22 And Solomon stood before the altar of Jehovah in the presence of the whole congregation of Israel, and spread forth his hands toward the heavens.
23 And he said, Jehovah, God of Israel! there is no God like thee, in the heavens above, or on the earth beneath, who keepest covenant and mercy with thy servants that walk before thee with all their heart;
24 who hast kept with thy servant David my father that which thou didst promise him; thou spokest with thy mouth, and hast fulfilled [it] with thy hand, as at this day.
25 And now, Jehovah, God of Israel, keep with thy servant David my father that which thou hast promised him, saying, There shall not fail thee a man in my sight to sit on the throne of Israel, if only thy sons take heed to their way, to walk before me as thou hast walked before me.
26 And now, O God of Israel, let thy words, I pray thee, be verified, which thou hast spoken unto thy servant David my father.
27 But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, the heavens, and the heaven of heavens, cannot contain thee; how much less this house which I have built!
28 Yet have respect unto the prayer of thy servant, and to his supplication, Jehovah, my God, to hearken unto the cry and to the prayer which thy servant prayeth before thee this day;
29 that thine eyes may be open upon this house night and day, upon the place of which thou hast said, My name shall be there: to hearken unto the prayer which thy servant prayeth toward this place.
30 And hearken unto the supplication of thy servant, and of thy people Israel, when they shall pray toward this place, and hear thou in thy dwelling-place, in the heavens, and when thou hearest, forgive.
31 If a man have sinned against his neighbour, and an oath be laid upon him to adjure him, and the oath come before thine altar in this house;
32 then hear thou in the heavens, and do, and judge thy servants, condemning the wicked, to bring his way upon his own head; and justifying the righteous, giving him according to his righteousness.
33 When thy people Israel are put to the worse before the enemy, because they have sinned against thee, and shall turn again to thee, and confess thy name, and pray, and make supplication unto thee in this house;
34 then hear thou in the heavens, and forgive the sin of thy people Israel, and bring them again unto the land that thou gavest unto their fathers.
35 When the heavens are shut up, and there is no rain, because they have sinned against thee; if they pray toward this place, and confess thy name, and turn from their sin, because thou hast afflicted them;
36 then hear thou in the heavens, and forgive the sin of thy servants, and of thy people Israel, when thou teachest them the good way wherein they should walk; and give rain upon thy land, which thou hast given to thy people for an inheritance.
37 If there be famine in the land, if there be pestilence, if there be blight, mildew, locust, caterpillar; if their enemy besiege them in the land of their gates; whatever plague, whatever sickness there be:
38 what prayer, what supplication soever be made by any man, of all thy people Israel, when they shall know every man the plague of his own heart, and shall spread forth his hands toward this house;
39 then hear thou in the heavens, the settled place of thy dwelling, and forgive, and do, and render unto every man according to all his ways, whose heart thou knowest (for thou, thou only, knowest the hearts of all the children of men),
40 that they may fear thee all the days that they live upon the land which thou gavest unto our fathers.
41 And as to the stranger also, who is not of thy people Israel, but cometh out of a far country for thy name's sake
42 (for they shall hear of thy great name, and of thy mighty hand, and of thy stretched-out arm); when he shall come and pray toward this house,
43 hear thou in the heavens thy dwelling-place, and do according to all that the stranger calleth to thee for; in order that all peoples of the earth may know thy name, [and] that they may fear thee as do thy people Israel; and that they may know that this house which I have built is called by thy name.
44 If thy people go out to battle against their enemy, by the way that thou shalt send them, and they pray to Jehovah toward the city that thou hast chosen, and the house that I have built unto thy name;
45 then hear thou in the heavens their prayer and their supplication, and maintain their right.
46 If they have sinned against thee, (for there is no man that sinneth not,) and thou be angry with them, and give them up to the enemy, and they have carried them away captives unto the enemy's land, far or near;
47 and if they shall take it to heart in the land whither they were carried captive, and repent, and make supplication unto thee in the land of them that carried them captive, saying, We have sinned, and have done iniquity, we have dealt perversely;
48 and if they return unto thee with all their heart and with all their soul, in the land of their enemies who led them away captive, and pray unto thee toward their land which thou gavest unto their fathers, the city that thou hast chosen, and the house that I have built unto thy name;
49 then hear thou in the heavens, the settled place of thy dwelling, their prayer and their supplication, and maintain their right;
50 and forgive thy people their sin against thee, and all their transgressions whereby they have transgressed against thee, and give them to find compassion with those who carried them captive, that they may have compassion on them
51 (for they are thy people, and thine inheritance, which thou broughtest forth out of Egypt, from the midst of the furnace of iron) --
52 thine eyes being open unto the supplication of thy servant, and unto the supplication of thy people Israel, to hearken unto them in all that they call for unto thee.
