A verse by verse commentary on 1 Kings 9 dealing with The Lord Appears to Solomon and Solomon’s Other Activities.

1. 1 KI GS 9 COMME TARY
EDITED BY GLE PEASE
The Lord Appears to Solomon
1 When Solomon had finished building the temple
of the Lord and the royal palace, and had
achieved all he had desired to do,
GILL, "And it came to pass, when Solomon had finished the building of the
house of the Lord,.... Which was done in seven years, 1Ki_6:38.
and the king's house; his own palace, which was finished in thirteen years, 1Ki_7:1,
and all Solomon's desire which he was pleased to do; all his other buildings, the
house for Pharaoh's daughter, the house of the forest of Lebanon, and may include his
vineyards, gardens, orchards, and pools of water, made for his pleasure, Ecc_2:4 in
which he succeeded and prospered, 2Ch_7:11.
HE RY, "God had given a real answer to Solomon's prayer, and tokens of his
acceptance of it, immediately, by the fire from heaven which consumed the sacrifices (as
we find 2Ch_7:1); but here we have a more express and distinct answer to it. Observe,
JAMISO , "1Ki_9:1-9. God’s covenant in a second vision with Solomon.
And it came to pass, when Solomon had finished the building of the house
— This first verse is connected with 1Ki_9:11, all that is contained between 1Ki_9:2-10
being parenthetical.
K&D 1-2, "The Answer of the Lord to Solomon's Dedicatory Prayer (cf. 2Ch_7:11-22).
- 1Ki_9:1, 1Ki_9:2. When Solomon had finished the building of the temple, and of his
palace, and of all that he had a desire to build, the Lord appeared to him the second
time, as He had appeared to him at Gibeon, i.e., by night in a dream (see 1Ki_3:5), to
promise him that his prayer should be answered. For the point of time, see at 1Ki_8:1.
‫ק‬ ֶ‫שׁ‬ ֵ‫ל־ח‬ ָⅴ, all Solomon's desire or pleasures, is paraphrased thus in the Chronicles: ‫ב‬ ֵ‫ל‬ ‫ל‬ ַ‫ע‬
‫א‬ ָ ַ‫ל־ה‬ ָⅴ, “all that came into his mind,” and, in accordance with the context, is very
properly restricted to these two principal buildings by the clause, “in the house of

2. Jehovah and in his own house.”
BE SO , "1 Kings 9:1-2. And it came to pass when Solomon had finished, &c. —
Or rather, according to 2 Chronicles 7:11, Thus Solomon finished the house of the
Lord, &c., and concluded all with the foregoing prayer, and the great festival which
he kept. That the Lord appeared to Solomon the second time — That is, the second
time in a dream or vision; the divine message, mentioned 1 Kings 6:11, having been
imparted unto him by some prophet or messenger sent from God on that errand.
Accordingly this appearance, like the former at Gibeon, is said (2 Chronicles 7:10)
to have been made by night, and in all probability the very night after he had
finished the solemnities of his festival, as the other had been. God had given a real
answer to Solomon’s prayer, and tokens of his acceptance of it, immediately, by the
fire from heaven which consumed the sacrifice, (2 Chronicles 7:1,) but here we have
a more express and distinct answer to it.
COFFMA , "The first difficulty here is the matter of dating this Divine appearance
to Solomon. Both Keil and Hammond place this event in the 24th year of Solomon's
reign,[1] but there is no certainty that the Temple remained undedicated for the
thirteen years between its completion and the completion of the king's palaces.
Yes, God here told Solomon that he had heard his prayer and hallowed the Temple,
etc., but it seems unlikely that God would have waited thirteen years to answer
Solomon's prayer, which, according to its place in this narrative, took place upon
the completion of the Temple. We find it very difficult to suppose that Solomon had
to wait thirteen years for this assurance that God had answered his prayer at the
dedication. As a matter of fact, the cloud, symbolizing the Divine presence, was an
assurance then and there that God had heard and answered his supplication.
"I have heard thy prayer ... and have hallowed this house" (1 Kings 9:3). These
words should be understood as God's reference to what he had already done
thirteen years prior to this special warning of Solomon against apostasy.
"I will cut off Israel out of the land ... Israel shall become a proverb and a byword ...
this house ... so high ... yet everyone that passeth by shall be astonished" (1 Kings
9:7-8). These dreadful consequences were promised to ensue following Israel's
rejection of God and falling into idolatry. This warning was not, "Added by some
postexilic editor,"[2] as suggested by Matheney. This writer has no patience with
scholars who feel compelled to get rid of every predictive prophecy which they
encounter in the Word of God. If the Bible is not literally filled with predictive
prophecy of the most circumstantial and exact kind, then there's not a line of it
worth reading. The passage before us is an example. ot only did God reveal to
Solomon in the vision here that the shameful apostasy of Israel would result in their
deportation to a foreign land, and the demolition of their vaunted Temple; but
Jeremiah (Jeremiah 26:18) and Micah (Micah 3:12) prophesied the same thing. The
Biblical critics, determined, if possible, to negate every predictive prophecy in the

3. Holy Bible have here employed the services of their mythical `Deuteronomist' to put
these prophecies in Solomon's vision centuries after their fulfillment! True believers
cannot be deceived by that type of fembu.
"Israel shall be a proverb and a byword among all people" (1 Kings 9:7). We agree
with Gates that, "This prophetic warning looks even beyond the captivity, and
envisions the later rejection of Israel for their repudiation of Jesus Christ the
Messiah."[3]
"And though this house is so high" (1 Kings 9:8). Solomon's Temple was built upon
the highest eminence in Jerusalem; and this reference to the Temple's highness
stresses the fact that it would be, "Just as conspicuous in its ruin as it was in it its
glory."[4]
ELLICOTT, "Of this chapter, the first portion (1 Kings 9:1-9) forms the conclusion
of the detailed narrative of the preceding chapter; the latter portion is wholly
different in style and subject.
Verse 1
(1) And it came to pass.—The obvious primâ facie meaning of this verse would land
us in much difficulty. By 1 Kings 6:38; 1 Kings 7:1, we find that, while the Temple
was built in seven years, the erection of the palace and the other buildings occupied
thirteen years; and from 1 Kings 5:10 and 2 Chronicles 8:1 it appears that these
works were successive, and therefore that the completion of the palace could not
have taken place till thirteen years after the completion of the Temple. Hence we
should have to conclude, either that the dedication was postponed for thirteen years,
till all the buildings were finished—which is in itself infinitely improbable, and
contradicts the express declaration of Josephus—or that a similar period intervened
between Solomon’s prayer and the Divine answer to it, which is even more
preposterous. The variation in 2 Chronicles 7:11 probably suggests the true key to
the difficulty: viz., that the notice in this verse is merely a summary of the history of
1 Kings 6-8, which records the whole of the building works of Solomon, and is not
intended to fix the date of the vision of 1 Kings 9:2-9.
EBC, "THE TEMPLE SACRIFICES
1 Kings 8:62-66; 1 Kings 9:25
"I have chosen this house to Myself for a house of sacrifice."
- 2 Chronicles 7:12
"Gifts and sacrifices, that cannot, as touching the conscience make the worshipper
perfect, being only carnal ordinances, imposed until a time of reformation."

4. - Hebrews 9:9-10
THE whole sacrificial system with which our thoughts of Judaism are perhaps
erroneously, and much too exclusively identified, furnishes us with many problems.
Whether it was originally of Divine origin, or whether it was only an instinctive
expression, now of the gratitude, and now of the guilt and fear, of the human heart,
we are not told. or is the basal idea on which it was founded ever explained to us.
Were the ideas of "atonement" or propitiation (Kippurim) really connected with
those of substitution and vicarious punishment? Or was the main conception that of
self-sacrifice, which was certainly most prominent in the burnt offerings? Doubtless
the views alike of priests and worshippers were to a great extent indefinite. We are
not told what led Cain and Abel to present their sacrifices to God; nor did Moses-if
he were its founder-furnish any theories to explain the elaborate system laid down
in the book of Leviticus. The large majority of the Jews probably sacrificed simply
because to do so had become a part of their religious observances, and because in
doing so they believed themselves to be obeying a Divine command. Others,
doubtless, had as many divergent theories as Christians have when they attempt to
explain the Atonement. The "substitution" theory of the "sin offering" finds little or
no support from the Old Testament; not only is it never stated, but there is not a
single clear allusion to it. It is emphatically asserted by later Jewish authorities, such
as Rashi, Aben Ezra, Moses ben- achman, and Maimonides, and is enshrined in the
Jewish liturgy. Yet Dr. Edersheim writes: "The common idea that the burning,
either of part or the whole of the sacrifice, pointed to its destruction, and symbolized
the wrath of God and the punishment due to sin, does not seem to accord with the
statements of scripture." Sacrifices were of two kinds, bloody (Zebach), or unbloody
(minchah, korban). The latter were oblations. Such were the cakes of shewbread,
the meal and drink offerings, the first sheaf at Passover, the two loaves at Pentecost.
In almost every instance the minchah accompanied the offering of a sacrificial
victim. The two general rules about all victims for sacrifice were,
(1) that they should be without blemish and without spot, as types of perfectness;
and
(2) that every sacrifice should be salted with salt, as an antiseptic, and therefore a
type of incorruption. {Mark 9:49}
Sacrificial victims could only be chosen from oxen, sheep, goats, turtle doves; and
young pigeons-the latter being the offering of the poor who could not afford the
costlier victims. Sacrifices were also divided generally
(1) into free, or obligatory;
(2) public, or private; and
(3) most holy or less holy,

