1 Kings 8:13

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

I have surely built you a house of habitation, a place for you to dwell in forever.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Highlights

1 first appearance in the Hebrew Bible

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זְבֻ֖ל

zᵉbûwl

H2073

“height”

Noun, Common, Masculine, Singular, Absolute

Appears 5× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears here

Full BDB Definition

Origin: from H2082

TWOT: 526a

exalted, residence, elevation, lofty abode, height, habitation

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

8: words
6: distinct lemmas
Historical: section

Notable vocabulary

The rarest word here is זְבֻ֖ל height H2073 — appearing just 5 times in the whole Hebrew Bible.

First appearance in Scripture

This word makes its first canonical appearance in the Hebrew Bible here:

זְבֻ֖ל height H2073

Shared distinctive vocabulary

זְבֻ֖ל height H2073 occurs in 5 verses of the Hebrew Bible. Also found in:

Grammatical profile

3 verbs
4 nouns
1 preposition

Verb forms

בָּנֹ֥ה Qal · Infinitive Absolute
בָנִ֛יתִי Qal · Perfect
לְשִׁבְתְּךָ֖ Qal · Infinitive Construct

Repetition

A word recurs within this verse — often emphatic in Hebrew:

בָּנֹ֥ה to build H1129 ×2

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to 1 Kings 8:13 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

2 Samuel 7:13 He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.
Exodus 15:17 You shall bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of your inheritance, The place, Yahweh, which you have made for yourself to dwell in; The sanctuary, Lord, which your hands have established.
Psalms 132:13–14 For Yahweh has chosen Zion. He has desired it for his habitation.
Hebrews 9:24 For Christ hasn't entered into holy places made with hands, which are representations of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us;
1 Chronicles 17:12 He shall build me a house, and I will establish his throne forever.
1 Chronicles 22:10–11 he shall build a house for my name; and he shall be my son, and I will be his father; and I will establish the throne of his kingdom over Israel for ever.
1 Chronicles 28:6 He said to me, Solomon your son, he shall build my house and my courts; for I have chosen him to be my son, and I will be his father.
1 Chronicles 28:10 Take heed now; for Yahweh has chosen you to build a house for the sanctuary: be strong, and do it.

1 Chronicles 28:20 David said to Solomon his son, Be strong and of good courage, and do it: don't be afraid, nor be dismayed; for Yahweh God, even my God, is with you; he will not fail you, nor forsake you, until all the work for the service of the house of Yahweh is finished.
2 Chronicles 6:2 But I have built you a house of habitation, and a place for you to dwell in forever.
Psalms 78:68–69 But chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion which he loved.
John 4:21–23 Jesus said to her, "Woman, believe me, the hour comes, when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, will you worship the Father.
Acts 6:14 For we have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy this place, and will change the customs which Moses delivered to us."
Hebrews 8:5–13 who serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly things, even as Moses was warned by God when he was about to make the tabernacle, for he said, "See, you shall make everything according to the pattern that was shown to you on the mountain."
Hebrews 9:11–12 But Christ having come as a high priest of the coming good things, through the greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this creation,

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew 1 Kings 8:13 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

בָּנֹ֥ה בָנִ֛יתִי בֵּ֥ית זְבֻ֖ל לָ֑ךְ מָכ֥וֹן לְשִׁבְתְּךָ֖ עוֹלָמִֽים

I have surely built you a house of habitation, a place for you to dwell in forever.

World English Bible · Public Domain

On this verse, The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges discusses the Septuagint’s reading. Read the note in Commentary ↓

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from a public-domain English Septuagint. How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Targum (Aramaic paraphrase)

The Targum is the ancient Jewish Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Scriptures — an interpretive translation, not the Hebrew text itself. Onkelos (literal) and Pseudo-Jonathan (expansive) render the Torah, and Jonathan the Prophets. Coverage is partial: where no permissively-licensed English translation exists for a verse, only the Aramaic is shown. This is verse-level text, not a word-by-word alignment to the Hebrew.

Targum Jonathan Prophets (Joshua–Malachi)

מִבְנָא בְנֵיתִי בֵּית מַקְדְשָׁא קֳדָמָךְ אֲתַר מְתַקַן לְבֵית שְׁכִנְתָּךְ עָלְמִין:

(no public-domain English translation for this verse)

Targum Jonathan — Aramaic: “Mikraot Gedolot” (public domain). English: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “London "Chaldee Paraphrase," 1871” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Commentary

Notes on 1 Kings 8:13 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Trapp's Complete Commentary

John Trapp

1Ki 8:13 I have surely built thee an house to dwell in, a settled place for thee to abide in for ever.

Ver. 13. I have surely built thee.] His great joy breaketh forth into a prayer.

