King James Version · The united kingdom
1 Samuel 11
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Then the came up, and encamped against : and all the men of said unto , Make a with us, and we will thee. And the answered them, On this condition will I make a with you, that I may thrust out all your right eyes, and lay it for a upon all Israel. 3And the of said unto him, Give us seven days’ respite, that we may send unto all the coasts of Israel: and then, if there be no man to us, we will come out to thee. Then came the to of , and told the tidings in the ears of the people: and all the people lifted up their voices, and wept. And, behold, came after the herd out of the field; and said, What aileth the people that they weep? And they told him the tidings of the men of . And of came upon when he heard those tidings, and his was kindled greatly. And he took a of oxen, and hewed them in pieces, and sent them throughout all the coasts of Israel by the hands of , saying, Whosoever cometh not forth after and after , so shall it be done unto his oxen. And the fell on the people, and they came out with one consent. And when he numbered them in , the were three hundred thousand, and the men of Judah thirty thousand. And they said unto the that came, Thus shall ye say unto the men of , To morrow, by that time the sun be hot, ye shall have help. And the came and shewed it to the men of ; and they were glad. Therefore the men of said, To morrow we will come out unto you, and ye shall do with us all that seemeth good unto you. And it was so on the morrow, that put the people in three companies; and they came into the midst of the host in the morning watch, and slew until the heat of the day: and it came to pass, that they which remained were scattered, so that two of them were not left together. And the people said unto , Who is he that said, Shall reign over us? bring the men, that we may put them to . And said, There shall not a man be put to this day: for to day hath wrought in Israel. Then said to the people, Come, and let us go to , and renew there. And all the people went to ; and there they made king before in ; and there they of before ; and there and all the men of Israel rejoiced greatly.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · The united kingdom, 1050 BC to 931 BC ›
Saul, David, and Solomon. A rare window when both Egypt and Mesopotamia are weak, which is how a small kingdom in the corridor between them could briefly become a regional power.
- The power vacuum
- This is the whole political explanation for the united kingdom. Egypt is fragmented, Assyria is recovering but still local, the Hittites are gone, and nobody is in a position to object to a strong state in the corridor. It lasts about a century, and Israel's golden age fits exactly inside it.
- Phoenicia
- Tyre under Hiram is the commercial power of the coast, and supplies the cedar, the craftsmen, and the shipping for Solomon's building programme. The alliance is trade, not charity: Israel had grain and a land route, Tyre had timber and ships.
- Egypt
- Weak enough that a pharaoh gives a daughter in marriage to an Israelite king, which is the opposite of Egyptian practice in stronger centuries. Late in the era it recovers under a new house, and Shishak will invade within five years of Solomon's death.
- Further afield
- Greece is still in its dark age but beginning to recover, and will adopt the Phoenician alphabet within a century or two. Carthage is founded by settlers from Tyre by tradition in 814 BC. In the Americas the Olmec centre shifts to La Venta.