5. of which the latter were slain at the north and the former at the east side of the
altar. The offerer, according to the Rabbis, had to do five things-to lay on hands,
slay, skin, dissect, and wash the inwards. The priest had also to do five things at the
altar itself-to catch the blood, sprinkle it, light the fire, bring up the pieces, and
complete the sacrifices. Sacrifices are chiefly dwelt upon in the Priestly Code; but
nowhere in the Old Testament is their significance formally explained, nor for many
centuries was the Levitic ritual much regarded. {See 6:19-21 1 Samuel 2:13, 1 Kings
19:21 2 Kings 5:17}
The sacrifices commanded in the Pentateuch fall under four heads.
(1) The burnt offering (Olah, Kalil), which typified complete self-dedication, and
which even the heathen might offer;
(2) the sin offering (Chattath), which made atonement for the offender;
(3) the trespass offering (Asham), which atones for some special offence, whether
doubtful or certain, committed through ignorance; and
(4) the thank offering, eucharistic peace offering (Shelem), or "offering of
completion," which followed the other sacrifices, and of which the flesh was eaten
by the priest and the worshippers.
The oldest practice seems only to have known of burnt offerings and thank
offerings, and the former seem only to have been offered at great sacrificial feasts.
Even in Deuteronomy a common phrase for sacrifices is "eating before the Lord,"
which is almost ignored in the Priestly Code. Of the sin offering, which in that code
has acquired such enormous importance, there is scarcely a trace-unless Hosea 4:8
be one, which is doubtful-before Ezekiel, in whom the Asham and Chattath occur in
place of the old pecuniary fines. {2 Kings 12:16} Originally sacrifice was a glad
meal, and even in the oldest part of the code {Leviticus 18:1-30; Leviticus 19:1-37;
Leviticus 20:1-27; Leviticus 21:1-24; Leviticus 22:1-33; Leviticus 23:1-44; Leviticus
24:1-23; Leviticus 25:1-55; Leviticus 26:1-46} sacrifices are comprised under the
Olam and Zebach. The turning-point of the history of the Sacrificial system is
Josiah’s reformation, of which the Priestly Code is the matured result.
It is easy to see that sacrifices in general were eucharistic, dedicatory, and expiatory.
The eucharistic sacrifices (the meal and peace offerings) and the burnt offerings,
which indicated the entire sacrifice of self, were the offerings of those who were in
communion with God. They were recognitions of His absolute supremacy. The sin
and trespass offerings were intended to recover a lost communion with God and
thus the sacrifices were, or ultimately came to be, the expression of the great ideas of
thanksgiving, of self-dedication, and of propitiation. But the Israelites, "while they
seem always to have retained the idea of propitiation and of eucharistic offering,
constantly ignored the self-dedication, which is the link between the two, and which
the regular burnt offering should have impressed upon them as their daily thought

6. and duty." Had they kept this in view they would have been saved from the
superstitions and degeneracies which made their use of the sacrificial system a curse
and not a blessing. The expiatory conception, which was probably the latest of the
three, expelled the others, and was perverted into the notion that God was a God of
wrath, whose fury could be averted by gifts and His favor won by bribes. There was
this truth in the notion of propitiation-that God hates, and is alienated by, and will
punish, sin; and yet that in His mercy He has provided an Atonement for us. But in
trying to imagine how the sacrifice affected God, the Israelites lost sight of the truth
that this is an inexplicable mystery, and that all which we can know is the effect
which it can produce on the souls of man. If they had interpreted the sacrifices as a
whole to mean this only - that man is guilty and that God is merciful; and that
though man’s guilt separates him from God, reunion with him can be gained by
confession, penitence, and self-sacrifice, by virtue of an Atonement which he had
revealed and would accept-then the effect of them would have been spiritually
wholesome and ennobling. But when they came to think that sacrifices were
presents to God, which might be put in the place of amendment and moral
obedience, and that the punishment due to their offences might be thus
mechanically diverted upon the heads of innocent victims, then the sacrificial system
was rendered not only nugatory but pernicious. or have Christians been exempt
from a similar corruption of the doctrine of the Atonement. In treating it as
vicarious and expiatory they have forgotten that it is unavailing unless it be also
representative. In looking upon it as the atonement for sin they have overlooked that
there can be no such atonement unless it be accompanied by redemption from sin.
They have tacitly and practically acted on the notion, which in the days of St. Paul
some even avowed, that "we may continue in sin that grace may abound." But in the
great work of redemption the will of man cannot be otiose. He must himself die with
Christ. As Christ was sacrificed for him, he, too, must offer his body a living
sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God. "Without the sin offering of the Cross," says
Bishop Barry, "our burnt offering (of self-dedication) would be impossible; so also
without the burnt offering the sin offering will, to us, be unavailing."
Many of the crudities, and even horrors, which, alike in Jewish and Christian times,
have been mixed up with the idea of bloody sacrifices, would have been removed if
more attention had been paid to the prominence and real significance of blood in the
entire ritual. As taught by some revivalists the doctrine of the blood adds the most
revolting touches to theories which assimilate God to Moloch; hut the true
significance of the phrase and of the symbol elevates the entire doctrine of sacrifice
into a purer and more spiritual atmosphere.
The central significance of the whole doctrine lies in the ancient opinion that "the
blood" of the sacrifice was "its life." This was why an expiatory power was ascribed
to the blood. There was certainly no transfer of guilt to the animal, for its blood
remained clean and cleansing. or was the animal supposed to undergo the
transgressor’s punishment; first, because this is nowhere stated, and next, because
had that been the case, fine flour would certainly not have been permitted (as it was)
as a sin offering. {Leviticus 5:11-13} Moreover, no willful offence, no offense "with
uplifted hand," i.e., with evil premeditation, could be atoned for either by sin or

7. trespass offerings; -though certainly so wide a latitude was given to the notion of sin
as an involuntary error as to tend to break down the notion of moral responsibility.
The sin offering was further offered for some purely accidental and ceremonial
offences, which could not involve any real consciousness of guilt. The "blood of the
covenant" {Exodus 24:4-8} was not of the sin offering, but of peace and burnt
offerings; and though, as Canon Cook says, we read of blood in paganism as a
propitiation to a hostile demon, "we seem to seek in vain for an instance in which
the blood, as a natural symbol for the soul, was offered as an atoning sacrifice."
"The atoning virtue of the blood lies not in its material substance, but in the life of
which it is the vehicle," says Bishop Westcott. "The blood always includes the
thought of the life preserved and active beyond death. It is not simply the price by
which the redeemed were purchased, but the power by which they were quickened
so as to be capable of belonging to God." "To drink the blood of Christ," says
Clement of Alexandria, "is to partake of the Lord’s incorruption."
Besides the points to which we have alluded, there is a further difficulty created by
the singular silence respecting sin offerings of any kind, except in that part of the
Old Testament which has recently acquired the name of the Priestly Code.
The word Chattath, in the sense of sin offering, occurs in Exodus 29:1-46; Exodus
30:1-38, and many times in Leviticus and umbers, and six times in Ezekiel.
Otherwise in the Old Testament it is barely mentioned, except in the post-exilic
Books of Chronicles {2 Chronicles 29:24} and Ezra. {Ezra 8:25} It is not mentioned
in any other historic book; nor in any prophet except Ezekiel. Again as we have
seen, the Day of Atonement leaves not a trace in any of the earlier historic records of
Scripture, and is found only in the authorities above mentioned. Through all the rest
of Scripture the scapegoat is unmentioned, and Azazel is ignored. Dr. Kalisch goes
so far as to say that there is conclusive evidence to prove that the Day of Atonement
was instituted considerably more than a thousand years after the death of Moses
and Aaron. For even in Ezekiel, who wrote B.C. 574, there is no Day of Atonement
on the tenth day of the seventh month, but on the first and seventh of the first
month (Abib, isan). He thinks it utterly impossible that, had it existed in his time,
Ezekiel could have blotted out the holiest day of the year, and substituted two of his
own arbitrary choice. The rites, moreover, which he describes differ wholly from
those laid down in Leviticus. Even in ehemiah there is no notice of the day of
Atonement, though a day was observed on the twenty-fourth of the month. Hence
this learned writer infers that even in B.C. 440 the Great Day of Atonement was not
yet recognized, and that the pagan element of sending the scapegoat to Azazel, the
demon of the wilderness, proves the late date of the ceremony.
It is interesting to observe how utterly the sacrificial priestly system, in the abuses
which not only became involved in it, but seemed to be almost inseparable from it, is
condemned by the loftier spiritual intuition which belongs to phases of revelation
higher than the external and the typical.
Thus in the Old Testament no series of inspired utterances is more interesting, more
eloquent, more impassioned and ennobling, than those which insist upon the utter

8. nullity of all sacrifices in themselves, and their absolute insignificance in comparison
with the lightest element of the moral law. On this subject the Prophets and the
Psalmists use language so sweeping and exceptionless as almost to repudiate the
desirability of sacrifices altogether. They speak of them with a depreciation akin to
scorn. It may be doubted whether they had the Mosaic system with all its details, as
we know it, before them. They do not enter into those final elaborations which it
assumed, and not one of them so much as alludes to any service which resembles the
powerfully symbolic ceremonial of the Great Day of Atonement. But they speak of
the ceremonial law in such fragments and aspects of it as were known to them. They
deal with it as priests practiced it, and as priests taught-if they ever taught anything-
respecting it. They speak of it as it presented itself to the minds of the people around
them, with whom it had become rather a substitute for moral efforts and an obstacle
in the path of righteousness, than an aid to true religion. And this is what they say:-
"Hath the Lord as great delight in sacrifice," asks the indignant SAMUEL, "as in
obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to
hearken than the fat of rams." {1 Samuel 15:22}
"I hate, I despise your feasts," says Jehovah by Amos, "and I will take no delight in
your solemn assemblies. Yea, though ye offer Me your burnt offerings and meal
offerings, I will not accept them: neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat
beasts. Turn thou away from Me the noise of thy songs; for I will not hear the
melody of thy viols. But let judgment roll down as waters, and righteousness as a
mighty stream." {Amos 5:21-23}
"Wherewith shall I come before the Lord," asks MICAH, "and bow myself before
the most high God? Shall I come before Him with burnt offerings, with calves of a
year old? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of
rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for
the sin of my soul? He hath showed thee, O man, what is good: and what doth the
Lord require of thee, but to do justly and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with
thy God?" {Micah 6:6-8}
HOSEA again in a message of Jehovah, twice quoted on different occasions by our
Lord, says: "I desire mercy and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God more than
burnt offerings." {Hosea 6:6} ISAIAH also, in the word of the Lord, gives burning
expression to the same conviction: "To what purpose is the multitude of your
sacrifices unto Me? saith the Lord: I am full of the burnt offerings of lambs, arid the
fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-
goats. When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this at your hands, to
trample My courts? Bring no more vain oblations; incense is an abomination unto
Me; new moon and sabbath, the calling of assemblies, -I cannot away with iniquity
and the solemn meeting. Your new moons and your appointed feasts My soul
hateth: they are a cumbrance unto Me; I am weary to bear them Wash you, make
you clean!" {Isaiah 1:11-16}
The language of JEREMIAH’S message is even more startling: "I spake not unto

