Hiring of Men

And king Solomon raised a levy out of all Israel; and the levy was thirty thousand men.

14 And he sent them to Lebanon, ten thousand a month by courses: a month they were in Lebanon, and two months at home: and Adoniram was over the levy

1 Kings 5:13-14

Solomon has to have some way to get all this work done. His best way to do this is to hire all those who aren't busy with the harvest or defense. To do this, he'd have to figure out who wasn't busy with what. Back in that day, there was no better way to do that than by what we know as draft. They called it a levy though just to be clear. It was sort of like a mandatory showing reminding everyone of the work to be done. Then too, he had to hire them. To do this, he likely sent out messengers to bring them all in. The other way to do this was to wait till a feast day when all were gathered there together. There was 30,000 hired in total, though not all at once. Let's say everyone got a dollar a day for wage. That would be 1 dollar times 30,000 to make exactly 30,000 needed to hire them in sum. He gave them this over the course of three months though. There was only 10,000 men sent out each time. We'll divide 10,000 into 30,000 to find out how much he spent on a monthly basis. It goes in three times, right? Therefore, he sent out 10,000 in labor expenses each month. Wait a minute though. That's just 10,000 for one day of the month. Each month as we know it today lasts about 30 days. We'll have to multiple 10,000 times 30 to find out the sum for that month. Then just subtract 4 days of rest from the sum. That's either 10,000 dollars times 4 days which makes 40,000 dollars off the sum or 30 days minus 4 times the result. Let's try the one at the last: 30 minus 4.

30

4

____

26

Then multiply 26 days times 10,000 to make the result.

10,000

26

_______

60,000

200,000

_______

260,000

260,000 dollars a month is quite a lot for these times. If they had worked all 30 days without stopping for the Sabbath, it would've made a total of 300,000 to be paid. Back in those days though, they'd have been paid each with a coin. At least they were in the times of our Lord. It's much the same principle, see.