2 Chronicles 8:17

(d) THE VOYAGE TO OPHIR (2Ch_8:17-18).

Comp. 1Ki_9:26-28.

(17) Then (’âz).—After the completion of the Temple.

Went Solomon to Ezion-geber, and to Eloth.—Syr., “Ezion-geber, a city which is over against Eloth.” 1Ki_9:26 reads, “And a fleet did king Solomon make at Ezion-geber, which is near Eloth.”

The sea.—Kings, the Red Sea. So Vulg. The words of our text do not necessarily imply a personal visit on the part of Solomon. He sent his shipwrights to the Idumean port.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

2Ch 8:17 Then went Solomon to Eziongeber, and to Eloth, at the sea side in the land of Edom.

Ver. 17. To Eziongeber.] A haven of the Red Sea, called by Josephus Berenice, by Jerome Essia; Eloth is also called Elath, {Deu 2:8} and at this day Elana, unde sinus Elaniticus.

Four hundred and fifty talents.] Thirty of them seem to go for the charges of the voyage. Compare 1Ki 9:28.

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.

8:17-18 By discussing Solomon’s activities at his kingdom’s most northern and southern borders, the Chronicler shows the extent of Solomon’s empire. Solomon controlled ports on the Red Sea that provided for international trade to the south. • Hiram was a valuable ally; his people, the Phoenicians of Tyre, had extensive trade networks and were expert mariners, helping Solomon trade with Ophir. • Ophir is traditionally thought to be in southwest Arabia (see Gen 10:28-29).

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Meaning, the red Sea.

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

Then went Solomon to Ezion-geber, and to Eloth--These two maritime ports were situated at the eastern gulf of the Red Sea, now called the Gulf of Akaba. Eloth is seen in the modern Akaba, Ezion-geber in El Gudyan [ROBINSON]. Solomon, determined to cultivate the arts of peace, was sagacious enough to perceive that his kingdom could become great and glorious only by encouraging a spirit of commercial enterprise among his subjects; and, accordingly, with that in mind he made a contract with Huram for ships and seamen to instruct his people in navigation.

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

Verse 17. Then went Solomon to Ezion-geber] See the notes on 1Kg 9:26-28, for conjectures concerning Ezion-geber and Ophir.

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

17, 18 (= 1Ki_9:26-28). Solomon’s Fleet

17. to Ezion-geber, and to Eloth] In 1 Kin. Ezion-geber which is beside Eloth on the shore of the Red Sea. Strictly speaking it was at the head of the Gulf of Akaba, the eastern arm of the Red Sea. Cp. 2Ch_20:36 (R.V.) and Deu_2:8.

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.

Asiongaber, which was called Bernice, (Josephus, [Antiquities?] viii. 2.) and now Suez. (Tirinus)

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).

Of this and the next verse, See Poole "1Ki 9:26", &c.

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

Ezion-geber Eloth. Parallel, 1Ki_9:26, which describes the former of these ports as "beside" the latter, "on the Red Sea," i.e. at the extremity of the eastern gulf of the Red Sea, called the Elanitic Gulf by Greeks and Romans, but now the Gulf of Akabah (Num_33:35-37; Deu_2:8; 2Sa_8:14; 1Ki_22:48; 2Ki_14:22 2Ki_16:6; 2Ch_20:36, 2Ch_20:37) David"s conquest of Edom was the occasion of its coming into the possession of Israel.

Vers. 17, 18.

The first merchant-ships.

I To WHOM THEY BELONGED.

1. Solomon who constructed a navy of ships. (1Ki_9:26) The first mention of ship-building by the Israelites. An advance in civilization, it is doubtful whether this was in harmony with the calling of the Israelites as a theocratic people, whose business it was to keep themselves distinct from other nations.

2. Hiram who sent the Israelitish monarch ships by the hands of his servants. Either Hiram sent to Eloth ship-carpenters, who built ships for Solomon (Bahr), or he built ships at Tyre, and sent them by the hands of sailors to join in Solomon"s expedition (Bertheau). If the latter, they must either have rounded the continent of Africa (Bertheau), or been carried by land transport across the Isthmus of Suez (Keil). The former would not have been impossible had the circumnavigation of Africa been at that time known. This, however, is doubtful, as Herodotus (4:42) mentions Pharaoh Necho of the twenty-sixth dynasty (B.C. 612) as the first to prove that Africa was entirely surrounded by water, with the exception of the small isthmus connecting it with Asia. This he did by sending Phoenician seamen in ships from the Arabian Gulf to seek their way to Egypt through the Pillars of Hercules and the Mediterranean Sea. Hence the latter method was more probably adopted for conveying Hiram"s ships to the Gulf of Arabia a method of transporting vessels known to the ancients. Herodotus (vii. 24) states that, while Xerxes cut a passage through the Isthmus of Mount Athos, he need not have done so, since without difficulty he might have carried his ships across the land. Thucydides (4:8) mentions that in this way the Peloponnesians conveyed eighty ships across the Leucadia-isthmus. (For additional examples, see Exposition.)

