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Commentary on Mark 7:24-30

Having challenged some of the religious principles of Pharisees and scribes, Jesus now pointedly goes into gentile territory. The next three stories take place in non-Jewish areas. Why did Jesus go to the city of Tyre on the Mediterranean coast? It may have been to give him some breathing space from the crowds which pressed in on him everywhere. Later, he will move on to Sidon, and then eastwards by way of the Sea of Galilee to the area known as Decapolis (Ten Towns). All of these places were dominated by Gentiles. Because the people there recognised his healing powers, he ministered to them also.

We are told that he entered a house in Tyre and did not want to be recognised. Why was this? Because his mission was only to his own people? Because people without faith only saw in Jesus a wonder worker? Nevertheless, he was already too well known even here to escape notice. His fame had spread even to these places.

It is then that a gentile woman came to him. She was a Greek, but Syro-Phoenician by birth. She prostrated herself before Jesus and begged him to exorcise the evil spirit in her daughter. Jesus’ answer seems somewhat strange and out of character:

Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.

Jesus’ words suggest an image where the children of the family are fed first, and then the leftovers are given to the dogs under the table. In so speaking, Jesus indicates the prior claim of the Jews to his ministry. In fact, we see this, too, in the missionary work of Paul. Whenever he arrived in a town for the first time, he always went to the Jewish synagogue first to preach the message of Christ, and only later to the Gentiles. Because of the shared tradition of Jews and Christians, they were the obvious people to hear the message first.

Jews (and also Muslims) avoided dogs as unclean animals. They were unclean because they ate all kinds of things indiscriminately. The name ‘dogs’ was sometimes applied by Jews to Gentiles, and for the same reason. It is likely that the woman would be aware of this disparaging title.

It is also important to sense the tone in which Jesus spoke, and this is indicated by the reply of the woman. It is done in a mood of friendly banter. This is clear from the immediate response of the woman:

Sir [also translated ‘Lord’], even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.

In other words, they do not wait until the children are finished eating. They eat simultaneously, even though they only get scraps. Her powerful faith is immediately rewarded and her daughter is healed.

This is a story anticipating the faith of future Gentiles who will become Christians. Let us pray that such faith may be ours also. We know that Jesus excludes absolutely no one from his mercy and healing power. Both as individuals and communities, may we too be as inclusive as possible in our relationships.

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Commentary on 1 Kings 11:4-13

As his life progressed, Solomon moved steadily downhill. The sacred writer implies that women were the cause of his downfall, and especially foreign women. Apart from the daughter of Egypt’s Pharaoh, he took many foreign women as his wives. Among these were many from ethnic groups with which the Israelites were forbidden to marry. The reason for this prohibition was the danger that one would be tempted to worship their gods. As is the case here.

Solomon fell in love with many such women and, towards the end of his life, he had 700 wives and 300 concubines (this is presumably something of a literary exaggeration!). The problem was not so much the number of women in his life – for even David had a number of wives. But these women turned him away from Yahweh as his God. Unlike his father, David, “his heart was not true to the Lord his God”.

Among the gods Solomon began to worship under the influence of his wives were Astarte (Asthtoreth), the goddess of the Sidonians, and Milcom (Molech), the idol of the Ammonites. Worship of Molech not only severely jeopardised the recognition of the absolute kingship of the Lord over his people, but also involved (on rare occasions) the practice of child sacrifice.

To appease his wives, Solomon built shrines to Chemosh, the god of the Moabites, and to Molech on a hill facing Jerusalem. And he did the same for many of his wives, who openly worshipped their own gods.

Twice in the past God had appeared to Solomon: the first time when he asked Solomon what special gift he wanted and Solomon, setting set aside wealth and military power, had asked for wisdom. In the second vision, just after Solomon had completed the Temple, Yahweh had promised many blessings on Solomon. But now God is angry with him, especially because of his repeated idolatry and his violation of the covenant. Solomon had broken the most basic demands of the covenant and thereby severely undermined the entire covenant relationship between God and his people.

In punishment, his kingdom would be given over to not a son, but to one of his servants. However, for the sake of David, Solomon would remain king until his death. Also, for David’s sake, Solomon’s son would be left king of just one tribe. In this way, the promise of an everlasting dynasty for David’s line would be at least partially observed.

As Jerusalem contained the Temple built by David’s son, the destiny of Jerusalem and the Davidic dynasty were closely linked. The Temple represented God’s royal palace, where his earthly throne (the Ark) was situated and where he had pledged to be present as Israel’s Great King.

