1 Kings 11:3

3 He had seven hundred royal wives and three hundred concubines - a thousand women in all! And they did seduce him away from God.

1 Kings 11:3 Meaning and Commentary

1 Kings 11:3

And he had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred
concubines
In all 1000, a prodigious number; though these might not be all for use, but for state after the manner of the eastern monarchs; these were a far greater number than are alluded to in ( Song of Solomon 6:8 ) , unless the virgins without number there, were such of these as were not defiled by him; but the number here seems plainly referred to in ( Ecclesiastes 7:28 ) ,

and his wives turned away his heart;
both from his duty to his God, and from attendance to his business as a king, especially the former, as follows.

1 Kings 11:3 In-Context

1 King Solomon was obsessed with women. Pharaoh's daughter was only the first of the many foreign women he loved - Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite.
2 He took them from the surrounding pagan nations of which God had clearly warned Israel, "You must not marry them; they'll seduce you into infatuations with their gods." Solomon fell in love with them anyway, refusing to give them up.
3 He had seven hundred royal wives and three hundred concubines - a thousand women in all! And they did seduce him away from God.
4 As Solomon grew older, his wives beguiled him with their alien gods and he became unfaithful - he didn't stay true to his God as his father David had done.
5 Solomon took up with Ashtoreth, the whore goddess of the Sidonians, and Molech, the horrible god of the Ammonites.
Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.