Musar untuk 1 Raja-raja 3:16

When Joshua was about to conquer the land of Israel, he sent out two spies who, due to their lofty spiritual level, overcame and humbled the two "harlots" mentioned by the Zohar. Once the Holy Temple was built in the days of King Solomon, when the fortunes of the Jewish people were at their peak [the 15th generation after Abraham. Ed.], these two "harlots" were defeated absolutely, and this is one of the reasons Solomon is described as sitting "on the throne of G–d" (Chronicles I 29,23). This is the mystical dimension of the two נשים זונות, harlots, who approached him, each claiming that the surviving baby was hers (Kings I 3,16-27). The above is all based on the Zohar, and elaborated on in the book קול בוכים.

It is related in the Zohar (2:178b; 3:60b) and in the writings of the Ari, z”l (Eitz Chaim, Sha’ar 49, 113b) that the two prostitutes of Shlomo’s day (I Melachim 3:16) were actually the two female demons Machalas and Lilis. Machalas is accompanied by four hundred and seventy- eight camps, the numerical value of her name, while Lilis is accompanied by four hundred and eighty camps, the numerical value of her name. When a person rejoices in the performance of a commandment he subdues Machalas and her cohorts. And when he mourns at a time that he is commanded to do so he subdues Lilis. I believe that this is the meaning of the verse, “It is better to go to a house of mourning than to a house of feasting” (Koheles 7b), for through mourning a man subdues two more camps than he does through rejoicing.

The two "wives" of these two "spies" did not submit to Joshua at the time, however. They represented the "hard" attribute of Justice and the attribute of impurity and had not submitted to Joshua. When king Solomon ascended the throne of Israel and the glory of Israel was at its height, kings from all over the world came to bring him presents, and he inherited the crown of every domain including the domains ruled over by the various demons. According to a version in the Targum Sheni on the Book of Esther, Solomon sent a threatening letter to the queen of Sheba warning her that if she would not come and submit to his rule, he would dispatch all kinds of demons who would kill her while she was asleep. There is also a story in the Zohar that Solomon dispatched one of the demons to king Chirom while the latter was in bed. This demon took king Chirom well into the depths of purgatory until he expressed his willingness to submit to the rule of king Solomon. This is what is meant in Kings I 5,26: "The Lord had given Solomon wisdom as He had promised him. There was peace between Chirom and Solomon and the two of them made a treaty." When the two women Lilith and Machalat heard this, they also submitted to Solomon and even prostrated themselves before him. This is the meaning of Kings I 3,16 that "then two prostitutes came and stood before the king". The verse emphasizes the arrival of these two women by stating אז תבאנה, "then they came," as if to state that until then they were not prepared to come and to submit to Solomon.