Week 16 I Kings
Solomon weathers a leadership crisis and becomes king.
Then in chapter four I see a bunch of names.
I scan down the list. Okay – new government, new officials.
Solomon appoints twelve deputies to his taxation districts. Twelve districts is no surprise – back in Joshua the land was divided among the twelve family units.
I look at the first name on the list: Ben-hur. Ben-hur leads Ephraim. Right away I figure I know how the pattern will play out – the name of some guy I don’t know will be connected with the name of a known guy/territory: Reuben, Simeon, Judah, etc.
My great idea breaks down with name #2. Ben-deker is deputy in Makaz.
I check the list for Jacob’s son’s names. I see Ephraim, Naphtali, Asher, Issachar, Benjamin, Judah. But that’s it.
Where are the rest? I need an accurate map of cities and tribal boundaries during Solomon’s reign. And I need time to match the cities to the traditional territories. For example, in my back-of-the-bible map the town of Bethshemesh looks like it could be in Judah.
But I don’t have a good atlas and I’m out of time. Maybe the cities line up with the original territories or maybe they don’t.
I guess it doesn’t make too much difference.
I need to keep in mind that things are changing all the time. And I need to keep in mind that the bible tells me things worth knowing but doesn’t tell me everything.