World English Bible · The united kingdom
1 Samuel 29
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Now the gathered together all their armies to ; and the encamped by the spring which is in . The lords of the passed on by hundreds and by thousands; and and his men passed on in the rear with . Then the princes of the said, "What about these ?" said to the princes of the , "Isn't this , the the king of Israel, who has been with me these days, or rather these years? I have found no fault in him since he fell away until today." But the princes of the were angry with him; and the princes of the said to him, "Make the man return, that he may go back to his place where you have appointed him, and let him not go down with us to battle, lest in the battle he become an adversary to us. For with what should this fellow reconcile himself to his ? Should it not be with the heads of these men? Isn't this , of whom people sang to one another in dances, saying, ' has slain his thousands, and his ten thousands'?" Then called and said to him, "As lives, you have been upright, and your going out and your coming in with me in the army is good in my sight; for I have not found evil in you since the day of your coming to me to this day. Nevertheless, the lords don't you. Therefore now return, and go in peace, that you not displease the lords of the ." said to , "But what have I done? What have you found in so long as I have been before you to this day, that I may not go and fight against the of my the king?" answered , "I know that you are good in my sight, as of . Notwithstanding, the princes of the have said, 'He shall not go up with us to the battle.' Therefore now rise up early in the morning with the servants of your who have come with you; and as soon as you are up early in the morning and have , depart." So rose up early, he and his men, to depart in the morning, to return into the land of the ; and the went up to .
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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.