Text -- 1 Kings 8:38-66 (NET)

8:38 When all your people Israel pray and ask for help, as they acknowledge their pain and spread out their hands toward this temple, 8:39 then listen from your heavenly dwelling place, forgive their sin, and act favorably toward each one based on your evaluation of his motives. (Indeed you are the only one who can correctly evaluate the motives of all people.) 8:40 Then they will obey you throughout their lifetimes as they live on the land you gave to our ancestors. 8:41 “Foreigners, who do not belong to your people Israel, will come from a distant land because of your reputation. 8:42 When they hear about your great reputation and your ability to accomplish mighty deeds, they will come and direct their prayers toward this temple. 8:43 Then listen from your heavenly dwelling place and answer all the prayers of the foreigners. Then all the nations of the earth will acknowledge your reputation, obey you like your people Israel do, and recognize that this temple I built belongs to you. 8:44 “When you direct your people to march out and fight their enemies, and they direct their prayers to the Lord toward his chosen city and this temple I built for your honor, 8:45 then listen from heaven to their prayers for help and vindicate them. 8:46 “The time will come when your people will sin against you (for there is no one who is sinless!) and you will be angry with them and deliver them over to their enemies, who will take them as prisoners to their own land, whether far away or close by. 8:47 When your people come to their senses in the land where they are held prisoner, they will repent and beg for your mercy in the land of their imprisonment, admitting, ‘We have sinned and gone astray; we have done evil.’ 8:48 When they return to you with all their heart and being in the land where they are held prisoner, and direct their prayers to you toward the land you gave to their ancestors, your chosen city, and the temple I built for your honor, 8:49 then listen from your heavenly dwelling place to their prayers for help and vindicate them. 8:50 Forgive all the rebellious acts of your sinful people and cause their captors to have mercy on them. 8:51 After all, they are your people and your special possession whom you brought out of Egypt, from the middle of the iron-smelting furnace. 8:52 “May you be attentive to your servant’s and your people Israel’s requests for help and may you respond to all their prayers to you. 8:53 After all, you picked them out of all the nations of the earth to be your special possession, just as you, O sovereign Lord, announced through your servant Moses when you brought our ancestors out of Egypt.” 8:54 When Solomon finished presenting all these prayers and requests to the Lord, he got up from before the altar of the Lord where he had kneeled and spread out his hands toward the sky. 8:55 When he stood up, he pronounced a blessing over the entire assembly of Israel, saying in a loud voice: 8:56 “The Lord is worthy of praise because he has made Israel his people secure just as he promised! Not one of all the faithful promises he made through his servant Moses is left unfulfilled! 8:57 May the Lord our God be with us, as he was with our ancestors. May he not abandon us or leave us. 8:58 May he make us submissive, so we can follow all his instructions and obey the commandments, rules, and regulations he commanded our ancestors. 8:59 May the Lord our God be constantly aware of these requests of mine I have presented to him, so that he might vindicate his servant and his people Israel as the need arises. 8:60 Then all the nations of the earth will recognize that the Lord is the only genuine God. 8:61 May you demonstrate wholehearted devotion to the Lord our God by following his rules and obeying his commandments, as you are presently doing.”

Solomon Dedicates the Temple

8:62 The king and all Israel with him were presenting sacrifices to the Lord. 8:63 Solomon offered as peace offerings to the Lord 22,000 cattle and 120,000 sheep. Then the king and all the Israelites dedicated the Lord’s temple. 8:64 That day the king consecrated the middle of the courtyard that is in front of the Lord’s temple. He offered there burnt sacrifices, grain offerings, and the fat from the peace offerings, because the bronze altar that stood before the Lord was too small to hold all these offerings. 8:65 At that time Solomon and all Israel with him celebrated a festival before the Lord our God for two entire weeks. This great assembly included people from all over the land, from Lebo Hamath in the north to the Brook of Egypt in the south. 8:66 On the fifteenth day after the festival started, he dismissed the people. They asked God to empower the king and then went to their homes, happy and content because of all the good the Lord had done for his servant David and his people Israel.

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:38

¹ tn Heb “every prayer, every request for help which will be to all the people, to all your people Israel.”

² tn Heb “which they know, each the pain of his heart.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:39

¹ tn The words “their sin” are added for clarification.

² tn Heb “and act and give to each one according to all his ways because you know his heart.” In the Hebrew text vv. 37-39a actually contain one lengthy conditional sentence, which the translation has divided up for stylistic reasons.