Solomon’s foreign marriages were primarily contracted for political ends, and the pagan shrines were intended for his wives and for traders. Such contacts, however, jeopardised the purity of the religion of Yahweh, and the author interprets the situation in the spirit and language of Deuteronomy. God punishes Solomon’s impiety by raising up enemies abroad (Hadad the Edomite) and at home (Jeroboam will take over 10 tribes as king, leaving only Judah to Solomon’s son). In the end, Solomon’s great wisdom could not prevent his being ruled by his heart and his political and economic interests.

How often have we, too, been ruled by our emotions and other considerations and been led into behaviour which we know is wrong? It is so easy for us to rationalise, which means creating false reasons to justify what we do. And yet, the only way to go for our own long-term good is the way of truth, integrity and genuine love.

Again we pray for that wisdom which gives us an insight into where truth and goodness are to be found. The road to that wisdom, of course, is the Way of Jesus.

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Commentary on Mark 7:14-23

After defending himself against the accusations of some Pharisees and Scribes about his not observing the traditions of the elders, Jesus now turns to the people. He enunciates what for him are the main principles:

• Nothing that goes into the body from outside can make a person ritually or religiously unclean.
• What makes a person unclean is the filth that comes from inside their mind and spoken through their mouth or expressed in action.

This was a major issue in the earliest days of the Church and was dealt with by the Council of Jerusalem. The story is told in the Acts of the Apostles (chap 15).

The first Christians were all Jews who continued to observe Jewish customs. But when non-Jews began to be accepted into the Christian communities, should they also be obliged to follow these laws and customs? It became clear that, from a religious point of view, no food could be called unclean. This helped to break down the barriers between Jew and Gentile. It has been pointed out that, immediately after this, Jesus entered gentile territory, something he did not often do in his own ministry (see tomorrow’s commentary).

Even Jesus’ disciples seemed shocked by Jesus’ teaching (probably reflecting the reactions of some of the early Jewish Christians). Jesus repeats what he says in the light of the Kingdom he was proclaiming:

He said to them, “So, are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile, since it enters not the heart but the stomach and goes out into the sewer?” (Thus he declared all foods clean.) And he said, “It is what comes out of a person that defiles.”

Real uncleanness is in the ‘heart’—i.e. in one’s mind. Real uncleanness comes from within ourselves in the form of:

…sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, debauchery, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.

As Christians, we do not normally worry about clean and unclean foods on religious grounds, but we can sometimes judge people’s religious commitment by their observance or non-observance of purely external things—a nun not wearing a habit, a person not taking holy water on going into the church, or someone taking Communion in the hand versus by mouth.

We may have gotten rid of the problem of unclean foods, but there are many other ways by which we focus on trivial externals while ignoring the real evils, the places where real love is absent—in ourselves.

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Commentary on 1 Kings 10:1-10

The story of the Queen of Sheba’s visit to Solomon gives an opportunity for the sacred writer to describe the extraordinary magnificence of the Jerusalem court.

Archaeological evidence suggests that Sheba is to be identified with a mercantile kingdom that flourished in southwest Arabia circa 900-450 BC. It profited from the sea trade of India and east Africa by transporting luxury commodities north to Damascus and Gaza on caravan routes through the Arabian Desert. It is possible that Solomon’s fleet of ships threatened Sheba’s continued dominance of this trading business. The queen, too, may have wanted to establish better trading relationships. Solomon dominated the Transjordan and, holding Ezion-Geber, controlled the caravan route from north Arabia to Syria and Egypt. Judging by the descriptions of both Solomon and the queen, it was a highly lucrative trade for both of them.

However, some hold that the queen mentioned here more probably ruled over one of the Sabaean settlements of northern Arabia. The Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) distinguishes between the more usual ‘Sheba’ (used here) and ‘Seba’ which it associates more closely with Cush, or Ethiopia. The name Seba came to be used for the far South, just as Tarshish stands for the Western limits of the earth, figuring as one of the great tribes of travelling merchants. This far-off people, together with the kings of Arabia and Seba, will come to do homage to the future King, as implied in Matthew’s account of the birth of Jesus (Matt 2:11, referring to Ps 72:1-11 and Is 60:6).

