The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Chronicles — Section 20

clusirn nation, is a grand instnnoe of nllturc Hebrew verb MJ'.11)," to open." Out of twont,y- brenling nil trnmmcls, even when most nine times that the verb occurs in some divinPIY pnrpnaed, llnd ll gmnd token of the part of the fiel conjugntion, it ie trans• d!lwning comity of nations, :of free-tro.de lated "grave' nine times, "loosed" eleven under the unlikeliest auspices, and of the times, " put off" twice, "ungirded" onoe brotherhood of humanity, nernr more broadly "opened " four times, " appoar" onoe, 1Lnd illustrated than when on an international "go free" once. Perhnps the "opening" scale. The competence of the Phamicians the ground with the plough (Ier1, x..xviii. nnd the people of Sidon and those over whom 24) leads most e.osily on to tho idea of" on- Hiram immediatelv reigned in the working grnving." Cunning men whom .. , David of the metals, and furthermore in a very .. , did provide. As we read in 1 Chron. "ide range of other subjects, is well sustained xxii. 15; x..xviii. 21. by the allusions of very various authorities Ver. 8.-Algum trees, out of Lebanon. (already instanced under 1 Chron. xiv. l, These trees nre called algum in the three and passim ; Homer, • Iliad,' vi. 289-294; passages of Chronicles in which the tree is xxiii. 743; • Odys.,' iv. 614; xv. 415-426; mentioned, viz. here and oh. ix. 10, 11; but Herod., iii. 19 ; vii. 23, 44, 96; Strabo, xvi. in the three passages of Kings, almug, viz. 1 2. § 23). The mnn who was sent is de- Kings x. 11, 12 bi,. As we rend in 1 Kings scribed in vers. 13, 14, infra., as also 1 Kings x. 11 ; eh. ix. 10, 11, that they were exports vii. 13, 14. Purple, ... orimson, ... blue. It is from Ophir, we are arrested by the expres- not o.bsolutely necessary to suppose that the sion, "out of Lebanon," here. If they were same Hiram, so skilled in working of gold, accessible in Lebanon, it is not on the face silver, brass, and iron, was the authority sent of it to be supposed they would be ordered for these matters of various coloured dyes from such a distnnce as Ophir. Lastly, there for the cloths thnt would later on be required is very great difference of opinion as to what for curtains and other similar purposes in the tree was in itself. In Smith's • Bible the temple. So far, indeed, as the literal Dictionary,' vol. iii. appendix, p. vi., the sub- construction of the words go, this woul<l ject is discussed more fully than it can be seem to be what is meant, and no doubt may here, and with some of its scientific techni- have been the co.se, though unlikely. The calities. Celsius has mentioned fifteen woods purple (J1r:i~)- A Chaldee form of this for which the honour has been claimed. word (!\>le~~) occurs three times in Dan. v. l\fore modern disputants have suggested five, 7, IG, 29,'and appears in each of those cases of these the red sandalwood being considered, in our Authorized Version as "scarlet." perhnps, the likeliest. So great an authority Neither of these words is the word used in as Dr. Hooker pronounces that it is a ques- the numerous passages of Exodus, Numbers, tion quite undetermined. But inasmuch as Judges, Esther, Proverbs, Canticles, Jere- it is so undetermined, it would seem possible miah, and Ezekiel, nor, indeed, in ver. 13, that, if it were 11, precious wood of the smaller -infra and eh. iii. 14. In all these places, num- kind (as e.g. ebony with us), and, so to say, of bering nearly forty, the word is J~nt:t- The shy growth in Lebanon, it might be that it aid grow in Lebanon, but that a very insuffi- purple was probably obtained from some cient supply of it there was customarily shell-fish on the coast of the Mediterranean. supplemented by the imports received from The crimson ("~'."I?)- Gesenius says that this Ophir. Or, again, it may be that the words, was a colour ob'tained from multitudinous "out of Lebanon," are simply misplaced (1 insects that tenanted one kind of the ilex Kings v. 8), and should follow the words, (Coccus ,'licis), and that the word is from the "fir trees." The rendering " pillars" in Persian language. The Persian kerm, San- 1 Kings x. 12 for " rail~ " or " props " is scrit krimi, Armenian karmir, German car- unfortunate, as the other quoted uses of the mesin, and our own " crimson,'' keep the wood for "harps" and " psalteries" would -.me framework of letters or sound to a re- all betoken a small as well as very hard ~rkable degree. This word is found only wood. Lastly, it is a suggestion of Uanon here, ver. 13, i,ifra, and eh. iiL 14. The Rawlinson that, inasmuch as the alwug crimson of Isa. i. 18 and Jer. iv. 30, and the wood of Ophir came via Phronicia and Hiro.m, uarlet of some forty places in the Pentateuch Solomon may very possibly have been igno- and other books, come as the rendering of rant that "Lebanon" was not its proper the word '?:/- The blue (n~-?.fl)- This is the habitat. Thy servants can skill to cut tiin- 111\me word e.s is used in some fifty other ber. This same testimony is expressed yet passages in Exodus, Numbers, e.nd in later more stron,,.ly in 1 Kings v. 6, "There is books. This colour was obtained from a not any a;_ong us that can skill to hew shell-fiBh (Beliz ianthina) found in the timber like the Sidonians." Pasoages like Mediterranean, the shell of which was blue. 2 Kings xix. 23; lea. xiv. 8; xxxvii. 24, go Can skill to grave. The word "to grave" to show that the verb employed in our text i.11 the pie! conjugation of the very familiar is rightly rendered" bew,'' as referring to the alT. II, 1-18.) 'fl11<1 SECOND nooK OF THE CllTIONICLBS. 21