Chapter XVII.
The Heir of Solomon’s Godhead.
The anger of Jahveh against Solomon (1 Kings xi.) is, of course, the outcome of late theological explanations of how the ancient and much idealised kingdom could have been divided after divine promises of its protection. The interview with Solomon is a sort of dramatization, in which the anachronism of making Jahveh a historic contemporary of the Wise King represents the fact that when the tribal deity was evolved it was in antagonism to a Solomon who, though his body had long mouldered, was still “marching on.” That Solomon had to contend with the hard and fanatical elements afterwards consolidated in Jahvism is pretty clear, and we may see in him a primitive Akbar. A century after Akbar’s death the Rajah of Joudpoor said to the emperor Aurungzebe: “Your ancestor Akbar, whose throne is now in heaven, conducted the affairs of his empire in equity and security for the period of fifty years. He preserved every tribe of men in repose and happiness, whether they were followers of Jesus or of Moses, of Brahma or Mohammed. Of whatever sect or creed they might be, they all equally enjoyed his countenance and favour, insomuch that his people, in gratitude for the indiscriminate protection which he afforded them, distinguished him by the appellation of The Guardian of Mankind.” Moslem fanaticism could not tolerate such toleration, and Akbar’s reign was followed by conflicts very similar to those which followed Solomon’s reign, leading to the Mogul empire, but ultimately to the reign of an “Empress of India,” under whom we now see the same toleration of all religions which prevailed in the fifty years of Akbar.
The Moslem saw in Akbar’s liberality and toleration the supreme offence of putting other gods—Jesus, Brahma, Ahuramazda—beside Allah. The Jahvist saw retrospectively in Solomon’s liberality the putting of Moloch, Ashera, and other gods beside Jahveh. It was therefore recorded that Jahveh determined to rend all the tribes save one from Solomon’s son (a vaticinium ex evento). But that one was enough to preserve the Solomon cult.
Ἀνάγκη οὐδὲ Θεοὶ μάχονται. This Necessity, which the Greeks saw working above all the gods, is man himself, and worked also above Jah and Jahvism, nay, by means of them. Gradually they seemed to prevail over Solomonism. The Proverbs and Solomonic Psalms were transfused with Jahvism, but by this process the heavenly and the terrestrial kings were confused, and the idea of a human heir to the throne of Jahveh was conceived. As when, in our own era, Islam swallowed Zoroaster, with the result of bringing forth the great literary age of Persia, with Parsaism rationalized under a transparent veil of Moslem phrase and fable, so anciently arose the Hebrew Faizis and Saadis and Omar Khayyáms. Of these was the Isaiah who, with pigments of the Solomonic sunset, painted the sunrise of a new day, and a new earth-born God.
“Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government shall rest on his shoulder; and his name shall be called Counsellor of Wonders, God-hero, Father of Spoil, Prince of Peace. Enlarged shall be dominion, and without cessation of peace, on the throne of David, and throughout his kingdom, to establish it and uphold it by justice and righteousness from henceforth and forever.”
Every title, every tint, in this gorgeous vision is taken from the nuptial song for Solomon (Ps. xlv.) and Solomon’s Psalm (lxxii.) The “delightsomeness poured over (Solomon’s) lips” (Ps. xlv. 2) makes the Counsellor of Wonders; his deification (verses 6, 7) makes the God-hero; the tributes of Tarshish, and Sheba make him father of spoil (Ps. lxxii.); his “mildness” (Ps. xlv. 4) his abundant “peace” (Ps. lxxii. 3, 7) make the Prince of Peace; and the rest is a general refrain for both of the Psalms.
Psalm xlv. opens with the words, “My verse concerns the King,” and there is a fair consensus of the learned that the king is Solomon. It has been found impossible to fix upon any other monarch to whom the eulogia would be applicable, and the resemblance of the theme to the Song of Solomon proves that at an early period writers connected the Psalm with Solomon and one of his espousals.
In quoting Professor Newman’s translation of this Psalm (ante II) I alluded to my slight alterations. These are few and verbal, but momentous, and were not made without consultation of many critical authorities and versions. Professor Newman was unable to believe that the poet really meant to address Solomon as God, and in verse 6 translates “Thy throne divine,” in verse 7, “Therefore hath God, thy God, etc.” Others, with similar theistic bias, have shrunk from what, according to the balance of critical interpretation, is the clear sense of the original:
“Thy throne, O God, ever and always stands;