Guest column: Where is the wisdom of Solomon today?

by Joanne Bier Beemon

I think this is true, but I might be wrong. Hindsight is not always 20/20.

When I was 9 or so, I was given a tin Sunoco oil can bank. For some reason, I loved it dearly. My sister, Sandy, whom I called “Tweety Bird,” (to my bad-tempered “Tornado”) was one year younger than I and could save her Easter candy for two months. She was a sliver in my big toe.

Sandy and I got into a big fight over the yellow motor oil can bank. We got so loud, my father had to intervene. He asked us to tell him whose bank it was. I explained in passionate but measured, logical terms that the bank was mine. It surprised me that when Dad turned to Sandy, her claim was as sincere and equally as passionate, albeit somewhat more emotional than mine.

After silently weighing our arguments, Dad announced that if we could not come to an agreement on who the bank belonged to, he would destroy it.

Being a somewhat precocious, agnostic (I had decided if there was a God, He was on the other side and I wanted as little to do with Him as possible) child and fascinated by religion, I had studied the Old Testament. I was familiar with the story of the two women who came to King Solomon with a newborn child, both claiming to be his mother.

Like my Dad, King Solomon listened to the story of both women. The king then proclaimed that he would take a sword and cut the baby in two and give each woman half. One woman cried out that Solomon should give the baby to the other woman. The other woman said to go ahead and cut the child in two.

Then King Solomon wisely said that it was clear that the woman who had cried out to save the child by giving him to the other woman, clearly loved the baby as a Mother would, while the other woman had no love for the child. So he gave the child to the woman who had begged to save the baby’s life.

I knew the story. Sandy insisted again that the Sunoco bank was hers. I had the key to winning back my bank. I knew the story, the trick. But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t let Sandy win.

Dad made his way to the can opener mounted on the wall. He paused but I was frozen. He brought the blade down and into the can. I heard the puncture. Dad glanced toward us again and then cranked the can until the lid fell inside. He then placed the decapitated can on the floor and crushed it beneath his work boot.

Fast forward: Watching the news and the ongoing horror of Ukraine, the murder, rape, destroyed homes and dreams, children and women fleeing with their cats and dogs, abandoned bicycles and dead bodies, burned up tanks, the temporary graves in backyard gardens, I remember the old stories of the Bible.

God commanded the Israelites to kill every man, woman and child of the Canaanites, holding up the sun for three days so slaughter could be complete.

I know what war is. War always unleashes the most vile, twisted, sadistic, deranged, detached behavior from humanity, evil of man’s sin against God, the Earth and tomorrow’s children. We know this.

We know what war is. It will get worse and more terrible until the people and body of Ukraine are dead. Until Russia’s people are drained and starve. Every cruelty and death must be revenged with more and greater cruelty and death.

Neither Russia nor Ukraine/NATO can bear to see the other victorious. And so we watch in mute horror as the people die and the land is decimated because we are on the just side, the right side and Putin is evil and we can still send in more Stingers and tanks and mercenaries.

There is no powerful wise Solomon to appeal to here. And like Sister Sandy and I, there are no combatants who can love enough to give the prize to their enemy.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Joanne Bier Beemon is perhaps the only county-wide elected Green Party member when she was elected nearly 25 years ago as drain commissioner for Charlevoix County. She was a classmate of the editor in bygone days at Grand Valley State University.