World English Bible · The united kingdom
Proverbs 7
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My son, keep my words. Lay up my within you. Keep my and live! Guard my teaching as the apple of your eye. Bind them on your fingers. Write them on the tablet of . Tell , "You are my sister." Call your relative, that they may keep you from the strange woman, from the who flatters with her words. For at the window of my house, I looked out through my lattice. I saw among the simple ones. I discerned among the youths a young man void of , passing through the street near her corner, he went to her house, in the twilight, in the evening of the day, in the middle of the night and in . Behold, there a woman met him with the attire of a , and with crafty intent. She is loud and defiant. Her feet don't stay in her house. Now she is in the streets, now in the squares, and lurking at every corner. So she caught him, and kissed him. With an impudent she said to him: " of are with me. Today I have paid my . 15Therefore I came out to meet you, to diligently seek your , and I have found you. I have spread my couch with carpets of tapestry, with striped cloths of the yarn of . I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon. 18Come, let's take our fill of loving until the morning. Let's solace ourselves with loving. For my husband isn't at home. He has gone on a long journey. He has taken a bag of money with him. He will come home at the full moon." With persuasive words, she led him astray. With the flattering of her , she seduced him. He followed her immediately, as an ox goes to the slaughter, as a fool stepping into a noose. Until an arrow strikes through his liver, as a bird hurries to the snare, and doesn't know that it will cost his life. Now therefore, sons, listen to me. Pay attention to the words of my . Don't let turn to her ways. Don't go astray in her , for she has thrown down many wounded. Yes, all her slain are a mighty army. Her house is to , going down to the rooms of .
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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.