53 For thou hast separated them from among all peoples of the earth, to be thine inheritance, as thou spokest through Moses thy servant, when thou broughtest our fathers out of Egypt, O Lord Jehovah.
54 And it was so, that when Solomon had ended praying all this prayer and supplication to Jehovah, he arose from before the altar of Jehovah, from kneeling on his knees with his hands spread forth to the heavens,
55 and he stood and blessed the whole congregation of Israel with a loud voice, saying,
56 Blessed be Jehovah, who has given rest to his people Israel, according to all that he promised: there has not failed one word of all his good promises which he spoke through Moses his servant!
57 Jehovah our God be with us, as he was with our fathers; let him not forsake us nor cast us off:
58 that he may incline our hearts to him, to walk in all his ways, and to keep his commandments and his statutes and his ordinances, which he commanded our fathers.
59 And let these my words, with which I have made supplication before Jehovah, be nigh to Jehovah our God day and night, that he maintain the right of his servant, and the right of his people Israel, as the matter of each day shall require;
60 that all peoples of the earth may know that Jehovah is God, that there is none else;
61 and that your heart may be perfect with Jehovah our God, to walk in his statutes and to keep his commandments, as at this day.
62 And the king, and all Israel with him, offered sacrifices before Jehovah.
63 And Solomon sacrificed a sacrifice of peace-offerings, which he sacrificed to Jehovah, twenty-two thousand oxen and a hundred and twenty thousand sheep. So the king and all the children of Israel dedicated the house of Jehovah.
64 The same day the king hallowed the middle of the court that was before the house of Jehovah; for there he offered the burnt-offerings, and the oblations, and the fat of the peace-offerings, because the brazen altar that was before Jehovah was too small to receive the burnt-offerings, and the oblations, and the fat of the peace-offerings.
65 And at that time Solomon held the feast, and all Israel with him, a great congregation, from the entrance of Hamath unto the torrent of Egypt, before Jehovah our God, seven days and seven days, fourteen days.
66 On the eighth day he sent the people away; and they blessed the king, and went to their tents, joyful and glad of heart for all the goodness that Jehovah had done to David his servant, and to Israel his people.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on 1 Kings 8
Commentary on 1 Kings 8 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 8
The building and furniture of the temple were very glorious, but the dedication of it exceeds in glory as much as prayer and praise, the work of saints, exceed the casting of metal and the graving of stones, the work of the craftsman. The temple was designed for the keeping up of the correspondence between God and his people; and here we have an account of the solemnity of their first meeting there.
1Ki 8:1-11
The temple, though richly beautified, yet while it was without the ark was like a body without a soul, or a candlestick without a candle, or (to speak more properly) a house without an inhabitant. All the cost and pains bestowed on this stately structure are lost if God do not accept them; and, unless he please to own it as the place where he will record his name, it is after all but a ruinous heap. When therefore all the work is ended (ch. 7:51), the one thing needful is yet behind, and that is the bringing in of the ark. This therefore is the end which must crown the work, and which here we have an account of the doing of with great solemnity.
1Ki 8:12-21
Here,
1Ki 8:22-53
Solomon having made a general surrender of this house to God, which God had signified his acceptance of by taking possession, next follows Solomon's prayer, in which he makes a more particular declaration of the uses of that surrender, with all humility and reverence, desiring that God would agree thereto. In short, it is his request that this temple may be deemed and taken, not only for a house of sacrifice (no mention is made of that in all this prayer, that was taken for granted), but a house of prayer for all people; and herein it was a type of the gospel church; see Isa. 56:7, compared with Mt. 21:13. Therefore Solomon opened this house, not only with an extraordinary sacrifice, but with an extraordinary prayer.
1Ki 8:54-61
Solomon, after his sermon in Ecclesiastes, gives us the conclusion of the whole matter; so he does here, after this long prayer; it is called his blessing the people, v. 55. He pronounced it standing, that he might be the better heard, and because he blessed as one having authority. Never were words more fitly spoken, nor more pertinently. Never was congregation dismissed with that which was more likely to affect them and abide with them.
1Ki 8:62-66
We read before that Judah and Israel were eating and drinking, and very cheerful under their own vines and fig-trees; here we have them so in God's courts. Now they found Solomon's words true concerning Wisdom's ways, that they are ways of pleasantness.