11:1 strange women. The term “strange women” refers to “foreign women,” women who practiced their pagan religions and worshiped their respective nature gods. As with his marriage to the daughter of Pharaoh, the others may also have been—at least in part—political marriages, contracted to help extend the influence and wealth of his kingdom. He may even have felt this was an effective way to spread the knowledge of the true God to these other nations, just as modern evangelicals who dialogue with worldly philosophies hope thereby to win their adherents to Christ. Such compromises, however, almost inevitably lead to apostasy, and this happened in Solomon’s case as well (see I Kings 11:4-8).