9. your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of
Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices: but this thing I commanded them,
saying, Obey My voice." And again-in the version of the LXX, given in the margin
of the Revised Version for the unintelligible rendering of the Authorized Version-he
asks: "Why hath the-beloved wrought abomination in My house? Shall vows and
holy flesh take away from thee thy wickedness, or shalt thou escape by these?"
{Jeremiah 7:22, Jeremiah 11:15} Jeremiah, is, in fact the most anti-ritualistic of the
prophets. So far from having hid and saved the Ark, he regarded it as entirely
obsolete. {Jeremiah 3:16} He cares only for the spiritual covenant written on the
heart, and very little, if at all, for Temple services and Levitic scrupulosities.
{Jeremiah 7:4-15; Jeremiah 31:31-34} THE PSALMISTS are no less clear and
emphatic in putting sacrifices nowhere in comparison with righteousness:-"I will
not reprove thee for thy sacrifices; or for thy burnt offerings which are continually
before Me. I will take no bullock out of thine house, or he-goats out of thy folds."
"Will I eat the flesh of bulls, Or drink the blood of goats? Offer unto God
thanksgiving; And pay thy vows unto the Most High." {Psalms 50:8-14}
And again:-
"For Thou desirest not sacrifice, else would I give it Thee: Thou delightest not in
burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: A broken and contrite
heart, O God, Thou wilt not despise." {Psalms 51:16-17}
And again:-
"Sacrifice and offering Thou hast no delight in; Mine ears hast thou opened: Burnt
offering and sin offering hast Thou not required." {Psalms 40:6}
And again:-
"To do justice and judgment is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice."
{Proverbs 21:3}
And again:-
"I will praise the name of God with a song, And magnify it with thanksgiving. This
also shall please the Lord rather than a bullock that hath horns and hoofs." {Psalms
69:30-31}
Surely the most careless and conventional reader cannot fail to see that there is a
wide difference between the standpoint of the prophets, which is so purely spiritual,
and that of the writers and redactors of the Priestly Code, whose whole interest
centered in the sacrificial and ceremonial observances. or is the intrinsic nullity of
the sacrificial system less distinctly pointed out in the ew Testament. The better-
instructed Jews, enlightened by Christ’s teaching, could give emphatic testimony to
the immeasurable superiority of the moral to the ceremonial. The candid scribe,

10. hearing from Christ’s lips the two great commandments, answers, "Of a truth,
Master, Thou hast well said that He is one; and there is none other but He: and to
love Him with all the heart and to love his neighbor as himself, is much more than
all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices."
And our Lord quoted Hosea with the emphatic commendation, "Go ye and learn
what that meaneth, I desire mercy, and not sacrifice." {Matthew 9:13} And on
another occasion: "But if ye had known what this meaneth, I desire mercy, and not
sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless." {Matthew 12:7}
The presenting of our bodies, says St. Paul, as a living sacrifice is our reasonable
service; and St. Peter calls all Christians a holy priesthood to offer up spiritual
sacrifice. {1 Peter 2:5}
It is impossible, says the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews, "that the blood of
bulls and goats should take away sins; and he speaks of the priests daily offering the
same sacrifice, the which can never take away sins." {Hebrews 10:4; Hebrews
10:11} And again:-"To do good and to distribute forget not: for with such sacrifices
God is well pleased." {Hebrews 13:16}
The wisest fathers of Jewish thought in the post-exilic epoch held the same views.
Thus the son of Sirach says: "He that keepeth the law bringeth offerings enough."
(Sirach 35:1-15) And Philo, echoing an opinion common among the best heathen
moralists from Socrates to Marcus Aurelius, writes, "The mind, when without
blemish, is itself the most holy sacrifice, being entirely and in all respects pleasing to
God."
And what is very remarkable, modern Judaism now emphasizes its belief that
"neither sacrifice nor a Levitical system belong to the essence of the Old
Testament," Such was the view of the ancient Essenes, no less than of Maimonides
or Abarbanel. Modern Rabbis even go so far as to argue that the whole system of
Levitical sacrifice was an alien element, introduced into Judaism from without,
tolerated indeed by Moses, but only as a concession to the immaturity of his people
and their hardness of heart.
Such, too, was the opinion of the ancient Fathers of the author of the Epistle of
Barnabas, of Justin Martyr, Origen, Tertullian, Jerome, Chrysostom, Epiphanius,
Cyril, and Theodoret, who are followed by such Roman Catholic theologians as
Petavius and Bellarmine.
This at any rate is certain-that the Judaic system is not only abrogated, but
rendered impossible. Whatever were its functions, God has stamped with absolute
disapproval any attempt to continue them. They are utterly annulled and
obliterated forever.
"I am come to repeal the sacrifices." Such is the {missing Greek words} ascribed to
Christ; "and unless ye desist from sacrificing, the wrath of God will not desist from

11. you." The argument of St. Paul in the Epistles to the Romans and Galatians, and of
the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews, show us why this was inevitable; and they
were but following the initiative of Christ and the teaching of His Spirit. It is a
mistake to imagine that our Lord merely repudiated the inane pettinesses of
Pharisaic formalism. He went much further. There is not the slightest trace that He
personally observed the requirements of the ceremonial law. It is certain that He
broke them when he touched the leper and the dead youth’s bier. The law insisted
on the centralization of worship, but Jesus said, "The day cometh, and now is, when
neither in Jerusalem, nor yet in this mountain, shall men worship the Father. God is
a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth." The
law insisted, with extreme emphasis, on the burdensome distinctions between clean
and unclean meats. Jesus said that it is not that which cometh from without, but
that which cometh from within which defileth a man, and this He said "making all
meats clean." {Mark 7:19} St. Paul, when the types of Mosaism had been forever
fulfilled in Christ, and the antitype had thus become obsolete and pernicious, went
further still. Taking circumcision, the most ancient and most distinctive rite of the
Old Dispensation, he called it "concision" or mere mutilation, and said thrice over,
"Circumcision, is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but ‘a new creature"’;
"but faith working by love," "but the keeping of the commandment of God." The
whole system of Judaism was local, was external, was minute, was inferior, was
transient, was a concession to infirmity, was a yoke of bondage: the whole system of
Christianity is universal, is spiritual, is simple, is un-sacrificial, is un-sacerdotal, is
perfect freedom. Judaism was a religion of a temple, of sacrifices, of a sacrificial
priesthood: Christianity is a religion in which the Spirit of God
"Doth prefer before all temples the upright heart and pure."
It is a religion in which there is no more sacrifice for sin, because the one perfect
and sufficient sacrifice, oblation and satisfaction, has been consummated for ever. It
is a religion in which there is no altar but the Cross; in which there is no priest but
Christ, except so far as every Christian is by metaphor a priest to offer up spiritual
sacrifices which alone are acceptable to God.
The Temple of Solomon lasted only four centuries, and they were for the most part
years of dishonor, disgrace, and decadence. Solomon was scarcely in his grave
before it was plundered by Shishak. During its four centuries of existence it was
again stripped of its precious possessions at least six times, sometimes by foreign
oppressors, sometimes by distressed kings. It was despoiled of its treasure by Asa,
by Jehoash of Judah, by Jehoash of Israel, by Ahaz, by Hezekiah, and lastly by
ebuchadnezzar. After such plunderings it must have completely lost its pristine
splendor. But the plunder of its treasures was nothing to the pollutions of its
sanctity. They began as early as the reigns of Rehoboam and Abijah. Ahaz gave it a
Syrian altar, Manasseh stained it with impurities, and Ezekiel in its secret chambers
surveyed "the dark idolatries of alienated Judah."
And in the days when Judaism most prized itself on ritual faithfulness, the Lord of
the Temple was insulted in the Temple of the Lord, and its courts were turned by

12. greedy priests and Sadducees into a cowshed, and a dovecot, and a fair, and a
usurer’s mart, and a robber’s den.
From the first the centralization of worship in the Temple must have been
accompanied by the danger of dissociating religious life from its daily social
environments. The "multitudes who lived in remote country places would no longer
be able to join in forms of worship which had been carried on at local shrines.
Judaism, as the prophets so often complain, tended to become too much a matter of
officialism and function, of rubric and technique, which always tend to substitute
external service for true devotion, and to leave the shell of religion without its soul."
Even when it had been purified by Josiah’s reformation, the Temple proved to be a
source of danger and false security. It was regarded as a sort of Palladium. The
formalists began to talk and act as though it furnished a mechanical protection, and
gave them license to transgress the moral law. Jeremiah had sternly to warn his
countrymen against this trust in an idle formalism. "Amend your ways and your
doings," he said. "Behold, ye trust in lying words which cannot profit. Will ye steal,
murder, and commit adultery, and swear falsely, and burn incense unto Baal, and
walk after other gods whom ye have not known, and come and stand before Me in
this house, which is called by My name, and say, We are delivered; that ye may do
all these abominations?"
The Temple of Solomon was defaced and destroyed and polluted by the
Babylonians, but not until it had been polluted by the Jews themselves with the
blood of prophets, by idolatries, by chambers of unclean imagery. It was rebuilt by a
poor band of disheartened exiles to be again polluted by Antiochus Epiphanes, and
ultimately to become the headquarters of a narrow, arrogant, and intriguing
Pharisaism. It was rebuilt once more by Herod, the brutal Idumean usurper, and its
splendor inspired such passionate enthusiasm that when it was wrapped in flames
by Titus, it witnessed the carnage of thousands of maddened and despairing
combatants.
"As ‘mid the cedar courts and gates of gold
The trampled ranks in miry carnage rolled
To save their Temple every hand essayed,
And with cold fingers grasp’d the feeble blade;
Through their torn veins reviving fury ran
And life’s last anger warm’d the dying man."
Yet that last Temple had been defiled by a worse crime than the other two. It had
witnessed the priestly idols and the priestly machinations which ended in the
murder of the Son of God. From the Temple sprang little or nothing of spiritual

