The Story of the Queen of Sheba and King Solomon

The Queen of Sheba is first mentioned in I Kings 10:1-13 and in II Chronicles 9:1-12 in the Bible and later in other works such as in the Aramaic Targum Sheni, the islamic Quran and finally in the Ethiopian work known as the Kebra Negast.

Timeline for the different mentions of the Queen of Sheba:
• c. 600 BCE – c. 500 BCE
First written appearance of the Queen of Sheba in the biblical Book of Kings,.

• c. 300 CE – c. 1000 CE
Approximate dates of the composition of the Targum Sheni which includes a different version of the tale of the Queen of Sheba.

• c. 632 CE – c. 700 CE
Approximate dates for the composition of the Quran which includes yet another version of the tale of the Queen of Sheba.

• c. 1300 CE – c. 1400 CE
Approximate dates for the composition of the Kebra Negast which includes the most elaborate re-telling of the tale of the Queen of Sheba.

The Queen in the Bible

The Books of I Kings and II Chronicles relate the story of the queen’s visit, and it is upon these works that later versions of the story are based. According to the biblical tale, once Solomon became king (965-931 BCE), he asked his god for wisdom in ruling his people (I Kings 3:6-9). God was pleased with this request and granted it but also added riches and honor to the king’s name which made Solomon famous far beyond his borders.
The Queen of Sheba heard of Solomon’s great wisdom and the glory of his kingdom and doubted the reports. Therefore, she traveled to Jerusalem to confirm it herself. The Bible only states that the monarch is “the queen of Sheba” (I Kings 10:1) but never specifies where “Sheba” is. Her purpose in coming to see the king was “to prove him with hard questions” (I Kings 10:1) and, once he had answered them and shown her his wisdom, she presented Solomon with lavish gifts and praised his wisdom and kingdom before returning to her country.
After giving Solomon these gifts, the queen then receives from him “all her desire, whatsoever she asked, besides that which Solomon gave her of his royal bounty” and then returns to her country with her servants (I Kings 10:13).

The Queen in the Targum Sheni

In the Targum Sheni (“Second Targum”), an Aramaic translation (targum) of biblical accounts, one notable addition to the story involves King Solomon holding a feast for the daunting army of animals, birds and demonic spirits he has as subjects. But the woodcock refuses to attend, on the grounds that Solomon is inferior to the Queen of Sheba. Solomon sends for the Queen and houses her in a room made of glass, through which he discovers that she has a hairy foot. She demands from him the answers to a number of riddles before she will pay homage. Solomon solves the riddles, and the two exchange gifts.

The Queen in the Qur’an

Bilqīs, as the Queen of Sheba is known in the Islamic tradition, appears in the Qur’an (or Koran) around the 10th century BCE. According to one account, Solomon, having heard from hoopoe bird that Bilqīs and her kingdom worshipped the Sun, sent a letter asking her to worship God. She replied by sending gifts, but, when Solomon proved unreceptive to them, she came to his court herself. The king’s genie, fearing that the king might be tempted into marrying Bilqīs, whispered to him that she had hairy legs and the hooves of a donkey. Solomon, being curious about such a peculiar phenomenon, had a glass floor built before his throne so that Bilqīs, tricked into thinking it was water, raised her skirts to cross it and revealed that her legs were truly hairy. Solomon then ordered the genie to create a depilatory for the queen. Tradition does not agree as to whether Solomon himself married Bilqīs or gave her in marriage to a Hamdānī tribesman. She did, however, become a believer.

The Queen in the Kebra Nagast

In 1322, the Kebra Nagast (The Glory of Kind) was translated from Arabic to Amharic. The Queen of Sheba appears as the most prominent figure in the Kebra Nagast, which is the Ethiopian national epic and foundation story. According to this tradition, the Queen of Sheba, called Makeda visited Solomon’s court after hearing about his wisdom. She stayed and learned from him for six months. On the last night of her visit, he tricked her into his bed, and she became pregnant. She returned to her kingdom, where she bore Solomon a son, Menilek. Menilek I was made king by his father, thus founding the royal Solomonic dynasty of Ethiopia, which ruled until the deposition of Haile Selassie I in 1974.

The Kebra Negast Version

In the Ethiopian Kebra Negast (“The Glory of Kings”) the story is retold but developed further. Here, the queen’s name is Makeda, ruler of Ethiopia, who is told of the wonders of Jerusalem under Solomon’s reign by a merchant named Tamrin. Tamrin has been part of an expedition to Jerusalem supplying material from Ethiopia for the construction of Solomon’s temple. He tells his queen that Solomon is the wisest man in the world and that Jerusalem is the most magnificent city he has ever seen.

Intrigued, Makeda decides to visit King Solomon. She gives him gifts and is given gifts in return and the two spend hours in conversation. Toward the end of their time together, Makeda accepts Solomon’s god and converts to Judaism. Solomon commands a great feast to celebrate Makeda’s visit before her departure, and she spends the night in the palace. Solomon swears an oath that he will not touch her as long as she does not steal from him.
Makeda agrees but, in the night, becomes thirsty and finds a bowl of water which Solomon has placed in the center of the room. She is drinking the water when Solomon appears and reminds her that she swore she would not steal and yet here she is drinking his water without permission. Makeda tells him he can sleep with her since she has broken her oath.
Before she leaves Jerusalem, Solomon gives her his ring to remember him by and, on her journey home, she gives birth to a son whom she names Menilek (“son of the wise man”). When Menilek grows up and asks who his father is, Makeda gives him Solomon’s ring and tells him to go find his father.

Menilek is welcomed by Solomon and stays in Jerusalem for some years studying the Torah. In time, however, he must leave and Solomon decrees that the first-born sons of his nobles will accompany Menilek back home (possibly because the nobles had suggested Menilek should leave). Before the group departs, one of the sons of the nobles steals the Ark of Covenant from the temple and replaces it with a duplicate; as the caravan leaves Jerusalem, the ark goes with them.

The theft of the ark is discovered soon after, and Solomon orders his troops to pursue the caravan, but they cannot catch up. Menilek, meanwhile, has discovered the theft and wants to return the ark but is persuaded that this is the will of God and the ark is supposed to travel to Ethiopia. In a dream, Solomon is also told that it is God’s will the ark was taken. In the Solomon’s dream, sun, rising over Israel, but being mistreated and despised by the Jews, it moved to shine over Ethiopia and Rome (the Byzantine empire). and so Solomon calls off his pursuit and tells his priests and nobles to cover up the theft and pretend the ark in the temple is the real one. Menilek returns to his mother in Ethiopia with the ark which is enshrined in a temple and, according to legend, remains there to the present day.