What’s in a Title
The proverbs of Solomon, son of David, king of Israel:
- Proverbs 1:1
Solomon could have started this in many different ways. “The proverbs of King Solomon of Israel, son of David” or “The proverbs of Solomon, king of Israel, son of David”. Usually you’d put your most prestigious title, however, he chooses to put the ‘king of Israel’ at the end. His name is unadorned followed by ’son of David’ and lastly ‘king of Israel’. It’s a bigger ‘claim to fame’ to be the son of David than king of Israel. He values his son-ship more than his kingship.
The ‘Davidic king’ also has importance. He was a picture of the Christ to come. It could be reasoned that Solomon valued this picture more. For us, it would be prioritizing our relationship to Christ above any Ph.D, JD, or MD degrees or even President of the USA. Solomon considered it higher than the highest position in the kingdom. His relationship to Christ is better than being king.