13. importance. Intended to teach the supremacy of righteousness, it became the
stronghold of mere ritual. For the development of true holiness, as apart from
ceremonial scrupulosity, its official protectors rendered it valueless.
We are not surprised that Christianity knows no temple but the hearts of all who
love the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity and truth; and that the characteristic of the
ew Jerusalem, which descends out of heaven like a bride adorned for her husband,
is:-
"And I saw no temple therein." {Revelation 21:22}
Abundantly was the menace fulfilled in which Jehovah warned Solomon after the
Feast of Dedication that if Israel swerved into immorality and idolatry, that house
should be an awful warning-that its blessing should be exchanged into a curse, and
that every one who passed by it should be astonished and should hiss.
PARKER, "Solomon"s Prayer Answered
1 Kings 9
WE have just studied that most wonderful prayer of ancient history, and have been
charmed first with its spiritual music; then with its great intellectual conception;
then with its appreciation of human necessities, and altogether with its fine, genial,
kingly sympathy with all classes and conditions of men. Placing ourselves at this
point of history, and listening to the noble supplication which the king poured out to
the majesty of heaven, we say instinctively, ever man prayed like this man: nothing
has been omitted from the desire of his love; this man is not only king but subject,
student, historian, philosopher, statesman, saint: the whole register of the human
mind seems to be covered by this king whilst he is bending before high heaven, and
talking to the sovereign and Father of the universe about profound subjects and
immediate human necessities. ow the prayer is done. We have seen Solomon rise
from his knees, and unclasp his hands, and stretch them forth and bless the people;
and thus opening a new page in the history of Israel, and thus representing the
dawn of a new era, in which surely there could have been no rebellion, no
unkindness, no alienation, no war, no sin.
The prayer is done. It is doubled by the Amen of all the people who listened to it
ow what has become of that prayer? Can such eloquence be lost? Will even the
wind itself care nothing for it—or will it keep it as music, and breathe it upon the
coming days, to tell them what did happen in the brightest hours of the Israelitish
history? Do such events go for nothing? Do such prayers perish in the air? Lay the
emphasis upon the word such. Do not speak merely of prayers, because that sacred
word may be so coldly spoken as to be deprived of all spirit, fire, impulse, and vital
meaning; but such prayer—so complete in its range, so exquisite in its expression, so
sympathetic in its whole spirit. If that can be lost, it is useless to talk about
immortality; for this prayer is the soul, and if it be can lost—burst into air and

14. nothingness—then immortality is but a phrase, and the hope of it a wild man"s
dream. It is in vain to talk about the immortality of the soul if what the soul does be
wholly mortal: if its noblest thoughts, its finest poetry, its loftiest aspirations, its
sweetest charities all go for nothing: what a mockery to the soul itself that it shall
keep beating and throbbing on while all the beating and throbbing must end in
nothingness! We argue the immortality of the soul from what may be termed the
necessary immortality of all goodness, brightness, music, vital affection, and
sacrificial sympathy.
What became of the prayer? Read the third verse: "And the Lord said unto him, I
have heard thy prayer and thy supplication, that thou hast made before me." The
man who offered such a prayer was not likely to turn immediately to the practice of
lying. There are some things we cannot believe. Who could think, after having heard
the great prayer, that no sooner had the Amen died from the quivering lip than that
same lip gave hospitality to falsehood, began to tell lies, and to bear iniquitous
testimony in the face and hearing of the people? We have, then, this point to deal
with, and it is not a light point. If we deny the prayer, we must not make the
suppliant himself a liar. He thinks he was answered: he says he was answered; he
gives the words of the answer. It is injustice, therefore, to treat all this as so much
verbiage, or to charge a perverted imagination upon the man who uttered this
prayer. If the prayer had not been before us it would have been easier to charge
Solomon with a species of fanatical spiritual extravagance: but unfortunately for the
hostile critic the prayer itself is here, open to intellectual and literary inquiry, as
well as to spiritual and religious inquest; and our contention is that the man who
could utter such a prayer could not turn round from the altar and say he had
received what had never been bestowed upon him. We have personal testimony,
therefore, in the instance of Solomon to the truthfulness of the doctrine that prayer
is answered. or does the personal testimony lie in the remote region of ancient
history alone. It is the testimony of men today. They feel by the warmth of the soul
that the sun has not been far away; they feel by the enlargement and sweetening of
charity that they have touched at least the hem of the Saviour"s garment; they know
by the dissolving of the cloud, the clearing-up of the perplexity, and the new
gladness in the soul, that some communication has come from heaven. This is our
testimony and we abide by it; we live in it. If we had not this testimony we could not
pray again, for our life is too precious to ourselves to be wasted in an eternal process
of doing nothing. The answer of one prayer is the inspiration of another. Christians
should be more positive and definite with regard to this matter of prayer. They
should bear their testimony less hesitantly; nay, they should bear it more gratefully,
not with any audacity or boasting, but with simplicity, and with a sense of what is
due to him who has communicated to the heart assurances and comforts which have
made that heart strong.
Was the answer worthy of God? We reply: It was a great answer, and, therefore,
was by so much worthy of him who "is able to do exceeding abundantly above all
that we ask or think." Solomon had desired in this prayer (see chap. 1 Kings 8:52)
"that thine eyes may be open unto the supplication of thy servant." Solomon desired
that God"s eyes might be upon the temple. What does God reply? He says, "Mine

15. eyes shall be there perpetually." But that is simply covering the line of the prayer,
and not extending that line by one point Then look again; for we must have omitted
somewhat in our quotation—"Mine eyes and mine heart shall be there perpetually"
( 1 Kings 9:3). Solomon asked for observation: God promised the presence of His
heart: his love should glow in the place; his heart should be rendered available to
the uses of the people. A sanctuary without a heart! what is it but a gilded
sepulchre? What men want in the sanctuary is God"s heart—that great love-
presence, that holy love-inspiration, that peculiar sympathy which touches human
life at every point, and fills the house with a sense of impartiality as if all might
equally enjoy according to individual capacity the love and light and help which
come from heaven. When we are called upon, then, to bear testimony to answered
prayer, we must not allow ourselves to be limited by these terms. If God merely
answered prayer, then in some sort would our minds be equal to God"s mind; for
we had measured exactly the capacity and precisely the blessing required for the
occasion. God never under-answers his people: it is a denial full of love, or an
answer which surprises the receiver by its redundance of blessing.
Does the answer end with the third verse? Was the transaction so easy—a great
prayer and a generous reply without detail? The answer proceeds much further: it
was a conditional reply. Hear these modifying and guarding words:—"And if thou
wilt walk before me" ( 1 Kings 9:4); "But if ye shall at all turn from following me" (
1 Kings 9:6). This is sad; yet it gives one deepening confidence in the answer itself.
Even from the modifications of the reply we may argue the solidity and significance
of the answer. The very cautions may be so interpreted as to leave no doubt about
the reality. Thus it is great life comes; thus it is that liberty is limited, and becomes,
as we have ever seen in these studies, only liberty to obey. God"s promises are
hinged upon explicit conditions. Ye have not because ye ask not, or because ye ask
amiss. And the lightnings cannot run so quickly as God"s thoughts run, and as
God"s judgments find their way upon the earth amongst the children of men; if,
between offering the prayer and receiving the answer, we have had one contrary
thought, one unholy impulse, or have done one unworthy deed, the message may be
spoiled even in the course of its transmission from heaven, and may come down
upon us like a dagger, or like a blast of fire, scorching the men it was intended to
bless. "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."
Did the matter end even there? God would surely terminate his communication with
a caution rather than with a judgment? o: "Then will I cut off Israel." ( 1 Kings
9:7.) It is like cutting off his right hand; but he will do it! Read the awful words in
an appropriate tone—"Then will I cut off Israel," a tone full of reluctance, pathos,
heartbreak. He would rather shut up the constellations, and turn back the sun; but
he will do it! He cannot afford to do otherwise. The universe without righteousness
is a contradiction in terms. There must be law at the head of things and the heart of
things. Our security is in this very spirit of judgment. We tremble before it, and
wonder why God cannot mitigate the severity of his judgment, forgetting that the
severity of God is as the rock which underlies the soil on which the flowers bloom.
or does the matter end here. The temple itself shall go for nothing when Israel
turns away from God. We have seen the great pile—great, not in dimensions, but in

16. costliness and value—rising course by course; we have seen cedar wood overlaid
with gold; we have seen the hinges of the doors to be of gold, and the lamp, and the
bowl, and the spoons, and the snuffers to be all of gold: we have seen the temple on
Mount Moriah, a high place, seen from afar. God will love the temple whatever the
people may do? o: "And at this house, which is high, every one that passeth by it
shall be astonished, and shall hiss" ( 1 Kings 9:8). The house is nothing if the child
be wrong. Home is "sweet home" no more when the hearts that make it are
perverted and full of bitterness. Write Ichabod upon the house, for God hath
forsaken his temple when the people who inhabit it have turned away from his
commandments and followed inventions and impulses of their own. Think of the
temple being hissed at; men wagging their heads as they pass by it, and calling it by
contemptuous names, saying, "Because they forsook the Lord their God, who
brought forth their fathers out of the land of Egypt, and have taken hold upon other
gods, and have worshipped them, and served them: therefore hath the Lord brought
upon them all this evil" ( 1 Kings 9:9). So it shall be with our professions. The very
greatness of our services shall be the measure of the contempt which is poured upon
us in the day of our unfaithfulness. Evil spirits will laugh and say, "Ha, ha! hast
thou become one of us? Thou wast son of the morning, favourite of the stars,
brightest of the Pleiades,—hast thou left thy place and fallen down into our
society?" To be mocked by our own prayers, to be taunted by our own professions,
to be reminded of the days when our orthodoxy was without a speck, and then to be
compelled to contrast our present selves, apostate and lost, with our former selves,
when we held the key of heaven"s door and could pray the day long and receive
replies from God,—say, is there any torture keener, any anguish more exquisite, any
hell so hot?
We have before us, then, the solemn lesson that it is possible to spoil our prayers by
our disobedience. Whilst this is a solemn lesson, it is also one that is full of solid
spiritual comfort. The universe is watched at both ends. There is no neglected spot
in all the sanctuary; there is no corner consecrated to evil; the light smites every
angle and fills the whole impartially. We cannot live upon public prayer, or Israel
never could have died after the prayer of Solomon. That prayer was in itself a
history, and seemed to fill up all that was needful once for all in the whole life of the
people. But every man must pray for himself. It is good and profitable to hear the
public prayer, to enjoy all the stimulus and comfort of Christian sympathy, and to
know the confidence and warmth of spiritual masonry; but when the public prayer
is said, each man must utter his own prayer, in his own way, according to his own
pain and need; and God will communicate an answer to every suppliant. The heart
knoweth its own bitterness. We cannot tell in open words and audible sounds all we
want to say to God. Blessed be his name, he has been so condescending as to say,
through Jesus Christ his Song of Solomon , "When thou prayest"—poor bruised
heart, poor needy soul, in-eloquent Prayer of Manasseh , short of words, but feeling
deeply—"When thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy
door, pray to thy Father which is in secret"—just in thine own way, brokenly,
lispingly, feebly, self-correctingly, advancing so far into a sentence, and then
withdrawing to amend it or abolish it or replace it; but in the secret closet have it
out between yourselves—you and God—and stop there till you get the answer.