The purpose of the queen’s visit was to test Solomon’s wisdom, whose fame had reached as far as her kingdom. Arriving with a large retinue and weighed down with expensive gifts, she asked him questions on all the things in which she was particularly interested. He dealt easily and competently with every problem she posed to him.

It seems that the queen of Sheba recognised a connection between the wisdom of Solomon and the God he served. Jesus used her example to condemn the people of his own day who had not recognised that “something greater than Solomon” was in their midst (Matt 12:42; Luke 11:31).

When the queen saw the wealth and opulence with which Solomon was surrounded – his palace, the food on his table, the number and dress of his attendants and the holocausts he offered in the Temple, she was rendered speechless. Solomon far surpassed all her expectations both in his wisdom and his prosperity. Indeed, she said, blessed were the king’s court and attendants to be always in the presence of such wisdom. The reports she had received at home gave no idea of the reality she now saw with her own eyes.

She concluded by calling blessings on the God who put a person of such wisdom and judgement as Solomon on Israel’s throne. However, it does not imply her personal recognition of the God of the Israelites; there is no hint that she abandoned belief in her own gods.

Before leaving, she gave even more gifts, including 120 gold talents, an enormous amount of money. Never again would anyone bring such an abundance of gifts as the Queen of Sheba brought to Solomon.

Underlying this story, of course, is the understanding that all Solomon’s magnificence was a sign of God’s blessings on his people. God alone was the source of all these blessings. It is clear that the description of this visit was not merely to describe the queen’s desire to experience Solomon’s wisdom at first hand. For the writer, the focus is not on the queen, but on the magnificence of Solomon’s court as a reflection of Israel’s glory and God’s special favour on them as a people.

We too need to remember that all the good things we have and experience are not simply the result of our own efforts. They can disappear just as quickly as they came. We can never claim anything as absolutely our own.

We are simply stewards of all that comes into our hands. What we are given is not merely for our own enjoyment, least of all to be used at the expense of others. They are gifts by which we can be of service to others. Everything is for one purpose only: God’s praise and service. And an awareness of that is a form of real wisdom.

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Commentary on Mark 7:1-13

A group of self-righteous scribes and Pharisees come to Galilee from Jerusalem to observe Jesus. Obviously, word has reached Jerusalem about what Jesus has been doing up in Galilee. They immediately notice that Jesus and his disciples do not observe some of the “traditions of the elders”, especially with regard to the washing of hands before eating. These traditions were a body of highly detailed, but unwritten human laws, which the scribes and Pharisees regarded as having the same binding force as the Law of Moses. Paul admits to having been a fanatical upholder of these traditions (see Gal 1:14).

It is hard not to come to the conclusion that many of these observances were originally based on practical experience. Eating without washing one’s hands could be a source of sickness, although they knew nothing about germs or bacteria. Because sometimes it could be diseased, eating pork made some people seriously sick, so the meat was banned altogether. But in order to ensure these hygienic requirements would be observed, they were linked to a religious sanction. Violating them was not just bad for your health, but a violation of God’s will. In the thinking of the Jewish leaders, to ignore them was to disobey God.

Clearly Jesus was not against the washing of hands as such, even as a religious observance. What he was against was the legalism by which the mere observance of some external actions was equated with being a devout lover of God. He quotes from the prophet Isaiah:

This people honors me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me;
in vain do they worship me,
teaching human precepts as doctrines. (Is 29:13)

The real commandments of God, like unconditional love of the neighbour, are neglected in favour of what are purely human traditions. Jesus illustrates the hypocrisy involved by showing how some supposedly devout people got around the basic responsibility of respect for parents (which the Mosaic law demanded) by claiming that they had consecrated all they owned to God and the temple, while in fact keeping it for their own use. The Corban (or Qorban in some translations) was a way of supposedly making a gift to God by an offering to the Temple, but in such a way that the donor could continue to use it for himself and not give it to others, even needy parents. This is like the story about the pastor who said, “Each week I throw all the collection up in the air for God. What stays up, he keeps; the rest comes to me”.

We sometimes meet Catholics who confuse the essential service of God with some religious rule. They judge people by whether they eat fish on Friday or not. They piously go through all kinds of devotional exercises, but their conversation is full of gossip and destructive criticism of others.

Others get tied down by scruples (“Did I say my penance after Confession?”) when the more important question would be, “Did I change my behaviour?” or “How did I keep my promise not to repeat the same sins?” Some ask: “Did I observe the full hour of fasting before communion?” when the more important issue would be, “Does my going to communion bring me closer to God and make me a more loving person with others?”

