Zadok the priest took the horn of oil from the Tent, and anointed Solomon. They blew the trumpet; and all the people said, “Long live king Solomon!” All the people came up after him, and the people piped with pipes, and rejoiced with great joy, so that the earth shook with their sound.
A crowd's singing and shouting was so loud it caused an earthquake.
Physics
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The cited passage
What current science says
The loudest recorded crowd roar hit about 142 decibels at a football stadium — loud enough to cause hearing damage but nowhere near enough to shake the ground. An earthquake requires energy released deep underground along fault lines. Even if every person on Earth screamed at once, the combined acoustic energy would be about 50 watts — roughly enough to power a single light bulb, not crack the planet open.
What the text says
This comes from 1 Kings 1:39-40. When a new king was anointed, the people celebrated with such volume that 'the earth rent with the sound of them' — their cheering literally split the ground.
Three honest ways to read this passage
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As history
The text records how its authors understood the world with the knowledge they had. Read this way, a difference from modern science is a window into the ancient mind, not a failure.
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As accommodation
The text speaks to its first audience in their own terms, to make a point that isn't mainly about physics or biology. Read this way, the scientific detail is the vehicle, not the cargo.
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As contradiction
The text makes a claim about the physical world that modern findings dispute. Read this way, the difference is a genuine factual disagreement worth naming.
GEBible doesn't pick one of these for you. Each entry shows the passage, what it says, and what current science says — nothing more.