1 Kings 11:14-25

Evangelical Heritage Version

God Raises Foreign Enemies to Oppose Solomon

¹⁴ Then the Lord raised up Hadad the Edomite, from the royal line of Edom, as an adversary for Solomon. ¹⁵ Earlier, while David was at war with Edom, when Joab the commander of the army went up to bury the dead, he struck down every male in Edom. ¹⁶ For six months Joab and all Israel stayed there until he exterminated every male in Edom. ¹⁷ But while Hadad was a young boy, he had fled with some Edomites from among his father’s servants to go to Egypt. ¹⁸ So they set out from Midian and went to Paran. They took some men with them from Paran and went to Egypt, to Pharaoh king of Egypt. He gave Hadad a house and decreed an allowance of food for him and gave him land.

¹⁹ Hadad found great favor in the eyes of Pharaoh, so Pharaoh gave him the sister of his own wife, the sister of Queen Tahpenes, as his wife. ²⁰ The sister of Tahpenes bore him a son named Genubath. Tahpenes weaned him in the house of Pharaoh, so Genubath was in the house of Pharaoh with Pharaoh’s own sons.

²¹ Later Hadad heard that David rested with his fathers and that Joab the commander of the army was dead. So Hadad said to Pharaoh, “Send me back to my own country.”

²² Pharaoh said to him, “What are you lacking here with me, so that you want to go back to your own country?”

He said, “Nothing, but please let me go.”

²³ God also raised up another adversary for Solomon, Rezon son of Eliada, who had fled from his master, Hadadezer king of Zobah. ²⁴ After David had destroyed Zobah’s army, Rezon gathered men around himself and was the commander of a band of raiders. They went to Damascus and lived there and ruled Damascus. ²⁵ He was Israel’s adversary during all the days of Solomon, in addition to all the difficulties which Hadad caused. He was hostile to Israel, and he ruled over Aram.