{"commentary":{"id":"adam-clarke","name":"Adam Clarke Bible Commentary","website":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Clarke","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Adam Clarke Bible Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"92e28c9363c876d215e296f2fe04abb3ab7e34a2aacebdf06bd62ae79c6e3dba","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/adam-clarke/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/adam-clarke/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":57,"totalNumberOfChapters":854,"totalNumberOfVerses":13318,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"1KI","commentaryId":"adam-clarke","name":"1 Kings","commonName":"1 Kings","introduction":"Preface to the First Book of the KingsOtherwise Called the Third Book of the Kings In the most correct and ancient editions of the Hebrew Bible, the two books of Kings make but one, with sometimes a little break, the first book beginning with 1 Samuel 22:40. Some of the ancient fathers seem to have begun the First Book of Kings at the death of David, Kg1 2:12. The more modern copies of the Hebrew Bible have the same division as ours; but in the time of the Masoretes they certainly made but one book; as both, like the books of Samuel, are included under one enumeration of sections, verses, etc., in the Masora. The titles to these books have been various, though it appears from Origen that they had their name from their first words, והמלך דוד vehammelech David, \"and King David;\" as Genesis had its name from בראשית bereshith, \"in the beginning.\" The Septuagint simply term it βασιλειων, of reigns, or kingdoms; of which it calls Samuel the first and second, and these two the third and fourth. The Vulgate has Liber Regum tertius; secundum Hebraeos, Liber Malachim: \"The Third Book of Kings; but, according to the Hebrews, the First Book of Malachim.\" The Syriac has, \"Here follows the Book of the Kings who flourished among this ancient people; and in this is also exhibited the history of the prophets who flourished in their times.\" The Arabic has the following title: \"In the name of the most merciful and compassionate God; the Book of Solomon, the son of David the prophet, whose benedictions be upon us. - Amen.\" The author of these books is unknown: that they are a compilation out of public and private records, as the books of Samuel are, there is little doubt; but by whom this compilation was made nowhere appears. Some have attributed it to Isaiah and to Jeremiah, because there are several chapters in both these prophets which are similar to some found in the first and second books of Kings; compare 2 Kings 18, 19, and 20, with Isaiah 36, 37, 38, and Isa 39:1-8; and Kg2 24:18; Kg2 25:1, etc., with Jer 52:1, etc. But rather than allow those prophets to be the authors or compilers of these books, some very learned men have judged that the chapters in question have been taken from the books of Kings in after times, and inserted in those prophets. It is worthy of remark that the fifty-second chapter found in Jeremiah is marked so as to intimate that it is not the composition of that prophet; for at the end of Jeremiah 51 we find these words, Thus far are the words of Jeremiah; intimating that the following chapter is not his. But the most common opinion is, that Ezra was the author, or rather the compiler of the history found in these books. Allowing only the existence of ancient documents from which it was compiled, it appears, 1. That it is the work of one person; as is sufficiently evident from the uniformity of the style, and the connection of events. 2. That this person had ancient documents from which he compiled, and which he often only abridged, is evident from his own words, The rest of the acts of such and such a prince, are they not written in the Chronicles of the Kings of Judah, or of Israel, which occur frequently. 3. These books were written during or after the Babylonish captivity, as at the end of the second book that event is particularly described. The author states also, Kg2 17:23, that Israel was, in his time, in captivity in Assyria, according to the declaration of God by his prophets. 4. That the writer was not contemporary with the facts which he relates, is evident from the reflections he makes on the facts that he found in the memoirs which he consulted. See 2 Kings 17:6-24. 