1 Kings 3:20

20 She got up in the middle of the night and took my son from beside me while your servant slept. She laid him at her breast, and laid her dead son at my breast.

1 Kings 3:20 Meaning and Commentary

1 Kings 3:20

And she arose at midnight
Perceiving what she had done, that she had overlaid her child, and it was dead; either through fear of punishment inflicted on persons thus negligent, or because of the disgrace of it, taking no more care of her child, she made use of the following stratagem: and took my son from beside me, while thine handmaid slept;
this served to puzzle the cause, for how could she know what she did when she was asleep? this she could not prove, it was only conjecture: and laid it in her bosom, and laid her dead child in my bosom;
where she found it in the morning; but still what proof was there that it was the other woman's, and not her own, that lay dead in her bosom?

1 Kings 3:20 In-Context

18 Then on the third day after I gave birth, this woman also gave birth. We were together; there was no one else with us in the house, only the two of us were in the house.

19 Then this woman's son died in the night, because she lay on him.

20 She got up in the middle of the night and took my son from beside me while your servant slept. She laid him at her breast, and laid her dead son at my breast.

21 When I rose in the morning to nurse my son, I saw that he was dead; but when I looked at him closely in the morning, clearly it was not the son I had borne."

22 But the other woman said, "No, the living son is mine, and the dead son is yours." The first said, "No, the dead son is yours, and the living son is mine." So they argued before the king.