I. KINGS.

Chap. i. ver. 18. "And now, behold, Adonijah reigneth; and now, my lord the king, thou knowest it not." The pronoun "thou," instead of the second "now," is found in all the ancient versions, the Chaldee paraphrase, and two hundred Hebrew manuscripts. The Septuagint has, kaì σù κύριέ μου βασιλεῦ οὐκ ἔγνως; and so the Vulgate.

i. 20. "And thou, my lord, O king, the eyes of Israel are upon thee." In this place the adverb now, in lieu of thou, is confirmed by the Syriac, Arabic, the Chaldee paraphrase, and nearly one hundred Hebrew manuscripts. The Vulgate reads, verumtamen domine mi rex.

i. 48. "Which hath given one to sit on my throne this day." The Septuagint has, èk Tоû σжÉρμатós μоv, “one of my seed." See iii. 6.

ii. 9. In this passage David is improperly represented as advising Solomon to slay Shimei, after having given a previous promise to Shimei that he would spare his life. Kennicott observes that it is not uncommon in the Hebrew language to omit the negative in a second part of the sentence, and to consider it as understood when once expressed. For example, Ps. ix. 18: "For the needy shall not alway be forgotten: the expectation of the poor shall not perish for ever." See also Prov. v. 16, where the affirmative text is corrected by the version of Aquila: μὴ διασκορπίζεσθαι αἱ πηγαί σου δέξω, which is proved by the context. The

verse in question, therefore, ought to be thus rendered: "Behold, thou hast with thee Shimei, who cursed me: but I sware to him by the Lord, saying, I will not put thee to death by the sword. Now therefore hold him not guiltless for thou art a wise man, and knowest what thou oughtest to do unto him; but bring not his hoary head to the grave with blood." So Solomon himself interpreted the injunction, by confining Shimei to a particular spot in Jerusalem so long as he lived.

ii. 22. "Ask for him the kingdom also; for he is mine elder brother; even for him, and for Abiathar the priest, and for Joab the son of Zeruiah." In these words, which are addressed by Solomon to Bathsheba, the kingdom is asked both for Abiathar and for Joab. The Septuagint reads, ὅτι οὗτος ἀδελφός μου ὁ μέγας ὑπὲρ ἐμὲ, καὶ αὐτῷ Αβιάθαρ ὁ ἱερεὺς, καὶ αὐτῷ Ἰωὰβ υἱὸς Σαρουίας. So likewise the Vulgate. Drs. Roberts and Kennicott have, however, happily removed the difficulty in this manner: "for he (Adonijah) is my elder brother, and he has for him (already declared on his side) both Abiathar and Joab." Josephus and the Targum state, that Joab and Abiathar were the allied friends of Adonijah on this occasion; and that they promoted his cause, is ascertained from chap. i. 7 and ii. 26, 28.

ii. 28. The Septuagint and Vulgate insert in this verse the proper name of Solomon, instead of Absalom.

ii. 37. "Thy blood shall be upon thine own head." The Septuagint adds, καὶ ὥρκισεν αὐτὸν ὁ βασιλεὺς ἐν τῇ nuépa èxelvη, "and the king made him swear that day." See verse 42 of this chapter. So also reads Josephus.

iii. 27. "Give her the living child, and in no wise slay it she is the mother thereof." The Septuagint reads, dóte τὸ παιδίον τῇ εἰπούσῃ, Δότε αὐτῇ αὐτὸ, καὶ θανάτῳ μὴ θανατώσητε αὐτὸ, αὕτη ἡ μήτηρ αὐτοῦ, “ give the living child to her that said, Give it to the other, and in no wise slay it she is the mother thereof."

iv. 19. "And he was the only officer which was in the land." Houbigant and Horsley read, "and each governor ruled his district." The former assertion is contradicted by verse 13.

iv. 26. "And Solomon had forty thousand stalls of horses for his chariots." This number is reduced to four thousand in 2 Chron. ix. 25, which Mr. Horne considers to be correct, the former being prohibited by Deut. xvii. 16.