³ tn Heb “Indeed you know, you alone, the heart of all the sons of mankind.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:40

¹ tn Heb “fear.”

² tn Heb “all the days [in] which.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:41

¹ tn Heb “your name.” In the OT the word “name” sometimes refers to one’s reputation or honor. The “name” of the Lord sometimes designates the Lord himself, being indistinguishable from the proper name.

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:42

¹ tn Heb “your great name.” See the note on the word “reputation” in the previous verse.

² tn Heb “and your strong hand and your outstretched arm.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:43

¹ tn Heb “and do all which the foreigner calls to [i.e., “requests of”] you.”

² tn Heb “your name.” See the note on the word “reputation” in v. 41.

³ tn Heb “fear.”

⁴ tn Heb “that your name is called over this house which I built.” The Hebrew idiom “to call the name over” indicates ownership. See 2 Sam 12:28.

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:44

¹ tn Heb “When your people go out for battle against their enemies in the way which you send them.”

² tn Or perhaps “to you, O Lord.” See 2 Chr 6:34.

³ tn Heb “your name.” See the note on the word “reputation” in v. 41.

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:45

¹ tn Heb “their prayer and their request for help.”

² tn Heb “and accomplish their justice.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:46

¹ tn Heb “they”; the referent (your people) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

² tn Heb “the land of the enemy.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:47

¹ tn Heb “they”; the referent (your people) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

² tn Or “stop and reflect”; Heb “bring back to their heart.”

³ tn Or “done wrong.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:48

¹ tn Or “soul.”

² tn Heb “in the land of their enemies.”

³ tn Heb “your name.” See the note on the word “reputation” in v. 41.

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:49

¹ tn Heb “their prayer and their request for help.”

² tn Heb “and accomplish their justice.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:50

¹ tn Heb “and forgive your people who have sinned against you, [forgive] all their rebellious acts by which they rebelled against you, and grant them mercy before their captors so they will show them mercy.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:51

¹ tn Or “for.”

² tn Heb “inheritance.”

³ tn The Hebrew term כּוּר (kur, “furnace,” cf. Akkadian ku„ru) is a metaphor for the intense heat of purification. A כּוּר was not a source of heat but a crucible (“iron-smelting furnace”) in which precious metals were melted down and their impurities burned away (see I. Cornelius, NIDOTTE 2:618-19). Thus Egypt served not as a place of punishment for the Israelites, but as a place of refinement to bring Israel to a place of submission to divine sovereignty.

sn From the middle of the iron-smelting furnace. The metaphor of a furnace suggests fire and heat and is an apt image to remind the people of the suffering they endured while slaves in Egypt.

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:52

¹ tn Heb “May your eyes be open.”

² tn Heb “to listen to them in all their calling out to you.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:53

¹ tn Or “For.”

² tn Heb “your inheritance.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:54

¹ tn Or “toward heaven.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:56

¹ tn Heb “he has given a resting place to his people Israel.”

² tn Heb “not one word from his entire good word he spoke by Moses his servant has fallen.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:58

¹ tn Heb “to bend our hearts toward him.” The infinitive is subordinate to the initial prayer, “may the Lord our God be with us.” The Hebrew term לֵבָב (levav, “heart”) here refers to the people’s volition and will.

² tn Heb “to walk in all his ways.”

³ tn Heb “keep.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:59

¹ tn Heb “May these words of mine, which I have requested before the Lord, be near the Lord our God day and night.”

² tn Heb “accomplish the justice of.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:60

¹ tn Heb “so that.”

² tn Heb “the Lord, he is the God, there is no other.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:61

¹ tn Heb “may your hearts be complete with the Lord our God.”

² tn Heb “walking in.”

³ tn Heb “keeping.”

⁴ tn Heb “as this day.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:63

¹ tn Or “tokens of peace”; NIV, TEV “fellowship offerings.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:64

¹ tn Heb “to hold the burnt sacrifices, grain offerings, and the fat of the peace offerings.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:65

¹ tn Or “the Wadi of Egypt” (NAB, NIV, NRSV); CEV “the Egyptian Gorge.”

² tn Heb “Solomon held at that time the festival, and all Israel was with him, a great assembly from Lebo Hamath to the Brook of Egypt, before the Lord our God for seven days and seven days, fourteen days.”

NET Notes: 1Ki 8:66

¹ tn Heb “on the eighth day” (that is, the day after the second seven-day sequence).

² tn Heb “they blessed the king.”

³ tn Heb “good of heart.”