A settled place for thee to abide in.] Some render it, Directionem ad solium tuum, a direction to thine eternal throne - viz., to heaven; whither this temple pointed men, saith Cajetan.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joseph Benson's Commentary

1Ki 8:13. I have surely built thee a house to dwell in — He turns his speech from them to God, as entering into the house, and expresses his desire and hope that he would continue to manifest, by such visible tokens, that he was present in it, and would, as it were, make it the place of his special and stated abode. A settled place for thee — Not a tabernacle, made to be carried about from place to place, but a durable and perpetual habitation.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Geneva Bible (1599)

Geneva Bible translators

He spake according to the tenor of God’s promise which was conditionally that they should serve him aright.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown

I have surely built thee an house--This is an apostrophe to God, as perceiving His approach by the cloud, and welcoming Him to enter as guest or inhabitant of the fixed and permanent dwelling-place, which, at His command, had been prepared for His reception.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Adam Clarke's Commentary

Verse 13. I have surely built thee a house] He was now fully convinced that the thing pleased God, and that he had taken this place for his settled habitation.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne

13. I have surely built thee a house to dwell in] R.V. ‘a house of habitation,’ which is more literal, but not a more elegant rendering. The king sees that God has deigned to accept the house that has been built, and his desire that God may always dwell there fashions the language which he uses. It is to be noted that in this dedication the priests play but a secondary part. Zadok is not once named. Solomon presides, speaks, prays. The LXX. (Vat.) omits these two verses altogether, but gives a modification and enlargement of them at 1Ki_8:53 below. See note there. Josephus describes the opening of Solomon’s address to God as ‘words which the king considered fit to be addressed to the divine Being, and which it was right for him to speak.’

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

I have surely built thee an house to dwell in,.... Turning himself from the priests and people, he quieted with a few words, he addressed the Lord; having built an house for him, for his worship and glory, with this view, that he might dwell in it, he was now, by the above token, fully assured it would be an habitation for him:

a settled place for thee to abide in for ever; which is observed in distinction from the tabernacle of Moses, which was often removed from place to place, otherwise this did not continue for ever; though Solomon might hope it would, at least unto the times of the Messiah; and indeed such a building on this spot, for such use, did continue so long, excepting the interval of the seventy years' captivity in Babylon.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary

Ever. He seems to contrast this solid and glittering fabric with the cloud, (Menochius) as, in some sort, more worthy of God’s presence. (Haydock)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Matthew Poole's English Annotations

I have surely built thee an house to dwell in; I perceive by this thick darkness that thou art coming among us, and therefore make haste and come, O thou blessed Guest, into the dwelling-place which I have built by thy command, and for thy service.

A settled place for thee to abide in for ever; not a tabernacle, which was made to be carried from place to place; but a durable, and, I hope, perpetual habitation.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Whedon's Commentary on the Bible

Daniel D. Whedon

13. A settled place… for ever — He had thus done according to the Divine counsel and direction, and with his face turned towards the holiest place he probably uttered these words as in prayer. The forever of this verse is but another echo of that gracious promise to David, (2Sa_7:16, note,) which was the germ of all later Messianic prophecies. The eye of faith and the vision of prophecy alike associate the ark of the covenant and its visible dwellingplace with an endless future; for though the patterns of the heavenly pass away, it is only because they are superseded by more glorious manifestations of the heavenly. Heb_9:23.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The Pulpit Commentary

I have surely built Heb. to build, I have built thee a house to dwell in, a settled place for thee to abide in forever. The temple was primarily, as already remarked, a shrine for the ark, between the cherubim of the mercy seat of which God dwelt. This was a wOkmo (from Wk, statuit), a settled place. The tabernacle was but a poor and transitory abode, partaking of the frailty of the shepherd"s tent. (Isa_38:12) For (aijwnev), cf. Isa_26:4 Isa_51:9 Dan_9:24 Psa_145:13.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Rashi

Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki (Rashi)

A dwelling place for You forever. From when it was chosen it would no longer be permissible [to offer sacrifices] on improvised altars, and the Divine Presence no longer dwelled in any other place.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

1 Kings, in the Historical, opens this verse with 8 words (6 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is zᵉbûwl (“height”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

What does “height” (zᵉbûwl) contribute to the verse as a whole?
This is the first place “height” appears in Scripture (first appears here). What does its debut here establish?
How does 2 Chronicles 6:2, which shares the word «height», read alongside this verse?
What does the repetition of “to build” (2× in this one verse) do in this verse?
The translations on this page render this verse differently — a whole-verse word diff, not a word-by-word alignment. What might account for the different wordings?
«בָּנֹ֥ה» is a Qal Infinitive Absolute verb. How does that grammatical form shape the action described?
Compare how Trapp's Complete Commentary and Joseph Benson's Commentary read this verse. Where do they agree or differ?

Things to notice

1 word makes its first canonical appearance in Scripture here.
These translations choose different wording for 11 words in this verse.
“to build” occurs 2× in this single verse.
6 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 8 words in this verse.