There can be a bit of the Pharisee in all of us, and that is the real subject of the teaching today. We will be judged by the depth of our love and nothing else.

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Commentary on 1 Kings 8:22-23,27-30

Having asked for wisdom in governing, Solomon now prays for himself and all the people. He begins with the covenant principle of mutual faithfulness – God towards his people, the people towards their God. God’s kindness to his people flows from the covenant made with Moses at Sinai, but it is conditional on their faithfulness. This is the core of the covenant agreement. In this passage there are there two applications: Yahweh has kept his promise by the building of the Temple, may he keep it also keep it in preserving the stability of the dynasty.

Solomon makes his prayer publicly in the presence of all the people. He begins by indicating the uniqueness of the God of Israel. No other god has acted in history as has the God of Israel, performing great miracles and so directing the course of events so that his long-range covenant promises are fulfilled. Yahweh has kept his promises to the people, who for their part are faithful to him with their whole heart. Of course, the second part is not completely true; the Old Testament is full of incidents where the people violated their side of the covenant. In particular, Yahweh has honoured his promises to Solomon’s father, David, and their fulfilment is seen in the Temple, which David had been told would become a reality in Solomon’s reign (this last statement from v24 is not in today’s reading).

Solomon then speaks in wonder at how a God, for whom the heavens themselves are not big enough, can contain himself within the confines of the Temple that Solomon has built in his honour:

But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Even heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, much less this house that I have built!

An idea which some of those who followed Solomon in later times tended to forget.

The construction of the Temple and the appearance of a visible manifestation of the presence of God within its courts could, and did in fact, give rise to the idea that God was irreversibly and exclusively bound to the Temple in a way that guaranteed his assistance to Israel, no matter how the people lived. Solomon, however, had recognised that, even though God had chosen to dwell among his people in a special and localised way, he far transcended being contained by any created thing, however magnificent.

Solomon concludes his prayer by begging God to continue to watch over the Temple and to listen to his prayers and those of all the people “when they pray toward this place”. When an Israelite was unable to pray in the Temple itself, he was to direct his prayers towards the place where God had pledged to be present among his people.

In our churches, too, we can wonder how the God of the whole universe can be so specially present in our tabernacles. This is a marvellous source of comfort for us and we should use all the opportunities we can to ‘drop in for a visit’ and ask Jesus to be part of our lives, our work, our families, our day.

At the same time, we can reflect that Jesus’ sacramental presence in the tabernacle is a reminder of his real presence in all the people we meet and in all the experiences we have. Every person, every place, every experience is a sacrament of God’s loving presence. Even when we are far from any church, Jesus is close to us. Let us be close to him.

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Commentary on Mark 6:53-56

In last Saturday’s Gospel reading, we saw Jesus and the Twelve landing at a remote place by the lake shore to spend a day of quietness and reflection. But as soon as they disembarked, they were met by a huge number of people for whom Jesus, as their Shepherd, was filled with the deepest compassion. After teaching them at length, he arranged with his disciples for the 5,000 people there to be fed.

After this, the disciples were sent off in their boat to Bethsaida. On the way, they ran into a huge storm. In the middle of it, Jesus appeared walking on the water. When he got into the boat and commanded the wind and the waves, there was total calm. In our weekday readings from Mark, these two scenes are passed over at this point (but we will be reflecting on them at another time).

Today we have a passage summarising what Jesus was doing for the people. It indicates the tremendous hunger of the people to be healed and made whole by Jesus. The people recognise him immediately and go everywhere to see him, bringing along those in need of healing. Jesus, in turn, was visiting towns and villages. The sick, strong in their faith, only asked to be allowed to touch the edges of his outer garment, and everyone who touched him was healed and made whole.

Let us pray that our influence on others at home, at work, and elsewhere may have a truly healing effect.

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Commentary on 1 Kings 8:1-7,9-13

As we begin today’s reading, Solomon has completed the building of his magnificent Temple as a permanent dwelling place for the Lord. The building is described in 1 Kings Chapter 6, and we are told it took seven years, not really very long by the standards of the time for what seems to have been a very large structure. Many of Europe’s great churches took much longer to complete.

Chapter 8, from which today’s reading is taken, describes the dedication of the Temple and the installation there of the Ark of the Covenant. At the instructions of King Solomon, the elders, leaders and princes of the people brought the Ark up in solemn procession from the city of David, also referred to as Zion. As we saw in a previous reading, David had previously brought the Ark from the House of Obed-Edom to Jerusalem, where it had been temporarily placed.

