1 Kings 3:23-28. This is the famous judgment of Solomon when confronted with two women both claiming a child was theirs. These women lived in the same house and had given birth at the same time. One's child had died and one had lived. They ended up before the king because one claimed that the woman whose child had died had stolen her living baby and claimed it was her own. The other woman said no, my child is the living child and the other woman is claiming this so she can take him from me. In these verses we get Solomon's decision. Faced with this impossible situation, he says cut the child in two and give half to one mother and half to the other. One woman says no - let the other have him, just don't kill him; but the other says fine - that way neither of us will have him. Solomon then gives the living child to the first woman, judging that she is the mother because her love for her child was greater than her desire to win.

Hearing this story as a child I always thought it oversold Solomon's "wisdom." No one would want to cut a baby in half, I thought. Both woman would object to this unless one of them was mentally unstable, and I thought a truly wise king would know that. But that was because by the time I was growing up human life was much more valued. In Old Testament times life, especially the life of a child, was much more disposable. Children were often valued more as a commodity to the family and community, rather than precious in and of themselves and worthy of protection at all costs. Mothers, though, have it in our nature to love and protect our children more than anything else in the world.

Solomon was truly wise for sensing that his strange suggestion would get a reaction that he could use as the basis for making a decision. He was faced with a truly impossible situation, and needed some way of bringing out more information. Maybe he did not foresee that one woman would be willing to have the baby cut in two, but he rightly suspected that the true mother would protest more vigorously for her child's well-being, even if it meant she would have to give him up. That is how mothers love.

Sadly, today, I think we are back to a more Old Testament view of life, and that is partly why I am able to see the wisdom of Solomon now when I couldn't before. Many women today gladly cut babies in two and celebrate it as a victory for women's rights! They give no thought to the effect this has on the mothers themselves, who have been lied to and believe that their child is nothing more than disposable clump of cells. No matter what these women may have been conditioned to believe, the truth is the truth, and they almost always have already begun subconsciously developing a mother's love for their child. The mental and emotional devastation of these mothers echoes throughout our society today.