would be taken from my son and given to my servant.” His eyes went round the room looking at each counselor, each fighting man, each tribesman. Somewhere within this body of men before him the culprit who would steal the crown must be even now standing undetected. He must find him, search him out, and then, perhaps, get rid of him.

His shoulders sagged beneath the terrible revelation. He’d asked in a moment of clarity for some reprieve, some good to come out of the bungle he’d made of his life and his calling. Now the answer seemed certain, final, hard as a rock. The kingdom would be lost and with it all hope of some redeeming goodness. God had spoken. Only Jerusalem, God’s little plot of earth, the place He’d put His name, was to be left to his son Rehoboam.

He buried his head in his hands. “Is everything then lost?” he prayed. “Is there no hope for the future of Israel?” There was no answer, and he knew that the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had given the verdict, and apart from some miracle, the kingdom was doomed.

Jeroboam had not gone to the morning sacrifice, but he had come to the great Hall of Judgment looking for one of Solomon’s chief counselors. He stood at the back of the hall half hidden by one of the great pillars. He
found himself pondering for the hundredth time all that Ahijah had told him. He found it almost incomprehensible that he, a building supervisor, the son of Nebat, should be elevated to king of ten tribes. He found it even more astonishing that he had been adopted, almost like the revered patriarch Moses, by the Egyptian princess.

He sensed he was walking on dangerous ground. If the king should hear that he had dined alone with his Egyptian queen, it could mean death. He shuddered. He had been so overwhelmed with the honor and the persuasiveness of Tipti that he hadn’t taken time to think much of the consequences if he should be caught.

Now he looked at the splendor around him. The hall of pillars was like a forest of stone. The huge stone blocks that made up the walls were carefully chiseled, and along both walls were arrayed golden incense burners and candelabra.

More majestic and regal than any of his works was the king himself. Jeroboam had almost worshiped him at one time. The way he held his head, the confidence that was evident in his walk, his slow, amused smile, and most of all the noble forehead and intelligent eyes marked him as a king among kings.

He saw the foreign dignitaries that had come with petitions and many others that had come with some puzzlement for Solomon to unravel. Their faces were a study in awe and admiration. They always went away marveling at the simplicity and yet the accuracy of his pronouncements. Even in Egypt his fame as a man of great wisdom had flourished.

He saw the two scribes that sat on either side of the throne to catch each word and record it. One scribe might not get the exact word and so there were two, and now on each side of the marble steps there were others writing, recording as though his words were gold.

As usual there was an animal nearby. Today it was a small monkey that had arrived with the most recent shipment of goods from Africa. When Solomon became tired of the petitions and the endless reports or questions, he would summon the little monkey to the arm of his throne and talk to him. “Solomon can understand the animals,” people were saying. Jeroboam didn’t doubt it.