David is really old now and one of his sons, Adonijah start setting himself up as the new king. Once he hears about what’s happening though, David quickly makes his other son Solomon king before Adonijah gets back to Jerusalem. That goes pretty well, with Adonijah stepping down and immediately recognizing his younger brother’s rule. All he asks is that Solomon not kill him and Solomon says that he will be just fine as long as he’s a helpful part of the kingdom and doesn’t try to do sneaky political stuff.
David dies around this time, but he gives Solomon some peculiar advise. David’s rule was marked by astounding forgiveness and grace. Every time something aweful happened, as soon as they got it sorted out, David’s men would want to go kill everyone who had stood against them and David would say something like “No way, we’ve won. This is a time for celebration.” And let everyone go about their business for the most part. Apparently he’s been taking good notes though because now he tells Solomon to start off his kingship by killing a bunch of these guys that David spared before. All those times he swore not to kill somebody, he just filed it away so he could have his successor kill them decades later, which is kind of like what a sociopath would do. David’s really old and near death now though so maybe he’s just getting jaded.
Amidst Solomon having all these guys killed, Adonijah shows up again trying to marry the concubine assigned to keep David warm at night. That’s not a euphemism, she was just supposed to lay down with him and keep the bed warm because he was too frail to keep himself warm anymore. They never had sex so it isn’t taboo for David’s son to marry her, just a little bit weird.
Solomon sees this as a political move though, which it probably was to be fair, and has Adonijah killed.
This seems like a rocky start to Solomon’s rule, but I guess everyone knows he means business now.
This is the 100th passage which means I’m almost a third of the way through the Bible. I had no idea what a commitment writing this was going to be, but I’m glad to have some accountability at least. I don’t think I ever would have made it through Numbers if I didn’t feel obligated to post something about it online. I’m feeling very thankful for those four or five guys in India, Russia and Washington who are regularly reading my entries. Thanks guys.
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