World English Bible · The united kingdom
Proverbs 4
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Listen, sons, to a . Pay attention and know ; for I give you sound learning. Don't forsake . For I was a son to , tender and an only child in the sight of my mother. He taught me, and said to me: "Let retain my words. Keep my , and live. Get . Get . Don't forget, and don't deviate from the words of my . Don't forsake her, and she will preserve you. Love her, and she will keep you. is supreme. Get . Yes, though it costs all your possessions, get . Esteem her, and she will exalt you. She will bring you to when you embrace her. She will give to your head a garland of . She will a of splendor to you." Listen, my son, and receive my sayings. The years of your life will be many. I have taught you in of . I have led you in straight . When you go, your steps will not be hampered. When you run, you will not stumble. Take firm hold of . Don't let her go. Keep her, for she is your life. Don't enter into of . Don't walk in of evil men. Avoid it, and don't pass by it. Turn from it, and pass on. For they don't sleep unless they do evil. Their sleep is taken away, unless they make someone fall. For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the of . But of is like the dawning that shines more and more until the perfect day. of is like . They don't know what they stumble over. My son, attend to my words. Turn your ear to my sayings. Let them not depart from your eyes. Keep them in the center of . For they are life to those who find them, and health to their whole body. Keep with all diligence, for out of it is the wellspring of life. from yourself a perverse . Put corrupt far from you. Let your eyes look straight ahead. Fix your gaze directly before you. Make of your feet level. Let all of your ways be established. Don't turn to nor to the left. Remove your foot from evil.
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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.