Ancient beliefs, 3000 years ago, varied by cultures about final judgment, a heaven or hell, and afterlife. The following is a novel excerpt of how I surmised King Solomon explained his views, based on his proverb, to the Queen of Sheba about final judgment. The novel is a contemporary application of a story form to promote understanding of the wisdom of Proverbs and wise sayings.
“What will happen to your wives when you die?”
“Naamah, the mother of my first son Roboam, will obtain the power of rule over my wives. She will arrange for my wives livelihoods and approve any of their remarriages. This office will become her duty as mother of my successor.”
“However, I believe Naamah would use her power against Siamuna, my Egyptian wife, after my death. It will not matter though, because Siamuna will poison herself when I die because of her Egyptian belief that she must accompany me into an afterlife. An Egyptian’s worse fear is they will not pass into an afterlife. They believe that after death, Anubis, their god of the dead, will weigh their hearts on a scale of justice, balanced against truth, before allowing them to pass on to an eternal afterlife. A heart that does not balance is to be thrown and eaten by the monster Ammut and their afterlife extinguished forever.”
“What do Israelites believe will happen when they die and what measures will your god use to judge them?”
“We believe that all dead spirits will go to Sheol, the bottomless pit in the earth. The righteous spirits when judged by Yahweh will sleep in peace forever with their fathers and their kinfolk. The evil spirits will face Abaddom, the destroyer of evil, and wander forever in misery with their own kind. While we are similar in our beliefs with Egyptians about a final judgment after death, Israelites believe the correctness of the measures used to judge us is only the affair and concern of Yahweh.” The balance and true scales are Yahweh’s concern; all the weights in the bag are his affair. (Proverb 16:11)
“Solomon, you believe in only one God and numerous Goddesses. The Egyptians believe in many Gods, same as my people. How do you know which beliefs are the truth?”
“Bilqis, I can only answer that I have faith in my beliefs of Yahweh. What do you believe?”
Source:
As A Lily Among Thorns – A Story of King Solomon, the Queen of Sheba, and the Goddess of Wisdom by Rudy U Martinka
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