raved in Tyrian purjile, their long black hair sprinkled freshly every day with gold-dust (ver. 7, 8; Josephus, Ant. viii, 7, iJ). Forty thousand stalls of horses for his chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen, made up the measure of his magnificence (1 Kings iv, 20). If some of the public works had the plea of utilitj- — the fortifi- cation of some cities for purposes of defence (Millo [the suburb of Jerusalem], Hazor, jMegiddo, the two Heth-horons); the foundation of others (Tadmor and Tiphsah) for (uirposcs of commerce — these were simply the pomps of a seltish luxury; and the people; after the first dazzle was over, felt that they were so. As the treasury became empty, taxes multiplied and monopo- lies became more irksome. Even the Israelites, besides the conscription which brought them into the king's armies (ix, 22), were subject, though for a part only of each year, to the corvee of compulsory labor (v, 13). The revolution that followed had, like most other revo- lutions, financial disorder as the chief among its causes. The people complained, not of the king's idolatry, but of their burdens, of his " grievous yoke" (xii,4). Their hatred fell heaviest on Adoniram, who was over the tribute. If, on the one side, the division of the king- dom came as a penalty for Solomon's idolatrous apos- tasy from Jehovah, it was, on another, the Nemesis of a selfish passion for glory, itself the most terrible of all idolatries.
3. Structures, — It remains for us to trace that other downfall, belonging more visibly, though not more real- ly, to his religious life, from the loftiest height even to the lowest depth. The building and dedication of the Temple are obviously the representatives of the former. That was the special task which he inherited from his father, and to that he gave himself with all his heart and strength. He came to it with all the noble thoughts as to the meaning and grounds of worship which his father and Nathan could instil into him. We have al- ready seen, in speaking of his intercourse with Tyre, what measures he took for its completion. All that can be said as to its architecture, proportions, materials, and the organization of the ministering priests and Le- vites, will be found elsewhere. See Tti.Mi'LE. Here it will be enough to picture to ourselves the feelings of the men of Judah as they watched, during seven long years, the cyclopean foundations of vast stones (still remaining when all else has perished [Ewald, iii, 207]) gradually rising up and covering the area of the threshing-tloor of Araunah, materials arriving contin- ually from Jopjia, cedar and gold and silver, brass " without weight" from the foundries of Siiccoth and Zarethan, stones ready hewn and squared from the quarries. F'ar from colossal in its size, it was conspicu- ous chiefly by the lavish use, within and without, of the gold of Ophir and Parvaim. It glittered in the morning sun (as has been well saiil) like the sanctuary of an El Dorado (Milman, Hist, of the .Jeirs, i, 259). Throughout tlie whole work the traiupiillity of the kingly city was unbroken by the sound of the work- man's hammer :
" Like some tall palm the noiseless fabric sprung."
We cannot ignore the fact that even now there were some darker shades in the picture. Not reverence only for th(! holy city, but the wish to shut out from sight I he misery he had caused, to close his ears against cries which were rising daily to the ears of the Lord of Sab- aoth, led him ))r<ibably to place the works connected with the Temple at as great a distance as possible from the Temple itself. F'orgetful of the lessons taught by the history of his own people, and of the precepts of th(! law ( Exod. xxii. 21 ; xxiii, 9 et «/.), following the example of David's jjolicy in its least noble asjwct (1 Chron. xxii, 2 l. he re(hiced the "strangers" in the land, the remnant of the Canaanitish races who had chosen the alternative of conformity to the religion of their con(pierors, to the state of helots, and made their life '• hitler with all hard bonda^ic." .See I'liOSiiLYTK.
SOLOMON"
869
SOLOMON
Copying the Pliaraohs in their magnificence, he copied them also in their disregard of human suffering. Act- ing, probabh', under the same counsels as had prompt- ed that measure, on the result of David's census, he seized on these "strangers" for the weary, servile toil against which the free spirit of Israel would have re- belled. One hundred and fifty-three thousand, with wives and children in proportion, were torn from their homes and sent off to the quarries and the forests of Lebanon (1 Kings v, 15; 2 Chron. ii, 17, 18). Even the Israelites, though not reduced permanentlj' to the he- lot state (viii, 9), were yet summoned to take their share, by rotation, in the same labor (1 Kings v, 13, 14). One trace of the special servitude of •' these hewers of stone" continued long afterwards in the existence of a body of men attached to tlie Temple, and known as Solomon's servants (q. v.).