5. There is every reason to believe that the author was a priest or a prophet; he studies less to describe acts of heroism, successful battles, conquests, political address, etc., than what regards the temple, religion, religious ceremonies, festivals, the worship of God, the piety of princes, the fidelity of the prophets, the punishment of crimes, the manifestation of God's anger against the wicked, and his kindness to the righteous. He appears everywhere strongly attached to the house of David; he treats of the kings of Israel only accidentally; his principal object seems to be the kingdom of Judah, and the matters which concern it. Now, all this agrees well with the supposition that Ezra was the compiler of these books. He was not only a priest, a zealous servant of God, and a reformer of the corruptions which had crept into the Divine worship, but is universally allowed by the Jews to have been the collector and compiler of the whole sacred code, and author of the arrangement of the different books which constitute the Old Testament. If some things be found in these books of Kings which do not agree to his time, they may be easily accounted for on his often taking the facts as he found them in the documents which he consults, without any kind of alteration; and this is so far a proof of his great sincerity and scrupulous exactness. The First Book of Kings contains the history of one hundred and nineteen years, from A.M. 2989 to A.M. 3108. It contains a great variety of interesting particulars, the chief of which are the following: The death of David; the reign of Solomon; the building and dedication of the temple; the building of Solomon's palace; an account of his great wisdom; his magnificence, and his fall; the division of Israel and Judah under Rehoboam; the idolatry of the ten tribes over whom Jeroboam became king. It states how Judah, Benjamin, and Levi attached themselves to the house of David; how Rehoboam was attacked by Shishak, king of Egypt, who pillaged the temple; how Baasha destroyed the house of Jeroboam, and seized on the government of Israel; how Jehu predicted the ruin of Baasha; how Ahab married the impious Jezebel, and persecuted the prophets of the Lord. It relates the acts of Elijah; the destruction of the prophets of Baal; the cruel death of Naboth; the death of Ahab; the good reign of Jehoshaphat, king of Judah; and the wicked reign of Ahaziah, king of Israel, etc. See Calmet's preface to the first and second books of Kings.","order":11,"numberOfChapters":22,"sha256":"e65df6d0d922c664a7c9ed979b70ca78012b8bcb98db54f8af6834da13af830e","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/adam-clarke/1KI/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"adam-clarke","book":"1KI","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":22,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/adam-clarke/1KI/22.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"adam-clarke","book":"1KI","chapter":22},"totalNumberOfVerses":423},"chapter":{"number":4,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":2,"content":["These were the princes which he had; Azariah the son of Zadok the priest - These were his great, chief, or principal men. None of them were princes in the common acceptation of the word. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["Elihoreph and Ahiah - scribes - Secretaries to the king.\nJehoshaphat - recorder - Historiographer to the king, who chronicled the affairs of the kingdom. He was in this office under David see Sa2 20:24. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["Azariah - was over the officers - He had the superintendence of the twelve officers mentioned below; see Kg1 4:7.\nZabud - was principal officer - Perhaps what we call premier, or prime minister.\nThe king's friend - His chief favourite - his confidant. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["Ahishar was over the household - The king's chamberlain.\nAdoniram - was over the tribute - What we call chancellor of the exchequer. He received and brought into the treasury all the proceeds of taxes and tributes. He was in this office under David; see Sa2 20:24. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["Twelve officers - The business of these twelve officers was to provide daily, each for a month, those provisions which were consumed in the king's household; see Kg1 4:22, Kg1 4:23. And the task for such a daily provision was not an easy one. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["Threescore great cities with walls and brazen bars - These were fortified cities: their gates and bars covered with plates of brass. Such were the gates in Priam's palace: - \nIpse inter primos correpta dura bipenni\nLimina perrumpit, Postes que a cardine vellit\nAeratos. Virg. Aen., lib. ii. ver. 479.\nFierce Pyrrhus in the front, with forceful sway,\nPlied the huge axe, and hew'd the beams away;\nThe solid timbers from the portal tore,\nAnd rent from every hinge the Brazen door.\nPitt. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["Eating and drinking, and making merry - They were very comfortable, very rich, very merry, and very corrupt. And this full feeding and dissipation led to a total corruption of manners. