Solomon’s reputation for wisdom and learning preceded his reputation as a magician and an exorcist. The author of the Book of Kings (composed in the mid-sixth century BCE) exalted the king of Israel both as a prolific author of proverbs and songs and as an expert on natural lore. A few centuries later, the Roman Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (ca. 37/38–100 CE) amplified this tradition in his Antiquities of the Jews, a sprawling history of the Jewish people from creation to the First Jewish-Roman War (66–73 CE). In this work, Josephus credited the ancient monarch with a God-given power over evil spirits and related a story about a Jewish exorcist who expelled a demon not only with knowledge of herbs and incantations passed down from Solomon but also by the invocation of the great king’s name.
And God also gave wisdom to Solomon and understanding beyond measure and a capacity of heart like the sand on the sea shore. And Solomon’s wisdom surpassed the wisdom of the people of the east and of the Egyptians. And he was wiser than all men, wiser even than Ethan the Ezrahite and Heman and Chalcol and Dorda, the sons of Mahol, and he was renowned in all nations thereabouts. Solomon also uttered three thousand proverbs and his songs numbered one thousand and five. And he spoke about trees from the cedar that is in Lebanon to the hyssop that grows from the wall, and he discussed animals and birds and reptiles and fish. And they came from all peoples to hear Solomon’s wisdom and from all the kings of the earth, who heard his wisdom.
Now the prudence and wisdom which God had bestowed on Solomon was so great, that he surpassed the ancients, insomuch that he was no way inferior to the Egyptians, who are said to have been beyond all men in understanding; nay, indeed, it is evident that their wisdom was very much inferior to that of the king’s. He also excelled and distinguished himself in wisdom above those who were most eminent among the Hebrews at that time for prudence; those I mean were Ethan, and Heman, and Chalcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol. He also composed one thousand and five books of proverbs and songs, and three thousand books of parables and similitudes. For he spoke a parable about every kind of tree, from the hyssop to the cedar; and likewise, also about beasts, about all sorts of living creatures, whether upon the earth, or in the seas, or in the air. For he was not unacquainted with any of their natures, nor did he pass over any inquiries about them, but he described them all like a philosopher, and demonstrated his exquisite knowledge of their several properties. God also granted him the skill of expelling demons, which is a body of knowledge both useful and beneficial to humankind. He also composed incantations to relieve illnesses. And he left behind him the ways of using exorcisms, by which demons can be expelled, so that they never return and this method of curing remains in force down to the present day. For I have seen a certain man of my own country, whose name was Eleazar, releasing people possessed by demons in the presence of Emperor Vespasian, and his sons, and his captains, and the great number of his soldiers.[3] The manner of the cure was this. He held up to the nose of the possessed man a ring that had [under its seal] a piece of a root prescribed by Solomon and thereby drew out the demon through his nostrils. And when the man immediately fell down, Eleazar abjured the demon never to return into him, evoking Solomon by name and reciting the incantations which he had composed. And then to persuade the spectators and to demonstrate to them that he had such a power, Eleazar placed a cup or basin full of water a little way off, and commanded the demon to overturn it as it fled the body, and thereby to let the spectators know that he had left the man. And when this was done, the skill and wisdom of Solomon were shown very clearly.