Daily Tanach Tuesday Sefer Melachim 1 Chapter 11: Hadad the Edomite regains strength to fight the Jewish people

1.      Hadad the Edomite regains strength to fight the Jewish people:

• Hashem raised the power an adversary again Shlomo, by the name of Hadad, the Edomite who was from royal lineage of Edom.
• The history of Hadad: When David was in Edom, Yoav the commander of the Army went up to bury the dead, as he had slain every male of Edom. Yoav and all the Jewish people had remained there for six months until they had slain every member of Edom. Hadad fled towards Egypt together with a number of Edomite men from amongst his father’s servants. At this time Hadad was yet a small child. Prior to arriving to Egypt they arrived to Midian and from there they traveled to Paran. They took men with them from the area of Paran and traveled to Egypt, to Pharaoh the king of Egypt. Pharaoh granted them a home and food and land. Hadad found much favor in the eyes of Pharaoh, and so Pharaoh gave him his wife’s sister as a wife, the sister of Queen Tachpenes. The sister of Tachpenes gave birth for him to a son named Genuvas. He was weaned by Tachpenes in the palace of Pharaoh and so it was that Genuvas grew up amongst the children of Pharaoh. When Hadad heard while in Egypt that Dovid and his general Yoav had passed away, he asked Pharaoh to send him off back to his land. Pharaoh pushed back against this request arguing to Hadad that he lacks nothing by him and there’s no reason for him to leave his land. Nonetheless, Hadad insisted that he let him return.

2.      Other adversaries that G-d raised again Shlomo:

• G-d also raised against Shlomo as an adversary, Rezon, the son of Eliada, who had fled from Hadadezer, the king of Zobah, who was his master. He assembled men around him and became the commander over an army when Dovid had slain them. So they went to Damascus and settled there and reigned over Damascus. He was an adversary to the Jewish people throughout all the days of Shlomo, in addition to all the evil that was caused due to Hadad. He hated the Jewish people and reigned over Aram.