Solomon was a king of ancient Israel who succeeded his father King David. According to religious texts, Solomon was renowned for his wisdom and wealth, and he is credited with building the first Jewish temple in Jerusalem. However, he also sinned by worshipping idols and marrying foreign women, which contributed to the kingdom splitting apart after his death. Solomon remains an important figure in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and he is regarded as both a prophet and a source of wisdom, though some legends also portray him as a magician.
Solomon was a king of ancient Israel who succeeded his father King David. According to religious texts, Solomon was renowned for his wisdom and wealth, and he is credited with building the first Jewish temple in Jerusalem. However, he also sinned by worshipping idols and marrying foreign women, which contributed to the kingdom splitting apart after his death. Solomon remains an important figure in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and he is regarded as both a prophet and a source of wisdom, though some legends also portray him as a magician.
Solomon was a king of ancient Israel who succeeded his father King David. According to religious texts, Solomon was renowned for his wisdom and wealth, and he is credited with building the first Jewish temple in Jerusalem. However, he also sinned by worshipping idols and marrying foreign women, which contributed to the kingdom splitting apart after his death. Solomon remains an important figure in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, and he is regarded as both a prophet and a source of wisdom, though some legends also portray him as a magician.
Solomon (/ˈsɒləmən/; Hebrew: שְׁ ֹלמ ֹה, Shlomoh),[a] also called Jedidiah (Hebrew י ְדִ ידְ י ָּה Yedidyah),
was, according to the Hebrew Bible, Old Testament,[3] Quran, and Hadiths, a fabulously wealthy and
wise king of the United Kingdom of Israel who succeeded his father, King David.[4] The conventional dates of Solomon's reign are about 970 to 931 BCE, normally given in alignment with the dates of David's reign. He is described as king of the United Monarchy, which broke apart into the northern Kingdom of Israel and the southern Kingdom of Judah shortly after his death. Following the split, his patrilineal descendants ruled over Judah alone.[5] According to the Talmud, Solomon is one of the 48 prophets.[6] In the Quran, he is considered a major prophet, and Muslims generally refer to him by the Arabic variant Sulayman, son of Dawood. The Hebrew Bible identifies him as the builder of the First Temple in Jerusalem,[4] beginning in the fourth year of his reign, using the vast wealth he and his father had accumulated. He dedicated the temple to Yahweh, the God of Israel.[7] He is portrayed as great in wisdom, wealth and power beyond either of the previous kings of the country, but also as a king who sinned. His sins included idolatry, marrying foreign women and, ultimately, turning away from Yahweh, and they led to the kingdom's being torn in two during the reign of his son Rehoboam. Solomon is the subject of many other later references and legends, most notably in the 1st century apocryphal work known as the Testament of Solomon. In the New Testament, he is portrayed as a teacher of wisdom excelled by Jesus,[8] and as arrayed in glory, but excelled by "the lilies of the field".[9] In later years, in mostly non-biblical circles, Solomon also came to be known as a magician and an exorcist, with numerous amulets and medallion seals dating from the Hellenistic period invoking his name.[10]
The Kings of Israel and Judah: A Captivating Guide to the Ancient Jewish Kingdom of David and Solomon, the Divided Monarchy, and the Assyrian and Babylonian Conquests of Samaria and Jerusalem