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":21,"content":["Solomon reigned over all kingdoms - The meaning of this verse appears to be, that Solomon reigned over all the provinces from the river Euphrates to the land of the Philistines, even to the frontiers of Egypt. The Euphrates was on the east of Solomon's dominions; the Philistines were westward on the Mediterranean sea; and Egypt was on the south. Solomon had, therefore, as tributaries, the kingdoms of Syria, Damascus, Moab, and Ammon, which lay between the Euphrates and the Mediterranean. See Calmet. Thus he appears to have possessed all the land that God covenanted with Abraham to give to his posterity. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":22,"content":["Solomon's provision for one day: - \nOf fine flour 30 measures, or cors. Of meal 60 ditto. Stall-fed oxen 10 Ditto from the pasture 20 Sheep 100; with harts, roebucks, fallow deer, and fat fowls. The כר cor was the same as the homer, and contained nearly seventy-six gallons, wine measure, according to Bishop Cumberland.\nSheep - צאן tson, comprehending both sheep and goats.\nHarts - מאיל meaiyal, the deer.\nRoebucks - צבי tsebi, the gazal, antelope, or wild goat.\nFallow deer - יחמור yachmur, the buffalo. See the notes on Deu 12:15; Deu 14:5.\nFatted fowl - ברברים אבוסים barburim abusim, I suppose, means all the wild fowls in season during each month. Michaelis derives ברברים barburim from ברא bara, which in Chaldee, Syriac, and Arabic, signifies a field, a desert; all that is without the cities and habitations of men: hence חיות ברא cheyvath bara, wild beasts, Dan 2:38, תור בר tor bar, wild bull; and therefore barburim may signify creatures living in the fields, woods, and deserts, which are taken by hunting, and opposed to those which are domesticated; and, consequently, may include beasts as well as fowls. Many have translated the word capons; but, query, was any such thing known among the ancient Jews? Solomon's table, therefore, was spread with all the necessaries and delicacies which the house or the field could afford.\nBut how immense must the number of men have been who were fed daily at the palace of the Israelitish king! Vilalpandus computes the number to be not less than forty-eight thousand, six hundred; and Calvisius makes, by estimation from the consumption of food, fifty-four thousand! These must have included all his guards, each of whom received a ration from the king's store. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":25,"content":["Every man under his vine - They were no longer obliged to dwell in fortified cities for fear of their enemies; they spread themselves over all the country, which they everywhere cultivated; and had always the privilege of eating the fruits of their own labors. This is the meaning of the phrase. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":26,"content":["Solomon had forty thousand stalls of horses - and twelve thousand horsemen - In Ch2 9:25, instead of forty thousand stalls, we read four thousand; and even this number might be quite sufficient to hold horses for twelve thousand horsemen; for stalls and stables may be here synonymous. In Kg1 10:26 it is said he had one thousand four hundred chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen; and this is the reading in Ch2 1:14. In Ch2 9:25, already quoted, instead of forty thousand stalls for horses, the Septuagint has τεσσαρες χιλιαδες θηλειαι ἱπποι, four thousand mares; and in this place the whole verse is omitted both by the Syriac and Arabic. In the Targum of Rabbi Joseph on this book we have ארבע מאה arba meah, four hundred, instead of the four thousand in Chronicles, and the forty thousand in the text. From this collation of parallel places we may rest satisfied that there is a corruption in the numbers somewhere; and as a sort of medium, we may take for the whole four thousand stalls, one thousand four hundred chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":28,"content":["And dromedaries - The word רכש rechesh, which we translate thus, is rendered beasts, or beasts of burden, by the Vulgate; mares by the Syriac and Arabic; chariots by the Septuagint; and race-horses by the Chaldee. The original word seems to signify a very swift kind of horse, and race-horse or post-horse is probably its true meaning. To communicate with so many distant provinces, Solomon had need of many animals of this kind. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":29,"content":["God gave Solomon wisdom, etc. - He gave him a capacious mind, and furnished him with extraordinary assistance to cultivate it.\nEven as the sand that is on the sea-shore - Lord Bacon observes on this: \"As the sand on the sea-shore encloses a great body of waters, so Solomon's mind contained an ocean of knowledge.\" This is a happy and correct illustration. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":30,"content":["The children of the east country - That is the Chaldeans, Persians, and Arabians, who, with the Egyptians, were famed for wisdom and knowledge through all the world. