Solomon assembled the elders of Israel, and all the heads of the tribes, the princes of the fathers' houses (האבות נשׂיאי, contracted from האבות בּית נשׂיאי) of the Israelites, as representatives of the whole congregation, to himself at Jerusalem, to bring the ark of the covenant out of the city of David, i.e., from Mount Zion (see the Comm. on 2Sa 6:16-17), into the temple which he had built upon Moriah. (On the use of the contracted form of the imperfect יקהל after אז, see Ewald, §233, b.)
Verse 2
Accordingly “all the men of Israel (i.e., the heads of the tribes and families mentioned in 1Ki 8:1) assembled together to the king in the month Ethanim, i.e., the seventh month, at the feast.” Gesenius explains the name האתנים (in 55 codd. האיתנים) as meaning “month of the flowing brooks,” after איתן in Pro 13:15; Böttcher, on the other hand, supposes it to denote the equinox. But apart from other grounds, the plural by no means favours this. Nor does the seventh month answer to the period between the middle of our September and the middle of October, as is supposed by Thenius, who founds upon this supposition the explanation already rejected by Böttcher, viz., “month of gifts;” but it corresponds to the period between the new moon of October and the new moon of November, during which the rainy season commences in Palestine (Rob. Pal. ii. p. 96ff.), so that this month may very well have received its name from the constant flowing of the brooks. The explanation, “that is the seventh month,” is added, however (here as in 1Ki 6:1, 1Ki 6:38), not because the arrangement of the months was a different one before the captivity (Thenius), but because different names came into use for the months during the captivity. בּחג is construed with the article: “because the feast intended was one that was well known, and had already been kept for a long time (viz., the feast of tabernacles).” The article overthrows the explanation given by Thenius, who supposes that the reference is to the festivities connected with the dedication of the temple itself.
Verses 3-4
After the arrival of all the elders (i.e., of the representatives of the nation, more particularly described in 1Ki 8:1), the priests carried the ark and brought it up (sc., into the temple), with the tabernacle and all the holy vessels in it. The expression אתם ויּעלוּ, which follows, introduces as a supplementary notice, according to the general diffuseness of the early Hebrew style of narrative, the more precise statement that the priests and Levites brought up these