During the festival in the month of Ethanim, all the people of Israel gathered in the presence of Solomon. Ethanim was a month in the Canaanite calendar which corresponded to the 7th month of the Jewish year. The feast which took place in this month was that of the Tabernacles (or Tents). This was 11 months after the completion of the Temple and the 12th year of Solomon’s reign. This feast was an appropriate time for the transition of God’s dwelling among formerly nomadic (tent-dwelling) tribes to a permanent abode among a now settled people.

When all the elders had assembled, the priests then carried the Ark and the Meeting Tent with all the sacred vessels which were inside. The Tent of Meeting was where the Ark was kept. It was called the ‘Tent of Meeting’ from the days in the desert when Moses used to ‘meet’ there with Yahweh. Solomon and all the people then offered a sacrifice of sheep and oxen “too many to number or count”.

The Ark was carried by the priests to its place beneath the wings of the cherubim in the sanctuary, the Holy of Holies in the Temple. These cherubim are described earlier, in chapter 6:23-28. The passage says in part:

In the inner sanctuary [were] two cherubim of olivewood, each ten cubits high. Five cubits was the length of one wing of the cherub and five cubits the length of the other wing of the cherub; it was ten cubits from the tip of one wing to the tip of the other…both cherubim had the same measure and the same form…[Their] height…was ten cubits. He put the cherubim in the innermost part of the house; the wings of the cherubim were spread out so that a wing of one was touching the one wall and a wing of the other cherub was touching the other wall; their other wings toward the center of the house were touching wing to wing. He also overlaid the cherubim with gold.

(Note: A cubit was about 0.45 metres or 1.5 feet.)

The cherubim had their wings spread protectively over the Ark, sheltering it and its carrying poles.

Inside the Ark were just the two stone tablets containing the Law, which Moses had received from Yahweh on Mount Sinai and which Moses had placed there at Horeb.

As soon as the priests had left the Ark in the Holy of Holies, the place was filled with a cloud, so that the priests could no longer minister there:

…the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord.

It was a clear endorsement of everything that had been done and a confirmation of his presence, just as a visible manifestation of the presence of the Lord had descended on the tabernacle at Sinai (see Ex 40:33-35).

Our reading finishes with a brief prayerful poem spoken by Solomon:

The Lord has said that he would dwell in thick darkness.
I have built you an exalted house,
a place for you to dwell forever.

The image of the Lord dwelling in a dense cloud is one often found in the Scriptures. And we see it in the Gospel during the experience of the Transfiguration (Matt 17:1-13; Mark 9:2-13; Luke 9:28-36).

Solomon’s Temple was later replaced by the massive structure erected by Herod the Great. Today, except for the fragment of the Wailing Wall, it is no more, and in its place is an Islamic mosque.

But, long before that, as Jesus died and said “It is finished”, the veil of the Holy of Holies, where the Ark was kept, was torn open to the common gaze. God was no longer present there. Instead, under the new covenant, signed in Jesus’ blood, he is now present in his people. The Temple now is not a building, but the community of disciples. And that is where we are both to find him and reveal him:

Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did it to me. (Matt 25:40)

As Jesuit priest and scientist Teilhard de Chardin put it so beautifully, we are living in a “divine milieu”. God is in the very air that we breathe and in every person and experience that we encounter.

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Commentary on Mark 6:30-34

The Twelve came back from their mission full of excitement at all they had done and taught. Jesus now told them to withdraw for a while for reflection and rest. This is what Jesus himself used to do. Large crowds were still mobbing Jesus and perhaps some of the Apostles too, so much so that they did not even have time to eat. This could have been a real time of temptation as the Apostles began to glory in their new-found power and the resultant fame and popularity.

We also see here once more the balance in Jesus’ life. He was so available to all those in need, the poor, the sick, the outcasts, but there was a limit to his availability. He knew when he needed to get away, to renew contact with his Father and to recharge his batteries (see Mark 1:35-37).

Some people are too self-centred. They have a very poor awareness of other people’s needs and do not bother to meet them. On the other hand, there are those who need to be needed. Their need is to have people looking constantly for them, but the result can often be ‘burnout’ or breakdowns. There are times when we have to learn to be able to say ‘No’ without feeling guilty.

