What Does 1 Kings 4:1 Mean?

And King Solomon reigned over all Israel.

1 Kings 4:1 · SDV

Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.

Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.

This verse in the King James

King James wording

King James Version

So king Solomon was king over all Israel.

THE KEY

Solomon’s name carries the root of wholeness, and the verse places that name over the whole people.

THE MEANING

A name rooted in wholeness occupies the governing seat, with its reach named as all Israel. The repeated “king” and “all Israel” make rule and scope explicit: the whole is gathered under one center.

THE ROOT

שְׁלֹמֹה

Shelomoh

GROWS FROM

שלם

sh-l-m

To be whole, complete, or sound.

“Solomon” in this verse is Shelomoh. Shelomoh grows from the same root as shalom, the Hebrew word for wholeness. The personal name carries that sense into the verse’s picture of rule over all Israel.

ALSO GROWS

shalom: Wholeness, completeness, peace.

שָׁלוֹם

The name’s root is also the word often translated “peace,” so wholeness lies beneath the English personal name.

shalem: Whole, complete, sound.

שָׁלֵם

This branch keeps the root’s sense of completeness concrete: wholeness is not only a feeling, but a state of being sound.

THE PATTERN

Wholeness becomes visible as shared order that reaches an entire people.

In his days the aligned one blooms, and wholeness in abundance until the moon is no more.

Psalm 72:7 · SDVAn abundance of wholeness marks the flourishing of the people under the king’s rule.

There shall be no end to the growth of his governance and wholeness, upon the throne of David and upon his kingdom, to set it firm and to support it with judgment and with alignment, from now and into the ages. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this.

Isaiah 9:7 · SDVGovernment and wholeness grow together as the kingdom is ordered and established.

And let the wholeness of the Anointed One govern in your hearts, into which also you were called in one body; and be thankful.

Colossians 3:15 · SDVWholeness takes the governing place and gathers many into one body.

THE THREAD

For a child is born to us, a son is given to us; the governance shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Father of the Ages, Prince of Wholeness.

Isaiah 9:6 · SDV

Shelomoh carries the root ⁨שלם⁩, the same root beneath shalom, wholeness. Isaiah joins that same word to government in the title “Prince of Peace,” bringing the name and the governing role into one line.

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