17. We cannot live upon a prayer—that Isaiah , an individual and specific prayer; but
we are to live in the spirit of prayer. There is all the difference in the world between
these two conditions. A prayer—that Isaiah , a single and particular prayer—may
be an utterance once for all. Occasional prayer is not prayer. Perhaps we have not
sufficiently considered that solid and vital doctrine. We cannot say to ourselves,
ow we will at this particular time pray; and then allow a long time to elapse and
probably pray again. That is not prayer at all. To neglect God, to have no commerce
with heaven, until the darkness is intolerable, and the pain can no longer be borne,
and the sense of loss creates a void in the life without width or depth that can be
measured, and then to cry mightily for the divine pity, is not prayer; it has no
relation to prayer; it must not be imported into the discussion of the utility or
answerableness of prayer; it is a blot upon the religious imagination, and it is an
irony in the exercise of the religious conscience. What then are we to do? We are to
pray "without ceasing,"—that Isaiah , we are not only to pray, but to be prayers, to
live our supplications, to breathe them always—not audibly, but in an undertone, in
a secret whisper; we are to touch nothing with hands that have not first been lifted
up to heaven. Then say whether prayer will not be answered! We have quarrels or
controversies about the answers, when we ought to have had severe and unsparing
inquest into the prayers themselves. Why contend about the reply, when we are not
sure about the thing to which the reply was given? When we are in doubt about the
answers given to prayer, let us change the point of doubt and fix it in our own
prayers themselves, and say with profitable frankness to our own souls, The prayer
was bad; the prayer was selfish; the prayer was not offered in the right name, the
prayer was not baptised with the sacrificial blood of the Son of God; the prayer was
an effort in words, it was not the sacrifice of a humble, meek, lowly, contrite heart.
Fix the attention of men on that point, and the whole atmosphere of the controversy
will be changed; and instead of wrangling in words, we shall be bowed down in self-
accusation and self-judgment, and say, "We have not, because we have asked
amiss."
GUZIK, "A. God appears to Solomon again.
1. (1 Kings 9:1-5) God confirms the answer to Solomon’s prayer.
And it came to pass, when Solomon had finished building the house of the LORD
and the king’s house, and all Solomon’s desire which he wanted to do, that the
LORD appeared to Solomon the second time, as He had appeared to him at Gibeon.
And the LORD said to him: “I have heard your prayer and your supplication that
you have made before Me; I have consecrated this house which you have built to put
My name there forever, and My eyes and My heart will be there perpetually. ow if
you walk before Me as your father David walked, in integrity of heart and in
uprightness, to do according to all that I have commanded you, and if you keep My
statutes and My judgments, then I will establish the throne of your kingdom over
Israel forever, as I promised David your father, saying, ‘You shall not fail to have a
man on the throne of Israel.’ “

18. a. When Solomon had finished building the house of the LORD and the King’s
house: This was some 24 years after Solomon came to the throne. The temple and
the palace work at Jerusalem were finished. ow Solomon had to deal with life after
completing his greatest accomplishment.
i. “It was the hour when the accomplishment of work means the relaxation of effort.
That is always a perilous hour, and the greater the work done the graver the peril. A
life which has been full of activity, when that activity ceases, demands some new
interest, and will find it, either high or low, noble or ignoble.” (Morgan)
ii. John Trapp on the words, all Solomon’s desire: “The word signifieth such a
desire as a young man hath after his mistress, or a bridegroom toward his bride;
which showeth that Solomon took too much content in his buildings and furniture,
passed over his affections too much unto them, and here began his fall.”
b. The LORD appeared to Solomon the second time: God was good to give Solomon
a special appearance at the beginning of his reign in (1 Kings 3:5-9). It was even
better of God to grant a unique appearance to Solomon the second time.
i. “Brethren, we want renewed appearances, fresh manifestations, new visitations
from on high; and I commend to those of you who are getting on in life, that while
you thank God for the past, and look back with joy to his visits to you in your early
days, you now seek and ask for a second visitation of the Most High.” (Spurgeon)
ii. “We do not need to be converted again; yet we do want that again over our heads
the windows of heaven should be opened, that again a Pentecost should be given,
and that we should renew our youth like the eagles, to run without weariness, and
walk without fainting. The Lord fulfill to everyone of his people to-night his blessing
upon Solomon!” (Spurgeon)
c. I have heard your prayer: The great prayer of Solomon in 1 Kings 8 meant
nothing unless God heard the prayer. The true measure of our prayer is if God in
heaven answers the prayer.
i. “Have you never known what it is to leave off prayer when you are in the middle
of it, and say, “I am heard: I am heard”? Have you not felt that you needed not to
cry any longer, for you had gained your suit, and must rather begin to praise than
continue to pray? When a man goes to a bank with a cheque, and he gets the money,
he does not stand loafing about the counter: he goes off about his business. And
oftentimes before God, he that is prepared to be a long time in prayer if it should be
necessary, feels that he must be brief in petition and long in thanksgiving.”
(Spurgeon)
ii. This answer seems to have come many years after the actual dedication of the
temple. Yet God also gave Solomon an immediate answer of approval at the time of
dedication, when the sacrifices were consumed with fire from heaven (2 Chronicles

19. 7:1-7).
d. I have consecrated this house which you have built: The building was Solomon’s
work, done in the power and inspiration of the LORD. The consecration of the
building was God’s work. Solomon could build a building, but only God could
hallow it.
i. “Man builds; God hallows. This co-operation between man and God pervades all
life. Man performs the outward and mechanical; God the inward and spiritual . . .
We must be careful to do our part with reverence and godly fear, remembering that
God must work in realms we cannot touch, and to issues we cannot reach, before
our poor exertions can avail.” (Meyer)
e. ow if you walk before Me as your father David walked . . . then I will establish
the throne of your kingdom over Israel forever: God’s answer to Solomon’s
previous prayer had a great condition. If Solomon walked before God in obedience
and faithfulness, he could expect blessing on his reign and the reign of his
descendants, and the dynasty of David would endure forever.
i. God did not demand perfect obedience from Solomon. David certainly did not
walk perfectly before the LORD, and God told Solomon to walk before Me as your
father David walked. This was not out of reach for Solomon.
PULPIT, "THE A SWER TO SOLOMO 'S PRAYER.—This chapter opens with
an account of God's second appearance to Solomon. It must not be supposed,
however, from the apparent close connexion of this relation with the preceding
narrative, that it stands to it in equally close chronological order. It probably finds a
place here because the historian has grouped together all the suitable materials in
his possession which related to the temple. But see on 1 Kings 9:1.
1 Kings 9:1
And it came to pass when Solomon had finished the building of the house of the
Lord, and the king's house [1 Kings 7:1], and all Solomon's desire which he was
pleased to do [By "desire" we are not to understand "pleasure buildings" (cf. 1
Kings 7:10, 1 Kings 7:19). The chronicler gives the true meaning: "all that came into
Solomon's heart." It is, however, somewhat doubtful what works are comprehended
under this term. 2 Chronicles 7:11 limits it to the two great erections already
described—"all that came into his heart to make in the house of the Lord and in his
own house." But it is by no means certain that our author intended the word to be
thus restricted; it is quite possible, e.g; that some of the buildings mentioned below
(2 Chronicles 7:15-19) are to be included. But another question of much greater
importance presents itself here. In the Divine communication of 2 Chronicles 7:3-9
there is constant and unmistakeable reference to the prayer of dedication (see
especially 2 Chronicles 7:3); in fact, this message is the answer to that prayer. It has
been held, consequently, that the answer must have followed, if not immediately, yet

20. soon after the petitions were uttered; if so, the dedication must clearly have taken
place, not on the completion of the temple (1 Kings 6:38), but on the completion of
the palace, etc.; in other words, the temple must have been finished fully thirteen
years before it was consecrated and occupied. Rawlinson suggests that the delay was
perhaps occasioned by the circumstance that the furniture of the temple was not till
then ready; but 1 Kings 6:38, Hebrews, seems to state distinctly that all the vessels
and appointments of the sanctuary were finished at the date there given. Reasons
have been given elsewhere (see note on 1 Kings 8:1) in support of the position that
the dedication possibly have been delayed for so long a period, especially after the
strenuous efforts which had been made to hurry on the undertaking. or does the
text, when carefully examined, really require this hypothesis; indeed, it suggests
some reasons for thinking that a considerable period must have intervened between
the prayer and the response. For the tone of this response is unmistakeably
foreboding, if not minatory. Verses 6-9 contain a stern warning. But there was
nothing, so far as we know, in the attitude of Solomon or of Israel at the time of the
dedication to call for any such denunciation. At that time, as the prayer surely
proves, Solomon's heart was perfect with the Lord his God. But the response has
unmistakeably the appearance of having been elicited by signs of defection. The
wide difference, consequently, between the spirit of the prayer and the tone of the
answer suggests that some time must have elapsed between them, and so far
supports the view that the dedication was not delayed until the palace, etc; was
completed. And it is also to be remembered that the prayer of dedication had not
been without acknowledgment at the time. The excellent glory which filled and took
possession of the house was itself a significant and sufficient response. o voice or
vision could have said more plainly, "I have heard thy prayer, I have hallowed this
house." But when, some thirteen years later—about the very time, that is, when he
was at the height of his prosperity, and when, owing to the completion of his
undertakings, we might fear lest his heart should be lifted up with pride—when
Solomon and his court began to decline in piety and to go after other gods, then this
merciful message opportunely refers him to the prayer which he was in danger of
forgetting, and warns him of the consequences of the apostasy to which he was
tending.]
MACLARE 1-9, "PROMISES AND THREATENINGS
The successful end of a great work is often the beginning of a great reaction. When the
tension is slackened, the whole nature of the worker is relaxed, and the temptation to
slothful self-indulgence is strong. God knows our frame, and mercifully times His
manifestations to the moments of special need. So, when Solomon had finished his great
task, ‘the Lord appeared the second time, as He had appeared at Gibeon.’ There had
been no manifest token of approval during all the years of building the Temple, for none
was needed; but now there was danger that the finished work might be followed by
languor and indifference, and therefore once more God spoke words of stimulus, both
promises and warnings.
A solemn alternative is set before the king, both parts of which are fitted to rouse his
energy and inspire him to faithful obedience. The same alternatives are presented to
each of us. In 1Ki_9:3-5 God promises blessed results from clinging to Him and keeping

