Consider the days of ancient King Solomon. Respecting his wise rule, the Bible states: “Judah and Israel continued to dwell in security, everyone under his own vine and under his own fig tree . . . all the days of Solomon.”​—1 Kings 4:25.

The secret of the security enjoyed under Solomon’s reign lay in applying Jehovah’s righteous laws. Before the Israelites entered the Promised Land, God had said: ‘If you continue walking in my statutes and keeping my commandments, the land will indeed give its yield. And you will indeed dwell in security in your land. And I will put peace in the land, and you will indeed lie down, with no one making you tremble.’​—Leviticus 26:3-6.

Sadly, after Solomon’s death the Israelites stopped obeying Jehovah; they turned to idolatry and filthy sex worship. As a result, they lost their security, and the land was invaded by Pharaoh Shishak of Egypt. (1 Kings 14:21-26) “You, for your part, have left me, and I, too, for my part, have left you to the hand of Shishak,” Jehovah explained to an assembly of rulers in Jerusalem.​—2 Chronicles 12:5.

Someone Greater Than Solomon

Jesus Christ confirmed the historic truth about Solomon and “all his glory.” (Matthew 6:29) But with respect to himself, Jesus said: “Look! something more than Solomon is here.” (Matthew 12:42) What did he mean? The security enjoyed under Solomon’s reign was limited. That human king could not free his subjects from sickness, sin, and death. Jesus, however, taught sinful men how they could attain perfect life in everlasting security.​—John 10:10; 13:34, 35; 17:3.

The basis for attaining such total security was laid by Jesus’ death and resurrection. (John 3:16; 1 Corinthians 15:20) From God’s right hand in heaven, he will soon bring earth-wide security to all who submit to his rule. King David of old was inspired to write about this in the poetic 72nd Psalm 72. These words had a partial fulfillment during the reign of David’s son, hence its Ps 72 superscription, “Regarding Solomon.” Yet, the main fulfillment concerns the Kingdom rule of the Greater Solomon, Jesus Christ.

According to Psalm 72:7, 8, the security to be enjoyed under Christ’s rule will be both global and everlasting. “In his days the righteous one will sprout, and the abundance of peace until the moon is no more. And he will have subjects from sea to sea and from the River to the ends of the earth.”​—Compare Zechariah 9:9, 10.

Subjects of Christ’s rule will also enjoy freedom from want, for Psalm 72:16 assures us: “There will come to be plenty of grain on the earth; on the top of the mountains there will be an overflow.” Naturally, there will also be freedom from discrimination, oppression, and violence. “For he will deliver the poor one crying for help, also the afflicted one and whoever has no helper. From oppression and from violence he will redeem their soul, and their blood will be precious in his eyes.”​—Psalm 72:12, 14.

As in King Solomon’s time, the basis for such earth-wide security will be the wise application of Jehovah’s universal laws. This will be in answer to David’s prophetic request: “O God, give your own judicial decisions to the king . . . Let him judge the afflicted ones of the people, let him save the sons of the poor one, and let him crush the defrauder.”​—Psalm 72:1, 4.

[Box on page 6]

“Under Solomon, Israelite material culture advanced more in three decades than it had during the preceding two hundred years. We find in Solomonic strata the remains of monumental constructions, great cities with massive walls, the mushrooming of residential quarters with well-built clusters of the dwellings of the well-to-do, a quantum jump in the technical proficiency of the potter and his manufacturing processes. We find, too, the remains of artefacts representing goods made in far-off places, signs of vigorous international commerce and trade.”​—The House of David, by Jerry M. Landay.

Evidence of Solomon’s Glory

ACCORDING to Bible chronology, King Solomon ruled Israel from 1037 B.C.E. to 998 B.C.E. Interestingly, the book The Archaeology of the Land of Israel, by Professor Yohanan Aharoni, reveals how a revolutionary advance in Israelite civilization took place “about 1000 B.C.E.”

One example given by Aharoni is the evidence of solid city walls built with large stones “cut into oblong, rectangular blocks, fitted together with precision.” In contrast, in countries neighboring Israel, parts of the city walls “were made of brick and wood.”

Furthermore, cities rebuilt at about the time of Solomon give evidence of careful planning, with neat lines of houses and carefully laid-out streets. Aharoni analyzes the ruins of “four towns in Judah built according to the same fundamental plan . . . Beer-sheba, Tell Beit Mirsim, Beth-shemesh, and Mizpah.” How this contrasts with another great center of civilization​—the earlier Mesopotamian city of Ur! Respecting it, Sir Leonard Woolley wrote: “There had been no attempt at town-planning . . . The unpaved streets, many of them blind alleys . . . formed a maze in which it would have been easy to lose one’s way.”

Aharoni also comments on the improvement in household utensils about the time of Solomon’s reign. “The change in material culture . . . is discernible not only in luxury items but also especially in ceramics . . . The quality of the pottery and its firing improved beyond all recognition . . . There suddenly appeared a rich repertoire of various types of vessels.”

The most glorious feature of Solomon’s reign was the magnificent temple, the palace, and the government buildings in Jerusalem. A vast quantity of gold was used to decorate these structures. (1 Kings 7:47-51; 10:14-22) Five years after Solomon’s death, Pharaoh Shishak of Egypt came and stripped Jerusalem of its treasure.​—1 Kings 14:25, 26.

In both Egypt and Palestine, archaeological inscriptions confirm that Shishak indeed conquered Israel. In fact, many historians acknowledge that Shishak’s plunder of Jerusalem revived a weak Egyptian economy and enabled Shishak to finance the massive enlargement of an Egyptian temple on which he recorded his conquest, as seen on this page. Shishak died soon afterward, and another inscription records that his son donated about 200 tons of gold and silver to the temples of Egypt. The inscription does not reveal the source of this wealth, but archaeologist Alan Millard, in his book Treasures From Bible Times, suggests that “much of it was the gold which Shishak carried away from Solomon’s Temple and palace in Jerusalem.”

No wonder that even an atheistic source acknowledges the reality of Solomon’s glorious reign! Bol’shaia Sovetskaia Entsiklopediia (Great Soviet Encyclopedia), under its entry “Solomon,” calls him “ruler of the Israelite-Judean kingdom,” adding that he ruled during “the kingdom’s zenith.”