II THE PORT WHENCE THEY SAILED.

1. Ezion-geber, a camping-station on the desert march of Israel (Num_33:35; Deu_2:8) afterwards the place where Jehoshaphat"s ships were wrecked. (1Ki_22:48) When the town was built is unknown. Its name imports "the backbone of a man" (Gesenius); the Greeks called it Berenice (Josephus, "Ant.," 8:6. 4).

2. Near Eloth, the Ailane of Josephus, the Ailath of the Greeks, and the Elana of the Romans, the modern Akaba, on the eastern bay of the Gulf of Akabah. Whether Ezion-geber was also on the east side of the gulf or on the west is uncertain, as no trace of it now exists.

3. On the shore of the Red Sea. The Yam Suf was the eastern arm of the Arabian Gulf, or the Gulf of Akabah. At the present day navigation is perilous in the vicinity of Elath in consequence of the sharp and rocky coast and the easily excited storms.

4. In the land of Edom. Mount Seir, Edom, Idumaea, the Mount of Esau (Deu_2:5; Joe_3:19; Isa_24:5 Oba_1:21) in the Assyrian inscriptions, Udumu or Udumi (Schrader, "Die Keilinsehriften," p. 149); a desolate region extending from the head of the Elanitic Gulf to the foot of the Dead Sea, described by Robinson as "a rolling desert, the surface of which was in general loose gravel and stones, everywhere furrowed and torn with the beds of torrents now and then a lone shrub of the ghudah being almost the only trace of vegetation" ("Biblical Researches," 2:502, 551).

III THE SAILORS BY WHOM THEY WERE MANNED. Servants of Hiram, who had knowledge of the sea. The Phoenicians the earliest navigators of the ocean. An inscription of Queen Hatasu, of the eighteenth Egyptian dynasty, queen regnant first with Thothmes II and afterwards with Thothmes III, has preserved a record of the construction by that royal lady of a navy on the Red Sea, and of a voyage of discovery to the land of Arabia in vessels manned by Phoenician seamen (Brugsch, "Egypt," 1:351, etc.; "Records of the Past," 10:11, etc.).

IV THE COUNTRY TO WHICH THEY STEERED. Ophir. By eminent authorities (Lassen, Ritter, Bertheau) located in India, this gold-producing region was probably in Arabia (Knobel, Keil, Ewald, Bahr) the land of Pun, to which the ships of Hatasu sailed for costly treasures.

V THE CARGO WITH WHICH THEY RETURNED.

1. Gold. Whether the four hundred and fifty talents were the cargo of one voyage or of all the voyages cannot be determined. Reckoning a talent at sterling, the amount would be or nearly two and a half millions. This precious metal was amongst the treasures fetched from the land of Pun by Hatasu"s fleet.

2. Precious stones. Learnt from a later statement. (2Ch_9:10) These also were obtainable in the land of Pun.

3. Algum trees. . (2Ch_9:10) What these were is unknown; probably they corresponded with the balsam-wood or "incense trees" brought from Pun by Hatasu"s ships. It was manifestly rare and costly, as Solomon made of it "terraces to the house of the Lord and the king"s palace, as well as harps and psalteries for singers;" "and there were none such seen before in the land of Judah." So said Hatasu"s scribes of her cargo. "Never has such a convoy been made like this one by any king since the creation of the world.

Learn:

1. Man"s dominion over nature he can affront the perils of the sea.

2. The advantages (from a secular point of view) of navigation inincreasing the world"s wealth and comfort, in extending man"s knowledge and power, and in binding the nations into a mutually dependent and helpful brotherhood.

3. The dangers (from a spiritual point of view) of foreign exploration, infostering the lust of conquest and possession, and in bringing God"s people into contact with heathen nations. W.

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

Voyage to Ophir. Cf. Kg1 9:26-28, and the commentary on that passage, where we have discussed the divergences of our narrative, and have also come to the conclusion that Ophir is not to be sought in India, but in Southern Arabia. By אז the date of this voyage is made to fall in the period after the building of the temple and the palace, i.e., in the second half of Solomon's reign.

Keil & Delitzsch — Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (1861–1891) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API. (Old Testament only.)

Ezion Geber and then to Elath on the coast

These are towns along the Sea of Reeds. They had ports where people who had ships could stop. AT: "the towns of Ezion Geber and Elath, on the coast of the Sea of Reeds" (See: How to Translate Names and Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)

Ophir

This is the name of a place. Its location is not known. (See: How to Translate Names)

450 talents of gold

"four hundred and fifty talents of gold." You may convert this to a modern measure. AT: "about sixteen thousand kilograms of gold" or "about fifteen metric tons of gold" (See: Numbers and Biblical Weight)

translationWords

Edom

command

servant

gold

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.