Solomon
Typological treatment in the corpus
Solomon, the son of David who restored peace after Absalom’s revolt and brought the kingdom to its height, is identified by Jones as a type of Christ as the true Prince of Peace. Noordzij connects Solomon’s temple dedication — the filling of the temple with God’s glory during the Feast of Tabernacles (1Kgs. 8) — to the eschatological outpouring of glory upon God’s spiritual house.
Biblical anchoring
| Reference | Context |
|---|---|
| 2Sam. 12:24-25 | Birth of Solomon — God named him Jedidiah (“beloved of God”) through Nathan |
| 1Kgs. 1:28-40 | Solomon anointed king after the Absalom crisis; David confirms him |
| 1Kgs. 4:20-25 | Solomon’s peaceful reign: Israel dwelt securely “each man under his vine and fig tree” |
| 1Kgs. 8:2, 10-11 | Temple dedication in the seventh month (Feast of Tabernacles); glory of the Lord fills the temple |
| Lev. 23:39 | The eighth day after the Feast of Tabernacles — an extra Sabbath, image of new creation |
| Isa. 9:6 | Prophecy: “His name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace” |
| Matt. 12:42 | Jesus: “Something greater than Solomon is here” |
Typological exposition by author
Stephen E. Jones
In The Struggle for the Birthright, Jones places Solomon in contrast with Absalom: both are sons of David bearing names meaning “peace,” but their natures are opposite:
“There are two princes of peace in the prophetic story of David. Absalom was the first. His name is Absalom, ‘father of peace.’ The second is Solomon, which also means ‘peace.’ Both of these men were sons of David; hence they both were princes. But Absalom was a prince of violence who was hypocritically named ‘father of peace.’ Solomon, on the other hand, established true peace in Israel and in that way was a type of Christ, the true ‘Prince of Peace.‘”1
For Jones this two-part structure is prophetically ordered: the two “princes of peace” represent two phases of messianic history. Absalom typifies the false messianic claims and the phase of rejection — the phase in which Jesus was crucified by leaders who knew his name but seized his throne. Solomon typifies the restoration phase: the establishment of Christ’s true reign of peace after the revolt has been definitively broken.
Solomon’s name — shalom — anticipates the fullness of messianic peace (Isa. 9:6): the Prince of Peace whose rule rests not on violence but on the justice of God. Jones connects this to his broader restorationism: the Davidic kingship is completed in two phases — first the rejection (Absalom phase: Jesus crucified by those who seized his throne), then the establishment of true peace (Solomon phase: the eschatological Kingdom established on righteousness). The entire Davidic narrative is thereby a prophetic kaleidoscope of Christology, in which Solomon’s calm and peaceful reign points forward to the reign of the greater Son of David.1
George Warnock
In Crowned With Oil (ch. 7) Warnock places Solomon in the typological line of David and the Melchizedek order. Solomon’s peace-name anticipates the peace of Christ’s kingdom, but the true fulfillment is Christ as Priest-King on the throne:
“He is the Man whose name is the Branch (Zech. 6:12). He is the Lord Jesus Himself. But He is One who ‘grows’ out of His place. He is a ‘Root out of dry ground’ (Isa. 53:2). He grows — and becomes a Vine.”[^b-warnock-7a]
Warnock connects Solomon’s peace to the Melchizedek order that David foreshadowed with his new tabernacle (1Chron. 15:27). Where Solomon’s temple was an earthly image of peace, Christ’s heavenly ministry is the “more excellent ministry” (Heb. 8:6) that brings peace through an indestructible life:
“Therefore, when He had ascended the throne of David in the heavens, Peter declared: ‘Therefore, being exalted at the right hand of God, He has received the promise of the Holy Spirit from the Father and has poured out this which you now see and hear’ (Acts 2:33).”[^b-warnock-7b]
Solomon’s peace-name is thereby antitypically fulfilled by Christ who occupies the throne of David and pours out the Holy Spirit — the eschatological peace that is not brought about by earthly temple-building but by heavenly priestly ministry.
C. and A. Noordzij
In The Feast of Tabernacles, Noordzij reads Solomon’s temple dedication as a typological image of the glory God will pour out upon His spiritual house at the true Feast of Tabernacles:
“An image of this we find in 1Kgs. 8. When Solomon had completed the temple, the ark was brought in, and ‘when the priests came out, a cloud filled the house of the Lord, so that the priests could not remain standing to minister because of the cloud: the glory of the Lord had filled the temple’ (v. 10-11). All this took place at the feast in the month of Ethanim (i.e. the seventh month, the month of the Feast of Tabernacles, v. 2). Thus God will fill His ‘house,’ not made with hands, with His glory at the true Feast of Tabernacles.”2
Solomon’s temple dedication — occurring during the seventh month, the Feast of Tabernacles — is for Noordzij a salvation-historical sign of extraordinary intensity. The ark finds its resting place, the Shekinah-cloud fills the building, the priests can no longer stand in the overwhelming presence of God. These are not three separate facts but one composite type: the union of God’s presence, his glory, and his house is the single great antitypical reality toward which this historical moment points. Christ — “greater than Solomon” (Matt. 12:42) — fills God’s spiritual house with a glory that definitively surpasses the earthly temple. The temple type in Noordzij’s reading is therefore more than an architectural image: it is a theophany-type, a model of God’s indwelling in his people at the level of full eschatological glory. The month Ethanim is not an incidental historical detail but a providential calendrical marker that God chose to anchor the glory-inauguration to the feast of eschatological completion.
Noordzij further connects the temple dedication to the eighth day (Lev. 23:39), the extra Sabbath following the seven feast days of the Feast of Tabernacles:
“The number eight in Scripture refers to ‘new life,’ life in Christ. This eighth day undoubtedly signifies that God’s purpose for humanity has been reached: a ‘new day’ has begun, a ‘Sabbath,’ a new era of unprecedented rest, the ‘day of the Lord.‘”2
The eighth day closes the typological schema that begins with Solomon’s temple construction, but this “closing” is not an ending but a transcendence. After the completed feast cycle of seven days the eightfold arrives — the number of new creation. In Noordzij’s number symbolism, eight is the transcendence of the seven-cycle of creation-being-completed: circumcision on the eighth day (Gen. 17:12), resurrection on the first/eighth day, eight souls in the ark (1Pet. 3:20). The day of the Lord that Christ as the Greater Solomon inaugurates is therefore not the conclusion of the redemptive-history cycle but the manifestation of a wholly new order — the day that knows no evening, the Sabbath-rest that does not give way to the next working day but endures into eternity. Noordzij positions Solomon’s temple dedication as the hinge-type between the feast-cycle completion and the new-creation manifestation: the glory that filled the temple was a momentary theophany; the glory of the antitypical Feast of Tabernacles is permanent and total, filling not a stone building but the living body of Christ’s people with the fullness of the divine presence.
Related types
- Connected: david, absalom, jubilee, feast-of-tabernacles
- Via glossary: restorationism
Footnotes
Footnotes
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Jones, SftB (The Struggle for the Birthright), ch. 6 (“The Rejection of Jesus”); Solomon as a type of Christ the true Prince of Peace, in contrast with Absalom as a false prince of peace. ↩ ↩2
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Noordzij, CZ (The Feast of Tabernacles), sections “The feast of perfect rest” and “The feast of full glory”; temple dedication as a type of glory-fulfillment, eighth day as image of new creation. ↩ ↩2