Solomon - A Bible Commentary on His Childhood and Early Life

As I have attempted to establish in other chapters of this book, Solomon was both a type of Christ and a type of Anti-Christ, depending upon how he chose to respond to the truths of God. In this chapter I plan on dwelling on the limited amount of information available in the Bible, and the writings of Ellen White, on the early childhood of Solomon. As in the story of Jesus, not much information is devoted to this subject. The largest single collection of thoughts on the childhood of Jesus is in the book Desire of Ages by Ellen White. Regarding the childhood, and early years of Solomon, there is even less information available. Yet the Bible does give us some information that we can work with and at least ponder some of the developmental issues of Solomon’s life and some of his formative crises.

In I Chronicles 3:1-9 we are given a chronology of David’s sons and one daughter Tamar. The sons are listed as follows: Amnon, Daniel, Absalom, Adonijah, Shephatiah, Ithream. These six sons were born to David while he was king at Hebron between 1000 BC and 993 BC when David captured Jebus, renamed it Jerusalem and moved the capital city there from Hebron.
While at Jerusalem David had more sons. Four of these remaining sons were Shimea, Shobab, Nathan, and Solomon all by Bathsheba. David also had Ibhar, Elishama, Eliphelet, Nogah, Nepheg, Japhia, Elishama, Eliada, Eliphelet. In addition to these children David had other children by concubines, and then of course Tamar – the sister.

The exact chronology of the births of these children is not clear. However, there is a clear difference between the Hebron children and the Jerusalem children. The Hebron children were the eldest and therefore higher in the pecking order of children both by size, experience, and the general perception that the firstborn child was the most likely to have the birthright and access to the succession of the rulership of the kingdom. So in this context Solomon would be far down the chain of command in the Jewish mindset.

We know from Bible writings that polygamy never has set up a positive environment for child rearing. We know from the story of Abraham and Jacob that there is a constant bickering for attention by the various wives, and a constant jockeying among the wives as to whose son would end up inheriting the kingdom. Genesis 16; 21:9-21; 29:20-30:24 All of this puts tension in the home and David’s home was no exception.

We are not told in the Bible how the many wives of David responded to David’s relationship to Bathsheba and all the circumstances involved in that experience. It is this writer’s perspective that it did not help the relationships he had with his other wives nor did it heal any of the internal rifts that polygamy brings.

The Bible tells us an interesting part of the story of Solomon in that the first born child between David and Bathsheba had died as a penalty for David’s murder of Bathsheba’s husband Uriah the Hittite. Sometime after the death of this unnamed child the Bible tells us that David comforted Bathsheba and she had a son and David named the child Solomon – Peaceable. II Samuel 12:24. The next phrase is intriguing in that the Bible says that Jesus loved this child. This is similar in concept to Luke 2:40, 52. It would appear that Solomon, like his anti-type Jesus, grew up normally and that God was interested in him in a special way.

The next piece of information is that of II Samuel 12:25 "And He sent by the hand of Nathan the prophet; and He called his name Jedidiah because of the Lord". Jedidiah means Beloved of the Lord. This text indicates that Jesus chose to express His thoughts of Solomon in such a manner as to clearly communicate that Solomon was especially beloved of Jesus. It is interesting to speculate if this special designation and naming had the same effect on Solomon’s family as did the coat of many colors for Joseph. Genesis 37:1-4 Or was there concern and jealousy amongst David’s family when Samuel refused to anoint the eldest of Jesse’s children and chose the youngest. Ellen White comments to this in PP 645

"The armies of Israel were depressed. Their courage failed. They said one to another, "Have ye seen this man that is come up? surely to defy Israel is he come up." In shame and indignation, David exclaimed, "Who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God?" Eliab, David's eldest brother, when he heard these words, knew well the feelings that were stirring the young man's soul. Even as a shepherd, David had manifested daring, courage, and strength but rarely witnessed; and the mysterious visit of Samuel to their father's house, and his silent departure, had awakened in the minds of the brothers suspicions of the real object of his visit. Their jealousy had been aroused as they saw David honored above them, and they did not regard him with the respect and love due to his integrity and brotherly tenderness. They looked upon him as merely a stripling shepherd, and now the question which he asked was regarded by Eliab as a censure upon his own cowardice in making no attempt to silence the giant of the Philistines. The elder brother exclaimed angrily, "Why camest thou down hither? and with whom hast thou left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know thy pride, and the naughtiness of thine heart; for thou art come down that thou mightest see the battle." David's answer was respectful but decided: "What have I now done? Is there not a cause?" PP 645

We also know that Jesus suffered this same persecution from his brothers. John 7:1-7 They lived with Jesus, and saw His wonderful personality and devotion to God, yet they did not let their hearts open to Jesus as they should have. So there is strong evidence in Scripture that Solomon, like Joseph, David, and eventually Jesus, experienced family persecution because he was to have a special calling to do God’s service.