21. His statutes; in 1Ki_9:6-9 He mercifully threatens the tragic issues of departure. In
applying these to ourselves we must remember that outward prosperity was attached to
a devout life more closely in Israel than it is now. But, though the form of the blessings
dependent on doing God’s will alters, the reality remains unaltered.
I. The promises to Solomon are preceded by the assurance that his prayer had been
heard. The answer corresponds very beautifully to the petitions. God has ‘put His name’
in the Temple, as the descent of the Glory to rest between the cherubim visibly showed,
and thus has fulfilled Solomon’s petition; but the answer surpasses the prayer in that the
presence of ‘the Name’ is promised ‘for ever.’ Similarly, in Psa_132:1-18, the answer to
the petition ‘Arise into Thy rest’ transcends the petition which it answers, and adds the
same promise of perpetuity, ‘This is My rest for ever.’ Again, Solomon had prayed, ‘that
Thine eyes may be open towards this house,’ and God answers with the expanded
promise that not His eyes only, but His heart shall be there perpetually. He is ‘able to do
exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think,’ and He delights to surprise us with
over-answers to our prayers. We cannot widen our desires so far but that His gifts will
stretch beyond them on every side.
But the promise of perpetual dwelling in the Temple is conditional, as appears in the
latter part of God’s answer, though no condition is stated at first. The promises to
Solomon individually are all contingent. The all-important ‘if’ at the beginning of 1Ki_
9:4 governs the whole. The divine eulogium on David, which introduces these promises,
suggests how mercifully God regards the imperfect lives of His servants. That merciful
interpretation of conduct is removed by a whole universe from palliation of sin. It
affords no ground for our thinking little of our inconsistencies. David’s crime was sternly
rebuked and sorely punished, but still his life, in its main drift and outline, could be
presented as a pattern, as being marked by integrity of heart and uprightness. The moon
shines like a disc of silver, though its surface is pitted with extinct volcanoes.
We may note, too, the pregnant description in outline of the elements of a devout life, as
here enjoined on Solomon. The first requisite is to walk before God; that is, to nourish a
continual consciousness of His presence, and to regulate all actions and thoughts under
the thrilling and purifying sense of being ‘ever in the great Taskmaster’s eye.’ Only we
are not to think of Him as only a Taskmaster, but as a loving Friend and Helper. A child
is happy in its little work or play when it knows that its father is looking on with
sympathy. The sense of God’s eye being on us should ‘make a sunshine in a shady place,’
should lighten labour and sweeten care. It is at the root of practical obedience, as its
place in this sequence shows; for there follow it, in 1Ki_9:4, ‘integrity of heart and
uprightness,’ on which again follow obedience to all God’s commandments.
First must come the clear recognition of God’s relation to us. That recognition will
influence our relation to Him, bending hearts to love and wills to submit, and the whole
inward being to cleave to Him. Thence, and only thence, will issue in the life the streams
of practical obedience. It is vain to seek to produce righteous deeds unless our hearts are
right, and it is as vain to labour at making our hearts right unless thoughts of what God
is to us have purified them. Morality is rooted in religion. On the other hand, no
knowledge of the truth about God is worth anything unless it touches the hidden man of
the heart, and then passes outward to mould conduct. ‘Faith without works is dead.’
Correct theology and glowing emotions lack their consummation if they do not impel to
holy and God-pleasing living.
The reward promised in 1Ki_9:5 is for Solomon alone. His throne is to be ‘established
for ever.’ The duration intended by that expression is therefore not absolutely unlimited,
but equivalent to ‘during thy lifetime.’ Solomon could only affect himself by his

22. obedience. The continuance of the kingdom after him depended on his successors. His
possession of the throne during his life was the beginning of the fulfilment of the
promise to David referred to in 1Ki_9:5, but it was only the beginning, and, like all God’s
promises, it was contingent on obedience. We receive no outward kingdom if we are
servants of God; but, in deepest truth, the righteous man is a king, ‘lord of himself,
though not of lands.’ All creatures serve the soul that serves God, and all Christ’s
brethren share in His royalty.
II. The second part of this divine utterance is addressed to the whole nation, as is
marked by the ‘ye’ there compared with the ‘thou’ in 1Ki_9:4, and it lays down for
succeeding generations the conditions on which the new Temple, that stood glittering in
the bright Eastern sunshine, should retain its pristine beauty. While the address to
Solomon incited to obedience by painting its blessed consequences, that to the nation
reaches the same end by the opposite path of darkly portraying the ruin that would be
caused by departure from God. God draws by holding out a hand full of good things, and
He no less lovingly drives by stretching out a hand armed with lightnings.
A plain declaration of the evils that dog disobedience is as loving as a bright vision of the
good that attends on submission. The sternest threatenings of Scripture are spoken that
they may never need to be executed. There is no more foolish misconception of
Christianity than that which calls it harsh because it reveals that ‘the wages of sin is
death.’ Note that the threatenings come second, not first. God’s heart is averse to smite.
To lavish blessing is His delight, and judgment is ‘His work, His strange work,’ forced on
Him by sin.
The special sin against which Israel was warned was that to which it was specially prone
and tempted by its circumstances. When all the nations ‘worshipped stocks and stones,’
it was hard to ‘keep thy faith so pure’ as to have no share in the universal bewitchment.
So the whole history of the people is one of lapses into idolatry and of chastisements
leading to temporary amendment, until the long, sharp lesson of the Captivity eradicated
the disposition to be as the nations around. No doubt, idolatry in its crudest forms is
outgrown now in Western lands, but sense still craves material embodiment of the
unseen, and still feels the pressure of the material and palpable. Hence the earthward
direction of so many lives. Asthmatical patients often breathe more easily in the slums of
a city than in pure mountain air, and sense-bound men find difficulty in respiration on
the heights of a religion which minimises the appeal to sense.
The penalty attached to departure from God was the loss of the land. Israel kept it on a
tenure like that of some of our English nobility, who hold their estates on condition of
doing some service to the sovereign. Of course, that connection between serving God and
national prosperity involved continual supernatural intervention, and cannot be applied
entirely to national prosperity now; but it still remains true that moral and religious
corruption saps the foundations of a people’s well-being, and, when carried far enough,
destroys a people’s existence. The solemn threat of becoming ‘a proverb and a byword’
among all peoples is quoted, apparently from Deu_28:37, and has been only too terribly
fulfilled for weary centuries.
The promise in 1Ki_9:3, that God’s eyes and heart should be perpetually on the Temple,
has now the condition attached that Israel should cleave to the Lord. Otherwise it will be
cast out of His sight, and be a mark for scorn and wonder. The vivid representation of a
dialogue between passers-by is quoted from Deu_29:24-26, where it is spoken in
reference to the nation. It carries the solemn thought that God’s name is made known
among the heathen by the punishment of His unfaithful people, not less really, and
sometimes more strikingly, than by the blessings bestowed on the obedient. If we will

23. not magnify Him by joyous service, by rewarding which, with good He can magnify
Himself, He will magnify Himself on us by retribution, the more severe as our blessings
have been the greater. The lightning-scathed tree, standing white in the forest, witnesses
to the power of the flash, as its leafy sisters in their green beauty proclaim the energy of
the sunshine. Israel has, perhaps, been a more convincing witness for God, in its
homeless centuries, than ever it was when at rest in the good land. ‘If God spared not the
natural branches, take heed lest He also spare not thee.’
2 the Lord appeared to him a second time, as he
had appeared to him at Gibeon.
BAR ES, "This appearance is fixed by 1Ki_9:1 to Solomon’s twenty-fourth year, the
year in which he completed his palace 1Ki_6:37-38; 1Ki_7:1. The fact seems to be that,
though the temple was finished in Solomon’s eleventh year, the dedication did not take
place until his twenty-fourth year. The order of the narrative in Kings agrees with this
view, since it interposes the account of the building of the palace 1Ki_7:1-12, and of the
making of the furniture 1 Kings 7:13-51, between the completion of the building of the
temple 1Ki_6:38 and the ceremony of the Dedication 1 Kings 8.
CLARKE, "The Lord appeared to Solomon - The design of this appearance,
which was in a dream, as that was at Gibeon, was to assure Solomon that God had
accepted his service, and had taken that house for his dwelling-place, and would
continue it, and establish him and his descendants upon the throne of Israel for ever,
provided they served him with an upright heart; but, on the contrary, if they forsook
him, he would abandon both them and his temple.
GILL, "That the Lord appeared to Solomon the second time,.... Junius and
Tremellius read this verse with the following, to the end of the ninth, in a parenthesis,
and render this clause, "for the Lord had appeared", &c. and Piscator translates it,
"moreover the Lord appeared", &c. as beginning a distinct narrative from the former;
and indeed if the words are to be connected with the preceding, as in our version, this
appearance must be thirteen years after the building of the temple, which is not
probable; but rather it was the night after the dedication of it, when an answer was
returned to Solomon's prayer in the preceding chapter; for that it should be deferred
twelve or thirteen years is not reasonable to suppose; and this appearance was the
second of the kind and manner:
as he had appeared unto him at Gibeon; in a dream and a vision, and by night,