So Jesus and his disciples take off in a boat to a solitary place where they will be left to themselves. Rather, that is what they thought they did. But the people saw them leaving and had a good idea where they were headed. While Jesus and his disciples crossed the lake in a boat, the people hurried along the lake shore. When Jesus stepped out of the boat, he was again faced by a huge crowd.

Jesus quickly decides that this is a time for availability. He is deeply moved by the people’s need; they were like lost sheep in need of a shepherd’s guidance. The people’s persistence in coming out to a desert place echoes the people of Israel in their wanderings. Here, Jesus is the Shepherd of the New Israel. So he begins to teach them. Their first hunger was spiritual. They needed to understand what Jesus stood for and why he did the things he did. There is a Eucharistic connection here and in what follows (the multiplication of loaves), and the teaching corresponds to what we now call the Liturgy of the Word during the Eucharist.

The story illustrates well the balance in Jesus’ life. As he did himself, he urges his disciples to retire and reflect on the meaning of what they are doing. Otherwise they may become active for activity’s sake, or for other less worthy motives. At the same time, in this particular situation, Jesus sees that a response is called for. The day of reflection is abandoned, and the people in their great need are served.

Let us learn, through careful discernment, to do likewise—to do the right thing at the right time.

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Commentary on 1 Kings 3:4-13

Today we have our first reading on King Solomon. It tells of the source of Solomon’s proverbial wisdom. In the second part of the chapter, which we will not be reading, is the story of that wisdom in action when Solomon solved a dispute between two women over which of them was the real mother of two children, one living, one dead.

We are told today that Solomon goes to Gibeon to sacrifice. Gibeon lay to the northwest of Jerusalem and was in the territory of Benjamin. At the time of the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites, the Gibeonites tricked Joshua and Israel into a peace treaty. The city was subsequently given to the tribe of Benjamin and set apart for the Levites. David avenged Saul’s violation of the Gibeonite treaty by the execution of seven of Saul’s descendants (see 2 Sam 21:1-9 and Monday’s reading of this week).

The reason for Gibeon’s importance was the presence there of the tabernacle and an ancient bronze altar. These must have been salvaged after the destruction of Shiloh by the Philistines. There Solomon made a huge offering of 1,000 holocausts. Later, the tabernacle will be moved to the new temple that Solomon will build in Jerusalem.

While still in Gibeon, the Lord tells Solomon in a dream to ask for anything he wants. Before the time of the prophets, dreams were one of the main channels by which God communicated with people. But in the New Testament, we also see Joseph being spoken to by God three times in a dream (Matt 1:20; 2:12 and 2:22), and there is the vision of Peter in Acts (10:10-16). It is not clear what the distinction would be between a dream and a vision.

In response to God’s command, Solomon praises the Lord for all that had been done through his father David. And these favours continue by God seating a son of David on his throne. But Solomon is very young and knows little about administration. The birth of Solomon is generally placed in approximately the middle of David’s 40-year reign, meaning that Solomon was about 20 years old at the beginning of his own reign, and hence lacked experience in assuming the responsibilities of his office.

Moreover, he is king of a very large number of people, “so numerous they cannot be numbered or counted”. Something of an exaggeration, of course, but from the small beginnings of a single family living in Egypt, the Israelites had increased to an extent approaching that anticipated in the promises given to Abraham and Jacob.

Solomon, therefore, asks the Lord to give him “an understanding mind” so that he can rule with equity and distinguish right from wrong. He prays for wisdom in practical affairs. It is a generous request, made not for himself, but for the benefit of the people over whom he rules.

The Lord is deeply pleased that Solomon has not asked for what Near Eastern rulers traditionally looked for: long life, great wealth, the destruction of enemies. He had asked for wisdom, for deep insight into what is true and good. And so the Lord gives him what he asks:

…I give you a wise and discerning mind; no one like you has been before you, and no one like you shall arise after you.

And, because of his integrity and concern for the good of his people, Solomon will also get those things which he did not ask for – riches and glory, the like of which had never been seen until that time.

And indeed, Solomon would become famous both for his wisdom and also for his great wealth.

God today puts to me the same question he put to Solomon:

Ask what I should give you.

What will I ask for? What do I really want? What do I really need? Let me not be too hasty in answering the question. Remember the promise of Jesus:

Instead, seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well. (Luke 12:31)

The answer I give to this question can be very revealing of my attitudes, my values, my priorities and where I stand in my relationships with God, others and self.