The King's Mirror (Speculum regale-Konungs skuggsjá)
Philosophy
The King's Mirror (Speculum regale-Konungs skuggsjá)
Education of princes; Encyclopedias and dictionaries -- Early works to 1600; Scandinavia -- Civilization
forgotten to be ashamed of having broken the agreement which we two made
as a reminder that you owe repentance for having cursed the Lord’s
anointed. There is, therefore, a double guilt upon your head now; and it
will be better for you to suffer a brief punishment here, so that others
may be warned by your misfortune, than that this crime should follow you
into eternal death, and others become bolder in such evil, if you die
unpunished.” Then the king ordered him to be killed and buried outside
the city as a reminder and warning to others never to break a covenant.
Footnote 336:
According to the Scriptural story Shimei left Jerusalem to bring back
two runaway servants. _I Kings_, ii, 39-40.
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LXVI
SOLOMON’S JUDGMENT IN THE CASE OF ADONIJAH AND HIS FOLLOWERS
_Son._ Now I wish to ask you why Solomon caused his brother Adonijah to
be put to death for requesting Abishag to be his wife.
_Father._ Adonijah had earlier, as you may have heard, led an uprising
against his father. When David had become an aged man and was very
decrepit because of his many years, Adonijah appointed himself to be
king without his father’s knowledge, and made a festive banquet as newly
consecrated king. He sent heralds running through the streets with pipes
and drums to proclaim throughout the city that Adonijah was now the
king. The chief men who were with him in this plot were Joab, David’s
chief captain and his kinsman, and Abiathar the bishop, and many other
lords. But when Zadoc the bishop, Nathan the prophet, Benaiah the
captain, and Bathsheba the queen came as if in deep sorrow to tell David
what great undertakings were hidden from him, he remained silent for
some time but sighed heavily. At last he spoke as from a heart full of
grief and said: “My sons are not minded like me, for I served King Saul
many days, though he sought after my life. And yet God had chosen me to
be king, for He was angry with King Saul; but I awaited the judgment of
God by which he would be deprived of his kingdom; but I would not
condemn him, though he was mine adversary. Now my son has done that to
me which I would not do to mine enemy. But because Adonijah has taken
the kingship to which God Himself appointed me, even before I had
renounced it or He Who had chosen me had removed me, he shall fall in
disgrace from this dignity, as that one fell who in arrogant pride
raised the first rebellion against his Lord.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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