24. 1Ki_3:5, see 2Ch_7:12.
HE RY, "I. In what way God gave him this answer. He appeared to him, as he had
done at Gibeon, in the beginning of his reign, in a dream or vision, 1Ki_9:2. The
comparing of it with that intimates that it was the very night after he had finished the
solemnities of his festival, for so that was, 2Ch_1:6, 2Ch_1:7. And then 1Ki_9:1, speaking
of Solomon's finishing all his buildings, which was not till many years after the
dedication of the temple, must be read thus, Solomon finished (as it is 2Ch_7:11), and
1Ki_9:2 must be read, and the Lord had appeared.
JAMISO , "That — rather, “For.”
the Lord appeared — This appearance was, like the former one at Gibeon, most
probably made in a supernatural vision, and on the night immediately following the
dedication of the temple (2Ch_7:12). The strain of it corresponds to this view, for it
consists of direct answers to his solemn inaugural prayer (1Ki_9:3 is in answer to 1Ki_
8:29; 1Ki_9:4, 1Ki_9:5 is in answer to 1Ki_8:25, 1Ki_8:26; 1Ki_9:6-9 to 1Ki_8:33-46;
see also Deu_29:22-24).
COKE, "Verses 2-9
1 Kings 9:2-9. That the Lord appeared to Solomon— Lest this young prince's heart
should be too much elated by this extraordinary grandeur, God was pleased to
appear to himin a dream on the first night of the dedication, when he expressed his
acceptance of that sumptuous edifice, and renewed his promises to him and his
posterity, provided he and they served him with an upright heart. On the other
hand, he assured him, that in case they provoked him by their idolatry and
disobedience, that glorious building, which was now the wonder of the world,
should infallibly become a desolation, a dwelling for owls and bats, and a proverb of
reproach among all nations. See Univ. Hist.
REFLECTIO S.—1. God declares his acceptance of Solomon's prayer, and
promises to answer it. As he had manifested his presence in his temple, his eye and
heart shall be always upon it, and his ear attentive to the prayers of all who come
thither for help. ote; God's eyes are now in every place over the righteous, and his
ears open to their prayers.
2. He promises him, on his obedience, the establishment of his house and throne to
the latest posterity. ote; They who would secure to their children the entail of
God's blessings, must leave them the examples of their fidelity.
3. He warns Him of the dreadful consequence of his, and the people's, and their
posterity's departure and apostacy from God, which would cause the destruction of
his family, the ruin of his kingdom, the demolition of this glorious temple, the
contempt of the heathen, and the mournful reflection of those who remained, on the
sins which brought down such desolating judgments. Thus Solomon and the people
were admonished not to pride themselves on their outward privileges, or rest on the
glory of the temple, seeing that its greater beauty was the holiness of the
worshippers; and that that once lost, the fine gold would become dim, and this lofty

25. fabric be laid in the dust. ote; (1.) If our growth in grace does not correspond with
our privileges, our boast of the temple, and the best form of worship, will but delude
and destroy us. (2.) Whenever we see or read the desolations that God hath wrought
in the earth, we should reflect on the dreadful evil and malignity of sin, and take
warning.
PULPIT,, "That the Lord appeared to Solomon the second time [see on 1 Kings
6:11, and 1 Kings 11:9; Solomon had received a message during the building of the
temple], as he had appeared unto him at Gibeon [i.e; in a dream (1 Kings 3:5) ].
BI, "The Lord said unto him, I have heard thy prayer.
Essential points in prayer
It was an exceedingly encouraging thing to Solomon that the Lord should appear to him
before the beginning of his great work of building the temple. See in the third chapter of
this First Book of the Kings, at the fifth verse, “In Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon
in a dream by night: and God said, Ask what I shall give thee.” I cannot forget when the
Lord appeared unto me in Gibeon at the first. Truly there are things about the lives of
Christian men that would not have been possible if God had not appeared to them at the
beginning. If he had not strengthened and tutored them, and given them wisdom beyond
what they possess in themselves; if he had not inspirited them. It is a priceless blessing
to begin with God, and not to lay a stone of the temple of our life-work till the Lord has
appeared unto us. I do not know, however, but that it is an equal, perhaps a superior,
blessing for the Lord to appear to us after a certain work is done; even as in this case:
“The Lord appeared to Solomon the second time, as He had appeared unto him at
Gibeon.” We want renewed appearances, fresh manifestations, new visitations from on
high; and I commend to those of you who are getting on in life, that while you thank God
for the past, and look back with joy to His visits to you in your early days, you now seek
and ask for a second visitation of the Most High. All days in a palace are not days of
banqueting, and all days with God are not so clear and glorious as certain special
Sabbaths of the soul in which the Lord unveils His glory. Happy are we if we have once
beheld His face; but happier still if He again comes to us in fulness of favour. I think that
we should be seeking those second appearances: we should be crying to God most
pleadingly that He would speak to us a second time.
I. Our proper place in prayer. The Lord said, “I have heard thy prayer, and thy
supplication, that thou hast made before Me.” There is the place to pray—“before Me”:
that is to say, before the Lord. But we should take care that the place is hallowed by our
prayer being deliberately and reverently presented before God.
1. This place is not always found. The Pharisee went up to the temple to pray, and
yet, evidently, he did not pray “before God”; so that even in the most holy courts he
did not find the place desired.
2. This blessed place “before God” can be found in public prayer. Solomon’s prayer
before God was offered in the midst of a great multitude.
3. But prayer before God can just as well be offered in private.
4. The prayer is to be directed to God.

26. 5. We should endeavour in prayer to realise the presence of God.
II. Our great desideratum in prayer. It is that which God said that He had given to
Solomon. “I have heard thy prayer and thy supplication.”
1. The first thing the soul desires in prayer is audience with God. If the Lord do not
hear us, we have gained nothing. And what an honour it is to have audience with
God!
2. But we Want more than that: we want that He should accept. It were a painful
thing to be permitted to speak to a great friend, and then for him to stand austere
and stern, and say, “I have heard what you have to say. Go your way.” We ask not this
of God.
3. Still, there is a third thing which we want, which God gave to Solomon, and that
was an answer.
III. Our assurance of answer to prayer. Can we have an assurance that God has heard
and answered prayer? Solomon had it. The Lord said unto him, “I have heard thy prayer
and thy supplication, that thou hast made before Me.” Does the Lord ever say that to us?
I think so. Let us consider how He does so.
1. I think that He says it to us very often in our usual faith.
2. But sometimes you require strong confidence. You have to solicit some
extraordinary blessing. You get to a place like that to which Jacob came, when
common prayer was not sufficient.
3. Sometimes this comes in the form of a comfortable persuasion.
4. The Lord also gives to His people a manifest preparation for the blessing. He
prepares them to receive it. Their expectation is raised, so that they begin to look out
for the blessing, and make room for it; and when it is so, you may be sure that it is
coming.
5. Actual observation also breeds in us a solid confidence that our suit is succeeding.
(C. H. Spurgeon.)
Prayer penetrates
Which are the sounds that penetrate furthest? We on terra firma are scarcely in a
position to judge. However, a number of scientists have been making a series of
experiments to test the relative penetrating quality of sounds, The Government lent
them a military balloon, which ascended from the artillery camp at Woolwich, and
passed over London. A sharp ear was kept for the sounds of the vast city that penetrated
upward. Trains were heard in practically continuous rumble, punctuated by their shrill
whistles. Sirens from the river and various factories rose sharp and clear. Most
noticeable were the barkings of high-voiced dogs, which could be distinctly heard even at
a mile high. The highly-instructive fact was noted, however, that, though the city was
crossed just at neon, when from the streets the striking of clocks and bells is always such
a noticeable feature, yet the most careful listener aloft could detect no such sounds.
These observations go to prove how inferior are the carrying powers of bells as heard
from aloft, and to emphasise the fact that noises of an unmusical, discordant nature have
much better chance of making themselves heard at a distance than have more
harmonious sounds. But the reverse is the case in the spiritual sphere. It is the discords

27. of earth that have no carrying power, and that last but for a day. It is the sweet and
harmonious utterance, the secret prayer, the quiet deed, that reaches unto the heavens.
(Signal.)
3 The Lord said to him:
“I have heard the prayer and plea you have made
before me; I have consecrated this temple, which
you have built, by putting my ame there forever.
My eyes and my heart will always be there.
BAR ES, "The answer given by God to Solomon’s prayer is reported more fully in
2Ch_7:12-22.
When God puts His Name in the temple He does it, in intention, “forever.” He will not
arbitrarily withdraw it; there it will remain “forever,” so far as God is concerned. But the
people may by unfaithfulness drive it away 1Ki_9:7-9.
And mine eyes and my heart - An answer in excess of the prayer 1Ki_8:29; “Not
Mine eyes only, but Mine eyes and Mine heart.”
GILL, "And the Lord said unto him, I have heard thy prayer and thy
supplication that thou hast made before me,.... With delight and pleasure, and
had accepted it; meaning the prayer recorded in the preceding chapter:
I have hallowed this house which thou hast built; by the cloud of glory filling it,
and by fire descending from heaven, and consuming the sacrifices offered in it, 2Ch_7:1.
to put my name there for ever; there to grant his presence, so long as his pure
worship should be continued in it; so the Targum adds,
"and my Shechinah or divine Majesty shall abide in it, if my will is done there
continually:''
and mine eyes and mine heart shall be there perpetually; his eyes of Providence
should be upon it, to watch over it, and protect it, and his worshippers in it; and he
should have a cordial regard to the sacrifices there offered, and to the persons of the
offerers, so long as they offered them in a right way, and to right ends and purposes.