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":31,"content":["He was wiser than all men - He was wiser than any of those who were most celebrated in his time, among whom were the four after mentioned, viz., Ethan, Heman, Chalcol, and Darda. Ethan was probably the same as is mentioned in some of the Psalms, particularly Psa 89:1, title; and among the singers in Ch1 6:42. There is a Heman mentioned in the title to Psa 88:1. In Ch1 2:6 we have all the four names, but they are probably not the same persons, for they are there said to be the sons of Zerah, and he flourished long before Solomon's time.\nSome suppose that בני מחול beney machol should be rendered masters of dancing or music, as מחול machol signifies not only a dance or choir, but also an instrument of music of the pipe kind. Perhaps a reference is here made to Solomon's skill in music and poetry, as he is compared to persons who appear to have been eminent poets and musicians. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":32,"content":["He spake three thousand proverbs - The book of Proverbs, attributed to Solomon, contain only about nine hundred or nine hundred and twenty-three distinct proverbs; and if we grant with some that the first nine chapters are not the work of Solomon, then all that can be attributed to him is only about six hundred and fifty.\nOf all his one thousand and five songs or poems we have only one, the book of Song of Solomon, remaining, unless we include Psa 127:1-5, Except the Lord build the house, etc., which in the title is said to be by or for him, though it appears more properly to be a psalm of direction, left him by his father David, relative to the building of the temple. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":33,"content":["He spake of trees - beasts - fowl - creeping things, and of fishes - This is a complete system of natural history, as far as relates to the animal and vegetable kingdoms, and the first intimation we have of any thing of the kind: Solomon was probably the first natural historian in the world.\nO, how must the heart of Tournefort, Ray, Linne, Buffon, Cuvier, Swammerdam, Blosch, and other naturalists, be wrung, to know that these works of Solomon are all and for ever lost! What light should we have thrown on the animal and vegetable kingdoms, had these works been preserved! But the providence of God has not thought fit to preserve them, and succeeding naturalists are left to invent the system which he probably left perfect. If there be any remains of his wisdom, they must be sought among the orientals, among whom his character is well known, and rates as high as it does with either Jews or Christians. I shall give some extracts from their works relative to Solomon when I come to consider his character at the end of Kg1 11:43. \n"]},{"type":"verse","number":34,"content":["There came of all people to hear the wisdom of Solomon - We learn from 1 Kings 10, that the queen of Sheba was one of those visitants, and perhaps the most remarkable, as we have the particulars of her visit, but not of the others.\nIt is astonishing that of a person so renowned for wisdom, so little should be left to prove the truth of a fact of which all the civilized nations of the world have heard, and of which scarcely any man has ever doubted. The people that came from all kings of the earth were probably ambassadors, who came to form and maintain friendship between their sovereigns and the Israelitish king. We cannot understand the place as speaking of people who, either through an idle or laudable curiosity, came to see and converse with Solomon; to give free access to such people would ill comport with the maintenance of his dignity.\n\n"]}],"introduction":"An account of Solomon's chief officers, Kg1 4:1-6. Names of the twelve officers that were over twelve districts, to provide victuals for the king's household monthly, Kg1 4:7-19. Judah and Israel are very populous; and Solomon reigns over many provinces, Kg1 4:20, Kg1 4:21. The daily provision for his family, Kg1 4:22, Kg1 4:23. The extent and peace of his dominions, Kg1 4:24, Kg1 4:25. His horses, chariots, and dromedaries; with the provision made for them, Kg1 4:26-28. His wisdom and understanding, Kg1 4:29-31. The number of his proverbs and songs; and his knowledge in natural history, Kg1 4:32, Kg1 4:33. People from all nations come to hear his wisdom, Kg1 4:34. \n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/adam-clarke/1KI/4.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"adam-clarke","book":"1KI","chapter":4},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/adam-clarke/1KI/5.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"adam-clarke","book":"1KI","chapter":5},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/adam-clarke/1KI/3.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"adam-clarke","book":"1KI","chapter":3},"numberOfVerses":18}