The latter statement is explained in 1Ki 8:7. “For the cherubim were spreading out wings towards the place of the ark, and so covered (lit., threw a shade) over the ark and over its poles from above.” If the outspread wings of the great cherubic figures threw a shade not only over the ark of the covenant, but also over its poles, the ark was probably so placed that the poles ran from north to south, and not from east to west, as they are sketched in my Archäologie.
Verse 8
1Ki 8:8 “And the poles were long, and there were seen their heads (i.e., they were so long that their heads were seen) from the Holy Place before the hinder room; but on the outside (outside the Holy Place, say in the porch) they were not seen.” יאכוּ cannot be rendered: they had lengthened the poles, from which Kimchi and others have inferred that they had made new and longer carrying-poles, since the form of the tense in this connection cannot be the pluperfect, and in that case, moreover the object would be indicated by את as in 1Ki 3:14; but האריך is used intransitively, “to be long,” lit., to show length, as in Exo 20:12; Deu 5:16, etc. The remark to the effect that the poles were visible, indicates that the precept of the law in Exo 25:15, according to which the poles were to be left in the ark, was observed in Solomon's temple also. Any one could convince himself of this, for the poles were there “to this day.” The author of our books has retained this chronological allusion as he found it in his original sources; for when he composed his work, the temple was no longer standing. It is impossible, however, to ascertain from this statement how the heads of the poles could be seen in the Holy Place, - whether from the fact that they reached the curtain and formed elevations therein, if the poles ran from front to back; or whether, if, as is more probable, they ran from south to north, the front heads were to be seen, simply when the curtain was drawn back.[1]
Verse 9
1Ki 8:9 “There was nothing in the ark but the two tables of stone, which Moses had put there at Horeb, when Jehovah concluded the covenant with Israel.” The intention of this remark is
- ↑ The proof which Thenius has endeavoured to give by means of a drawing of the correctness of the latter view, is founded upon untenable assumptions (see Böttcher, Aehrenl. ii. p. 69). It by no means follows from the expression דביר על־פּני that the heads of the poles were visible as far off as the door of the Holy Place, but simply that they could be seen in the Holy Place, though not outside.
