Dedication of the temple -- when it took place -- connection with the feast of tabernacles -- the

consecration services -- the king's part in them -- symbolical meaning of the great institutions in Israel --

the prayer of consecration -- analogy to the Lord's prayer -- the consecration -- thanksgiving and

1 KINGS 8; 2 CHRONICLES 5-7:11

AT length the great and beautiful house, which Solomon had raised to the Name of Jehovah, and to which

so many ardent thoughts and hopes attached, was finished. Its solemn dedication took place in the year

following its completion, and, very significantly, immediately before, and in connection with, the Feast of

Tabernacles. Two questions, of some difficulty and importance, here arise. The first concerns the

circumstance that the sacred text (1 Kings 7:l-12) records the building of Solomon's palace immediately after

that of the Temple, and, indeed, almost intermingles the two accounts. This may partly have been due to a

very natural desire on the part of the writer not to break the continuity of the account of Solomon's great

buildings, the more so as they were all completed by the aid of Tyrian workmen, and under the supervision

of Hiram. But another and more important consideration may also have influenced the arrangement of the

narrative. For, as has been suggested, these two great undertakings of Solomon bore a close relation to each

other. It was not an ordinary Sanctuary, nor was it an ordinary royal residence which Solomon reared. The

building of the Temple marked that the preparatory period of Israel's unsettledness had passed, when God

had walked with them "in tent and tabernacle" -or, in other words, that the Theocracy had attained not only

fixedness, but its highest point, when God would set "His Name for ever" in its chosen center. But this new

stage of the Theocracy was connected with the establishment of a firm and settled kingdom in Israel, when

He would "establish the throne of that kingdom for ever" (compare 2 Samuel 7:5-16). Thus the dwelling of

God in His Temple and that of Solomon in his house were events between which there was deep internal

connection, even as between the final establishment of the Theocracy and that of David's royal line in Israel.

Moreover, the king was not to be a monarch in the usual Oriental, or even in the ancient Western sense. He

was to be regarded, not as the Vicegerent or Representative of God, but as His Servant, to do His behest

and to guard His covenant. And this might well be marked, even by the conjunction of these two buildings

in the Scripture narrative.

These considerations will also help us to understand why the Feast of the Dedication of the Temple was

connected with that of Tabernacles (of course, in the year following). It was not only that, after "the eighth

month," when the Temple was completed, it would have been almost impossible, considering the season of

the year, to have gathered the people from all parts of the country, or to have celebrated for eight days a

great popular festival; nor yet that of all feasts, that of Tabernacles, when agricultural labor was at an end,

probably witnessed the largest concourse in Jerusalem.  121

But the Feast of Tabernacles had a threefold meaning. It pointed back to the time when, "strangers and

pilgrims" on their way to the Land of Promise, Israel, under its Divine leadership, had dwelt in tents. The full

import of this memorial would be best realized at the dedication of the Temple, when, instead of tent and

tabernacle, the glorious house of God was standing in all its beauty, while the stately palace of Israel's king

was rising. Again, the Feast of Tabernacles was essentially one of thanksgiving, when at the completion,

not only of the harvest, but of the ingathering of the fruits, a grateful people presented its homage to the

God to Whom they owed all, and to Whom all really belonged. But what could raise this hymn of praise to

its loudest strains, if not that they uplifted it within those sacred walls, symbolical of God's gracious

Presence as King in His palace in the midst of His people, whose kingdom He had established. Lastly, the

Feast of Tabernacles - the only still unfulfilled Old Testament type - pointed forward to the time of which the

present state of Israel was an initial realization, when the name of the LORD should be known far and wide

to earth's utmost bounds, and all nations seek after Him and offer worship in His Temple. Thus, however