62. Concerning the answer which Solomon made to them
And Solomon the King answered and said unto them, “Hearken ye unto me and to what I shall say unto you. Supposing He had taken me away whilst I was carrying Zion—what is impossible to God? And supposing He had taken you away whilst ye were carrying her—what is impossible to God? And supposing He were to make them to inherit our city, and destroy us—what is impossible to God? For everything is His, and none can gainsay His Will, and there is none who can transgress His command in heaven above or on earth below. He is the King Whose kingdom shall never, never pass away, Amen. But now let us go and kneel in the House of God.”
And the elders of Israel together with their King went into the House of God, and they entered the Holy of Holies, and they made supplication, and prostrated themselves, and ascribed blessing to God. And Solomon wept in the habitation of the heavenly Zion, the Tabernacle of the Law of God, and they all wept with him, and after a little while they held their peace. And Solomon answered and said unto them, “Cease ye, so that the uncircumcised people may not boast themselves over us, and may not say unto us, ‘Their glory is taken away, and God hath forsaken them.’ Reveal ye not anything else to alien folk. Let us set up these boards, which are lying here nailed together, and let us cover them over with gold, and let us decorate them after the manner of our Lady Zion, and let us lay the Book of the Law inside it. Jerusalem the free that is in the heavens above us, which Jacob our father saw, is with us, and below it is the Gate of Heaven, this Jerusalem on the earth. If we do the Will of God and His good pleasure, God will be with us, and will deliver us out of the hand of our enemy, and out of the hand of all those who hate us; God’s Will, and not our will, be done, and God’s good pleasure, and not our good pleasure, be done. Through this He hath made us sorrowful. Henceforward His wrath will cool in respect of us, and He will not abandon us to our enemies, and He will not remove His mercy far from us, and He will remember the covenant with our fathers Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob. He will not make His word to be a lie, and will not break His covenant so that our fathers’ seed shall be destroyed.”
63. How the Nobles of Israel agreed [with the King]
And then the elders of Israel made answer and said unto him, “May thy good pleasure be done, and the good pleasure of the Lord God! As for us, none of us will transgress thy word, and we will not inform any other people that Zion hath been taken away from us.” And they established this covenant in the House of God—the elders of Israel with their King Solomon unto this day. And Solomon lived [thus] for eleven years after the taking away of Zion from him, and then his heart turned aside from the love of God, and he forgot his wisdom, through his excessive love of women. And he loved very greatly the daughter of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, whose name was Mâḳshârâ, and he brought her into the house which he had made; and there were figures of the sun, moon, and stars in the roof thereof, and it was illumined by night as brightly as by day. Its beams were made of brass, and its roof of silver, and its panels (?) of lead, and its walls of stone, red with black, and brown with white [and] green; and its floor was of blocks of sapphire stone and sardius. And he used to go and dwell therein through his love for his house and his wife Mâḳshârâ, the daughter of Pharaoh the king of Egypt.
Now the queen possessed certain idols which her father had given her to bow down before, and because, when Solomon saw her sacrificing to them and worshipping them, he did not rebuke her or forsake her, God was wroth with him, and made him to forget his wisdom. And she multiplied her sacrifices, and her worship, and her folly, according to the stupidity of the Egyptians, and all the people of her house worshipped the idols, and learned the foolish service of idols. And enjoying the pleasure of their foolish service they worshipped with the daughter of Pharaoh, and the children of Israel joined themselves to her, and the women and their handmaidens joined themselves unto her in the worship and foolish service of idols. And Solomon himself found pleasure in hearing their foolish service and folly. And when she saw that he loved her, and hearkened, and held his peace, and asked many questions about the foolish service of the gods of the Egyptians, she made herself exceedingly agreeable to him, and she spoke to him with honeyed words, and with the tender speech of women, and with the sweet smile that accompanieth the presentment of an evil deed, and with the turning of the face and the assumption of a look of good intent, and with the nodding of the head. With actions of this kind she caused his heart to turn away from his good intent, and she enticed him to the evil of her work, wishing to drag him down into the folly of the foolish service of idols through carelessness. And as the deep sea draweth down into its depths the man who cannot swim, until the water overwhelmeth him and destroyeth his life, even so did that woman wish to submerge Solomon the King.