28. HE RY 3-9, "II. The purport of this answer. 1. He assures him of his special presence
in the temple he had built, in answer to the prayer he had made (1Ki_9:3): I have
hallowed this house. Solomon had dedicated it, but it was God's prerogative to hallow it
- to sanctify or consecrate it. Men cannot make a place holy, yet what we, in sincerity,
devote to God, we may hope he will graciously accept as his; and his eyes and his heart
shall be upon it. Apply it to persons, the living temples. Those whom God hallows or
sanctifies, whom he sets apart for himself, have his eye, his heart, his love and care, and
this perpetually. 2. He shows him that he and his people were for the future upon their
good behaviour. Let them not be secure now, as if they might live as they please now
that they have the temple of the Lord among them, Jer_7:4. No, this house was designed
to protect them in their allegiance to God, but not in their rebellion or disobedience. God
deals plainly with us, sets before us good and evil, the blessing and the curse, and lets us
know what we must trust to. God here tells Solomon, (1.) That the establishment of his
kingdom depended upon the constancy of his obedience (1Ki_9:4, 1Ki_9:5): “If thou wilt
walk before me as David did, who left thee a good example and encouragement enough
to follow it (and advantage thou wilt be accountable for if thou do not improve it), if thou
wilt walk as he did, in integrity of heart and uprightness” (for that is the main matter -
no religion without sincerity), “then I will establish the throne of thy kingdom, and not
otherwise,” for on that condition the promise was made, Psa_132:12. If we perform our
part of the covenant, God will not fail to perform his; if we improve the grace God has
given us, he will confirm us to the end. Let not the children of godly parents expect the
entail of the blessing, unless they tread in the steps of those that have gone before them
to heaven, and keep up the virtue and piety of their ancestors. (2.) That the ruin of his
kingdom would be the certain consequence of his or his children's apostasy from God
(1Ki_9:6): “But know thou, and let thy family and kingdom know it, and be admonished
by it, that if you shall altogether turn from following me” (so it is thought it should be
read), “if you forsake my service, desert my altar, and go and serve other gods” (for that
was the covenant-breaking sin), “if you or your children break off from me, this house
will not save you. But, [1.] Israel, though a holy nation, will be cut off (1Ki_9:7), by one
judgment after another, till they become a proverb and a by-word, and the most
despicable people under the sun, though now the most honourable.” This supposes the
destruction of the royal family, though it is not particularly threatened; the king is, of
course, undone, if the kingdom be. [2.] “The temple, though a holy house, which God
himself has hallowed for his name, shall be abandoned and laid desolate (1Ki_9:8, 1Ki_
9:9): This house which is high.” They prided themselves in the stateliness and
magnificence of the structure, but let them know that it is not so high as to be out of the
reach of God's judgments, if they vilify it so as to exchange it for groves and idol-temples,
and yet, at the same time, magnify it so as to think it will secure the favour of God to
them though they ever so much corrupt themselves. This house which is high. Those
that now pass by it are astonished at the bulk and beauty of it; the richness, contrivance,
and workmanship, are admired by all spectators, and it is called a stupendous fabric;
but, if you forsake God, its height will make its fall the more amazing, and those that
pass by will be as much astonished at its ruins, while the guilty, self-convicted, self-
condemned, Israelites, will be forced to acknowledge, with shame, that they themselves
were the ruin of it; for when it shall be asked, Why hath the Lord done thus to his house?
they cannot but answer, It was because they forsook the Lord their God. See Deu_29:24,
Deu_29:25. Their sin will be read in their punishment. They deserted the temple, and
therefore God deserted it; they profaned it with their sins and laid it common, and
therefore God profaned it with his judgments and laid it waste. God gave Solomon fair
warning of this, now that he had newly built and dedicated it, that he and his people
might not be high-minded, but fear.

29. K&D, "The divine promise to Solomon, that his prayer should be answered, is closely
connected with the substance of the prayer; but in our account we have only a brief
summary, whereas in the Chronicles it is given more elaborately (vid., 2Ch_7:12-16). “I
have sanctified this house which thou hast built, to put my name there.” For the
expression, see Deu_12:11. The sanctifying consisted in the fact, that Jehovah put His
name in the temple; i.e., that by filling the temple with the cloud which visibly displayed
His presence, He consecrated it as the scene of the manifestation of His grace. To
Solomon's prayer, “May Thine eyes stand open over this house” (1Ki_8:29), the Lord
replies, giving always more than we ask, “My eyes and my heart shall be there
perpetually.”
BE SO , "1 Kings 9:3. The Lord said, I have heard thy prayer — This shows that
the first verse is to be understood as we have just stated: for otherwise we must
suppose this appearance of God to Solomon to have taken place, and this answer to
have been given to his prayer, eleven years after he had finished the house, and
addressed that prayer to him at the dedication of it; which is very unlikely. I have
hallowed this house — By my glorious presence in the cloud, and by my acceptance
of thy sacrifices. I have sanctified it to my proper use and service. Solomon had
dedicated it, but it was God’s prerogative to hallow or consecrate it. Men cannot
make a place holy; yet what we in sincerity devote to God, we may hope he will
graciously accept as his. To put my name there for ever — As long as the Mosaic
dispensation lasts: whereas hitherto my worship has been successively in several
places. And mine eyes — My watchful and gracious providence. My heart — My
true and tender affection. Shall be there perpetually — Shall be toward this place
and people, upon condition of your obedience, as it here follows. Apply this to
persons, to God’s living temples: those whom he hallows or sanctifies; whom he sets
apart for himself, in consequence of their repentance and faith in Jesus, have his eye
upon and his heart toward them; they have his love and his care, and this
perpetually.
ELLICOTT, "(3) To put my name there for ever.—The meaning of the words “for
ever” is determined by the prayer which they answer. They simply mark the Temple
as the “settled habitation to abide in for ever” (see 1 Kings 8:13), in
contradistinction from the movable tabernacle. Whether they were to have a larger
significance is expressly declared to depend on the faithfulness of Israel (see 1 Kings
9:7-8).
Mine eyes and mine heart.—See .
ELLICOTT, "(3-9) And the Lord said unto him.—This vision of the Lord presents
a remarkable contrast with that recorded in 1 Kings 6:11-13, while the Temple was
in building. Then all was promise and encouragement; now, not only is warning
mingled with promise, but, as in Solomon’s own prayer, the sadder alternative

30. seems in prophetic anticipation to overpower the brighter. In this there is (as has
been often remarked) a striking exemplification of the austere and lofty candour of
the inspired narrative, sternly contradicting that natural hopefulness in the hour of
unexampled prosperity, which would have shrunk from even entertaining the idea
that the blessing of God on the Temple should be frustrated, and the glory of Israel
should pass away.
It is notable that, in its reference to the two parts of the promise to David, there is a
subtle and instructive distinction. As for the Temple, now just built in fulfilment of
that promise, it is declared without reserve that, in case of unfaithfulness in Israel, it
shall be utterly destroyed, and become an astonishment and a proverb of reproach
before the world. But in respect of the promise of the perpetuity of David’s
kingdom—the true Messianic prediction, which struck the key-note of all future
prophecies—it is only said that Israel shall be “cut off from the land,” and so
“become a proverb and a byword” in captivity. othing is said to contradict the
original declaration, that, even in case of sin, the mercy of God would chastise and
not forsake the house of David (2 Samuel 7:13-14; Psalms 89:30-37). So again and
again in prophecy captivity is denounced as a penalty of Israel’s sin; but the hope of
restoration is always held out, and thus the belief in God’s unchanging promise
remains unshaken. The true idea is strikingly illustrated by the prophet Amos (1
Kings 9:9-11): “I will sift the house of Israel, among all nations . . . yet shall not the
least grain fall upon the earth . . . I will raise up the tabernacle of David that is
fallen, and close up the breaches thereof.”
PULPIT, "And the Lord said unto him [This message is given at greater length in 2
Chronicles 7:12-22. 2 Chronicles 7:13, 2 Chronicles 7:14, e.g; contain a reference to
that part of the prayer which related to drought and rain], I have heard thy prayer
and thy supplication [These two words are found similarly united in Solomon's
prayer, verses 38, 45, 54], that thou hast made [Heb. supplicated] before me; I have
hallowed this house which thou hast built [sc. by the manifestation described 1
Kings 8:11. Cf. Exodus 29:43 : "the tabernacle shall be sanctified" (same word) "by
my glory." In 2 Chronicles we read, "I have chosen this place to myself for a house
of sacrifice," where, however, it is worth considering whether instead of the
somewhat singular ‫זבח‬ ‫בית‬ the original text may not have been ‫זבל‬ ‫,בית‬ as in 1 Kings
8:13] to put my name there [1 Kings 8:29; cf. 1 Kings 8:16, 1 Kings 8:17, 1 Kings
8:18, 1 Kings 8:19; also Deuteronomy 12:11; Luke 11:12] forever [1 Kings 8:13. As
Solomon offered it, so God accepted it, in perpetuity. That the house was
subsequently "left desolate" and destroyed (2 Kings 25:9) was because of the
national apostasy (1 Kings 8:8, 1 Kings 8:9) ], and mine eyes and mine heart shall be
there perpetually. [In 1 Kings 8:29 Solomon asked that God's "eyes may be open…
towards the house." The answer is that not only His eyes shall be open, but eyes and
heart shall be there [Ephesians 3:20; see Homiletics on 1 Kings 3:5);—the eye to
watch, the heart to cherish it.]

31. 4 “As for you, if you walk before me faithfully
with integrity of heart and uprightness, as David
your father did, and do all I command and
observe my decrees and laws,
BAR ES, "See 1Ki_3:14. Solomon’s subsequent fall lends to these repeated warnings
a special interest.
GILL, "And if thou wilt walk before me, as David thy father walked, in
integrity of heart, and in uprightness..... Who, though guilty of many sins and
failings in life, yet was sincere and upright in the worship of God, never apostatized from
it, or fell into idolatry, which is what is chiefly respected:
to do according to all that I have commanded thee, and wilt keep my
statutes and my judgments; observe all the laws of God, moral, ceremonial, and
judicial.
K&D, "1Ki_9:4, 1Ki_9:5 contain the special answer to 1Ki_8:25, 1Ki_8:26. - 1Ki_9:6-
9 refer to the prayer for the turning away of the curse, to which the Lord replies: If ye
and your children turn away from me, and do not keep my commandments, but worship
other gods, this house will not protect you from the curses threatened in the law, but
they will be fulfilled in all their terrible force upon you and upon this temple. This threat
follows the Pentateuch exactly in the words in which it is expressed; 1Ki_9:7 being
founded upon Deu_28:37, Deu_28:45, Deu_28:63, and the curse pronounced upon
Israel in Deu_29:23-26 being transferred to the temple in 1Ki_9:8, 1Ki_9:9. - ‫י‬ַ‫נ‬ ָ ‫על‬ ֵ‫מ‬ ַ‫ח‬ ֵ ִ‫שׁ‬
, to dismiss, i.e., to reject from before my face. “This house will be ‫ּון‬‫י‬ ְ‫ל‬ ֶ‫”,ע‬ i.e., will stand
high, or through its rejection will be a lofty example for all that pass by. The temple
stood upon a high mountain, so that its ruins could not fail to attract the attention of all
who went past. The expression ‫ּון‬‫י‬ ְ‫ל‬ ֶ‫ע‬ is selected with an implied allusion to Deu_26:19
and Deu_28:1. God there promises to make Israel ‫ּון‬‫י‬ ְ‫ל‬ ֶ‫,ע‬ high, exalted above all nations.
This blessing will be turned into a curse. The temple, which was high and widely
renowned, shall continue to be high, but in the opposite sense, as an example of the
rejection of Israel from the presence of God.
(Note: The conjecture of Böttcher, Thenius, and Bertheau, that ‫ּון‬‫י‬ ְ‫ל‬ ֶ‫ע‬ should be
altered into ‫ים‬ִ ִ‫,ע‬ has no support in Mic_3:12; Jer_26:18, and Psa_79:1, and has all
the ancient versions against it; for they all contain the Masoretic text, either in a
verbal translation (lxx), or in a paraphrase, as for example the Chaldee, “the house