16. Now all the work of Solomon was prepared] Render, So all the work of Solomon was established.
unto the day ... was perfected] LXX. offers a much shorter and smoother text, from the day on which it was founded until Solomon perfected the house of the Lord. This reading is probably right.
17, 18 (= 1 Kings ix. 26–28).
Solomon’s Fleet.
¹⁷Then went Solomon to Ezion-geber, and to Eloth, on the sea shore in the land of Edom.
17. to Ezion-geber, and to Eloth] In 1 Kings Ezion-geber which is beside Eloth on the shore of the Red Sea. Strictly speaking it was at the head of the Gulf of Akaba, the eastern arm of the Red Sea. Compare xx. 36 and Deuteronomy ii. 8.
¹⁸And Huram sent him by the hands of his servants ships, and servants that had knowledge of the sea; and they came with the servants of Solomon to Ophir, and fetched from thence four hundred and fifty talents of gold, and brought them to king Solomon.
18. sent him by the hands of his servants ships] The words would seem to imply that Huram had ships transported overland from the Phoenician coast to the Gulf of Akaba! Either the Chronicler has phrased the matter carelessly, or perhaps the text should be altered to conform with Kings, where it is merely said that Solomon built ships in Ezion-geber—probably with the help of Huram—and that Huram helped to man them.
Ophir] The situation of this oft-mentioned place is not known. It has been identified with some part of the coast (a) of India, (b) of Africa, (c) of Arabia. The last identification is the most probable; Ophir appears as the name of an Arabian tribe (Genesis x. 29). The name is variously written in the LXX. but usually with an initial “S,” Sophir(a), which has been supposed to refer to India.
four hundred and fifty talents] So LXX., but in 1 Kings “four hundred and twenty” (so Hebrew, in LXX. B “a hundred and twenty”).