v. 11. "And Solomon gave Hiram twenty measures of pure oil." The Septuagint has eľkoσi xiλiádas, “twenty thousand" measures, as in 2 Chron. ii. 10; and so read Dr. Wall and Horsley.

v. 16. The number of 3300 officers should be 3600, who were set over 70,000 porters, and 80,000 hewers of wood employed by Solomon, being at the same rate as in 2 Chron. ii. 2, 18, viz. 24 over every 1000.

v. 18. "And the stone-squarers." So read the Chaldee, Syriac, and Arabic, but the Vulgate has the proper name of Giblii. These stone-squarers were Giblites, who are mentioned in Josh. xiii. 5. Gebal, which occurs in Ez. xxvii. 9, was a Phoenician city, called Byblos by the Greeks, and Gabale by the Romans, situate at the foot of Lebanon, on the shore of the Mediterranean. Its modern name is Jebail. See Maundrell, Burckhardt, and Dr. Ro

binson. The Septuagint adds, Tрía eтn, "three years," as the time during which they prepared stones and timber for the temple.

vi. 1. The much-controverted date of 480, calculated from the exodus to the year when Solomon commenced the building of the temple, which is rejected as spurious by Dr. Hales and Mr. Clinton, reasoning à priori and à fortiori, is more likely to be 580 than any other, in order to reconcile it with the chronological enumeration of the apostle Paul, when preaching at Antioch. See Acts xiii. 16-23. Josephus also gives an excess over the Hebrew text of more than a century.

vi. 8. "The door for the middle chamber was on the right side of the house: and they went up with winding stairs into the middle chamber, and out of the middle into the third." The reading of the Septuagint is, kaì ó πvλòv τῆς πλευρᾶς τῆς ὑποκάτωθεν ὑπὸ τὴν ὠμίαν τοῦ οἴκου τὴν Seğiáv," and the door of the ground chamber was on the δεξιάν, right side of the house."

vi. 15. "And he built the walls of the house within with boards of cedar, both the floor of the house, and the walls of the ceiling: and he covered them on the inside with wood, and covered the floor of the house with planks of fir." The present translation affirms a contradiction. See marginal reading, which is that of the Septuagint: Sià ξύλων κεδρίνων ἀπὸ τοῦ ἐδάφους τοῦ οἴκου καὶ ἕως τῶν τοίχων καὶ ἕως τῶν δοκῶν, “ with boards of cedar from the floor of the house unto the walls and beams." It is evident that the ceiling and walls of the house were of cedar, and the floor of fir, of whichever wood the beams may have

been made. In the next verse the same confusion recurs in the Hebrew rendering, which is amended by the Greek text. The Vulgate has, à pavimento usque ad superiora.

vi. 29, 30. "And he carved all the walls of the house round about with carved figures of cherubims and palmtrees and open flowers, within and without. And the floor of the house he overlaid with gold, within and without." Dr. Wall notices this translation as incorrect, from which it might be gathered that the exterior walls of the house were embellished in fashion similar to the interior, though architecturally unsuitable; and the floor was both overlaid and underlaid with gold, which would be irrational extravagance. The Septuagint reads, τοῦ ἐσωτέρου καὶ τοῦ ewτépov, by which expressions may be understood the holy of holies within the veil, and the sanctuary without it, as well as the inside wall and upper flooring of each.

vii. The first twelve verses of this chapter, which describe the building of the house of Lebanon, are transferred in the Septuagint to the end of it; and verses 37 and 38 of chapter vi. would find their more convenient place after verse 51 of chapter vii. In verse 12, reference is abruptly made in the Hebrew text to "the inner court of the house of the Lord, and the porch of the house;" but both these members of the sentence are wanting in the Greek version, which adds, καὶ συνετέλεσε Σαλωμὼν ὅλον τὸν οἶκον αὐτοῦ, “ and Solomon entirely finished his own house." Tremellius understands the passage as meaning that the three rows of hewed stones, and a row of cedar beams, used by Solomon for his private palace, were the same as those of the temple: "similiter atrio domûs Jehovæ interiori, et porticui ejusdem domûs.”