1 Kings 8:62-66

D. THE DEDICATORY CELEBRATION 8:62-66

TRANSLATION

(62) And the king and all Israel with him offered sacrifice before the LORD. (63) And Solomon offered for a sacrifice of peace offerings, which he offered unto the LORD, twenty-two thousand oxen and a hundred twenty thousand sheep. So did the king and all the children of Israel dedicate the house of the LORD. (64) In that day the king sanctified the middle court which was before the house of the LORD, for there he made burnt offerings and meal offerings and the fat of peace offerings, because the bronze altar which was before the LORD was too small to contain the burnt offerings and the meal offerings and the fat of peace offerings. (65) And at that time Solomon made a great feast, and all Israel with him, a great congregation from the entrance of Hamath to the brook of Egypt, before the LORD our God, for seven days and seven days, fourteen days. (66) On the eighth day he sent the people away and they blessed the king. Then they went to their tents rejoicing and glad of heart because of all the goodness which the LORD had done for David His servant and for Israel His people.

COMMENTS

The dedication ceremonies were followed by a magnificent sacrifice offered by the king and people alike (1 Kings 8:62). Apart from their religious use and significance, these sacrifices testified to the religious devotion of the worshiper. The sacrifices also provided meat for the prolonged feast by which this glorious day was celebrated. The peace offering alone consisted of twenty-two thousand oxen and a hundred thousand sheep.[239] Critics have attacked these figures as being an exaggeration, but the following considerations argue in favor of their credibility:

[239] Even Gray (OTL, p. 216) concedes that the numbers may be near the truth, though of course round numbers.

1. Josephus relates that on one occasion during the reign of Nero the priests slaughtered two hundred fifty thousand paschal lambs between the ninth and eleventh hours.[240] If that many lambs could be slaughtered in three hours of the afternoon, there can be no difficulty in accepting the figures here.

[240] Wars VI, 9.3.

2. The sacrifices were made over the course of at least seven days and more likely fourteen days. This would mean that only 1,565 oxen and 8,572 sheep would have been offered each day.
3. The number of Levites qualified for service in the days of David was thirty-eight thousand. A reasonable assumption is that there were at least two or three thousand priests. But if only five hundred priests officiated during the dedicatory services, each would only have had to attend to sacrifice of three oxen and eighteen sheep each of the fourteen days of celebration.

4. According to the law in Leviticus 1:3, the slaughtering, flaying and preparation of the sacrificial animal could be performed by any Israelite. Only the sprinkling of the blood upon the altar and the burning of the sacrificial piecesthe fat pieceson the altar were the exclusive prerogative of the priests.

5. By the very lowest computations there could hardly be less than a hundred thousand heads of houses present at the feast, and the figures given in David's census suggest that there may have been four or five times that number (2 Samuel 24:9). Every Israelite would doubtless offer his sacrifice of thanksgiving on such an occasion as this.

6. In the peace offering only the fat was burned on the altar and the rest of the sacrificial animal was eaten. Thus enormous numbers of animals would have been required to feed the vast multitudes which gathered for the dedication.
Even though the bronze altar in the Temple courtyard had a top surface of one hundred square yards, it was not large enough to accommodate the offering at the Temple dedication. In addition to the enormous number of peace offerings just mentioned, burnt offerings and meal offerings appropriate to such an occasion were being made. The burnt offering was entirely consumed in the altar fire. The meal offering contained incense and oil in addition to meal. Because of all these sacrifices, Solomon sanctified the middle court, i.e., the entire area of the court of priests, which was before the house (1 Kings 8:64). Probably the court and its objects were sprinkled with the holy anointing oil as Moses had done to the Tabernacle and the furnishings (Exodus 40:1-15). The whole space may have been regarded as one huge altar (Rawlinson), or temporary altars may have been erected all over the courtyard (Keil).

A great congregation had assembled from as far as the entrance (or district) of Hamath in the north on the Orontes river to the Wadi of Egypt (Wadi el-Arish) in the south, i.e., from one end of the land to the other. These worshipers joined Solomon in a seven day feast of dedication which was in turn followed by the seven day Feast of Tabernacles (1 Kings 8:65; cf. 2 Chronicles 7:9-10). On the eighth day of the second feast, the twenty-second day of the seventh month,[241] Solomon dismissed the multitude. The crowd reciprocated by blessing (i.e., saluting) their king, and on the morrow, departed for their tents (i.e., dwellings) full of joy and gladness because of what the Lord had done for His servant David and His people Israel (1 Kings 8:66). David is mentioned in 1 Kings 8:66 because the Temple was part of the fulfillment of the divine promise given to him.

[241] The Feast of Tabernacles lasted from the fifteenth to the twenty-first of the seventh month. On the eighth day, that is the twenty-second of the month, Solomon dismissed the people, and on the next morning, the twenty-third of the month the people took their journey home (2 Chronicles 7:10).