and useful course to pursue; תּבוּנה, rather keenness of understanding to arrive at the correct solution of difficult and complicated problems; לב רחב, mental capacity to embrace the most diverse departments of knowledge.
Verse 30
His wisdom was greater than the wisdom of all the sons of the East, and all the wisdom of the Egyptians. קרם בּני (sons of the East) are generally the Arabian tribes dwelling in the east of Canaan, who spread as far as to the Euphrates (cf. Jdg 6:3, Jdg 6:33; Jdg 7:12; Jdg 8:10; Job 1:3; Isa 11:14, etc.). Hence we find קרם ארץ used in Gen 25:6 to denote Arabia in the widest sense, on the east and south-east of Palestine; whereas in Gen 29:1 קרם בּני ארץ signifies the land beyond the Euphrates, viz., Mesopotamia, and in Num 23:7, קרם הררי, the mountains of Mesopotamia. Consequently by “the sons of the East” we are to understand here primarily the Arabians, who were celebrated for their gnomic wisdom, more especially the Sabaeans (see at 1 Kings 10), including the Idumaeans, particularly the Temanites (Jer 49:7; Oba 1:8); but also, as כּל requires, the Chaldaeans, who were celebrated both for their astronomy and astrology. “All the wisdom of the Egyptians,” because the wisdom of the Egyptians, which was so greatly renowned as almost to have become proverbial (cf. Isa 19:11; Isa 31:2, and Act 7:22; Joseph. Ant. viii. 2, 5; Herod. ii. 160), extended over the most diverse branches of knowledge, such as geometry, arithmetic, astronomy, and astrology (Diod. Sic. i. 73 and 81), and as their skill in the preparation of ointments from vegetable and animal sources, and their extensive acquaintance with medicine, clearly prove, embraced natural science as well, in which Solomon, according to 1Ki 4:33, was very learned.
Verse 31
1Ki 4:31 “He was wiser than all men (of his time), than Ethan the Ezrachite and Heman, Chalcol and Darda, the sons of Machol.” These four persons are most probably the same as the “sons of Zerach” (Ethan, Heman, Calcol, and Dara) mentioned in 1Ch 2:6, since the names perfectly agree, with the exception of דּרע for דּרדּע, where the difference is no doubt attributable to a copyist's error; although, as the name does not occur again, it cannot be decided whether Dara or Darda is the correct form. Heman and Ethan are also called Ezrachites (האזרחי) in Psa 88:1 and Psa 89:1; and אזרחי is another form of זרחי, the name of the family of Zerach the son of Judah (Num 26:13, Num 26:20), lengthened by א prosthet. But they were both Levites - Heman a Korahite of the line of