Again there is not much information in the Bible of what exactly happened to Solomon as he grew up. But Solomon was in the family of David when the affair between Amnon, the first born child, and Tamar the sister of Absalom occurred. How old Solomon was when this happened we are not told. But Solomon must have had the opportunity to at least hear the internal family stories about this event and must have wondered why his father David did not address the matter like a true judge and king should. Finally Absalom talks David into letting Absalom, Amnon, and all of the king’s sons to go to a party upon the successful harvest of wool from the sheep. II Samuel 13:27 Again we do not know if Solomon went to this party of he was too young to go. We do know that at this party Absalom had Amnon murdered. At this display of judgment the message came back to David that Absalom had killed all of the king’s son. So panic spread to all of the household of David over this rumor. So all of the family of David must have been impacted in one way or the other. Eventually Absalom flees to Geshur the father of his mother.

We are not told in Scripture the impact of the murder of Amnon on the rest of the family. But we can suppose that this event provided many object lessons in the development of Solomon.
Several years later Absalom is brought back to Jerusalem but David will not see him. Absalom then starts a campaign to usurp the kingdom from his father David. This eventually ripens to full revolt and David and his family must flee for their safety. Solomon to must have fled for his life with his father David and his mother Bathsheeba. What an experience to observe, and to meditate upon. What interesting messages must Jesus have conveyed to His beloved Jedidiah during this time of crisis. Solomon must have observed all of these things, and hopefully he spent some time asking his father why these things happened.

During the revolt of Absalom we know that Solomon lost two older brothers – Amnon and Absalom. We also know that Solomon lost is maternal great grandfather Ahithophel to the rebellion also. (Eliam was the son of Ahithophel and the father of Bathsheeba. II Samuel 23:34 and II Samuel 11:3) We do not know how many other friends or relatives Solomon lost in this event but the civil war must have been devastating for him and his perceptions of childhood security.

Another interesting facet of the story we are not told about is what kind of relationship did Solomon develop with Nathan the prophet or Gad the prophet. We are not told whether he came to them to ask questions of them and if so what kinds of answers did he receive. We do not know what relationship Solomon had with David’s mighty men. We know that David’s mighty men loved David to the point of being willing to sacrifice their lives for him so there were many stories to tell and we can wonder if Solomon took advantage of those stories. We do know two things though about the mighty men. We know that Solomon eventually has Joab killed and we know that Benaiah, one of the captains of David’s mighty men, became Solomon’s personal administrator of justice. II Samuel 23:20; I Kings 2:25, 29. So somewhere in the process of time Solomon had developed a relationship with Benaiah the son of Jehoiada.

At least one more issue needs to be addressed in this little story. We do not know what kind of relationship David had with Solomon as he grew up. David had many sons and we do not have any stories to tell us much about his relationship with any of the sons except his great love for Absalom. We do know that David did not appear to be much of a disciplinarian, and especially after his affair with Bathsheba robbed him of much of his courage to make the tough and difficult decisions that kings have to make. We know that David was not a family disciplinarian because of the testimony of I Kings 1:6 where the Bible says about Adonijah "And his father had not displeased him at any time in saying, Why had thou done so?" How this lack of family discipline effected Solomon we can only speculate in some of the future behaviors of Solomon.

We are not told of anything that Solomon had done up to the time of his being assigned to be king by Jesus that would have indicated that Solomon had shown any qualities of being king material. Yet it appears that David heard the message and accepted the choice of Jesus that Solomon was the man to be king even over his eldest son Adonijah. The only clue we have of this process is in I Chronicles 22 5-13 where David says that the Lord had identified Solomon in verse 9 "Behold, a son shall be born to thee, who shall be a man of rest; and I will give him rest from all his enemies round about; for his name shall be Solomon (peaceable – margin reference), and I will give peace and quietness unto Israel in his days." Apparently David was convinced that Solomon was the man selected by Jesus and he submitted to His King.

There are no doubt many more lessons that could be deduced by further study but the above ideas are the ones most clearly identified by this writer. May God bless you as you study the Word further and may God bless you with more understanding yet.