1 Kings 8:39 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
1 Kings 8:39
Then hear thou in heaven thy dwelling place, and forgive, and do, and give to every man according to his ways, whose heart thou knowest; (for thou, even thou only, knowest the hearts of all the children of men;)
to hear intelligently (often with implication of attent… · verb, qal imperfect, 2nd person masculine singular
heaven
הַשָּׁמַ֜יִםha.sha.Ma.yim
H8064
the sky (as aloft · definite article + noun, common masculine plural absolute
dwelling
שִׁבְתֶּ֙ךָ֙shiv.Te.kha
H3427
properly · verb, qal infinitive construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person masculine singular
place
מְכ֤וֹןme.Khon
H4349
properly · noun, common masculine singular construct
forgive
וְסָלַחְתָּ֣ve.sa.lach.Ta
H5545
to forgive · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
do
וְעָשִׂ֔יתָve.'a.Si.ta
H6213
to do or make · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
give
וְנָתַתָּ֤ve.na.ta.Ta
H5414
to give · conjunction + verb, qal sequential perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
man
לָאִישׁ֙la.'Ish
H376
a man as an individual or a male person · preposition with the article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
ways
דְּרָכָ֔יוde.ra.Khav
H1870
a road (as trodden) · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
heart
לְבָב֑וֹle.va.Vo
H3824
the heart (as the most interior organ) · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine singular
knowest
תֵּדַ֖עte.Da'
H3045
to know (properly · verb, qal imperfect, 2nd person masculine singular
knowest
יָדַ֙עְתָּ֙ya.Da'.ta
H3045
to know (properly · verb, qal perfect, 2nd person masculine singular
hearts
לְבַ֖בle.Vav
H3824
the heart (as the most interior organ) · noun, common masculine singular construct
children
בְּנֵ֥יbe.Nei
H1121
a son (as a builder of the family name) · noun, common masculine plural construct
men
הָאָדָֽםha.'a.Dam
H120
ruddy i.e. a human being (an individual or the species · definite article + noun, common masculine singular absolute
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
1 Chronicles 28:9 And thou, Solomon my son, know thou the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart and with a willing mind: for the LORD searchet…
Jeremiah 17:10 I the LORD search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.
1 Samuel 16:7 But the LORD said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth…
Acts 1:24 And they prayed, and said, Thou, Lord, which knowest the hearts of all men, shew whether of these two thou hast chosen,
1 Kings 8:32 Then hear thou in heaven, and do, and judge thy servants, condemning the wicked, to bring his way upon his head; and justifying the righteou…
1 Kings 8:36 Then hear thou in heaven, and forgive the sin of thy servants, and of thy people Israel, that thou teach them the good way wherein they shou…
2 Chronicles 6:30 Then hear thou from heaven thy dwelling place, and forgive, and render unto every man according unto all his ways, whose heart thou knowest;…
Psalms 11:4-5 The LORD is in his holy temple, the LORD’s throne is in heaven: his eyes behold, his eyelids try, the children of men.
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on 1 Kings 8:22-53
Solomon having made a general surrender of this house to God, which God had signified his acceptance of by taking possession, next follows Solomon's prayer, in which he makes a more particular declaration of the uses of that surrender, with all humility and reverence, desiring that God would agree thereto. In short, it is his request that this temple may be deemed and taken, not only for a house of sacrifice (no mention is made of that in all this prayer, that was taken for granted), but a house of prayer for all people; and herein it was a type of the gospel church; see Isa 56:7, compared with Mat 21:13. Therefore Solomon opened this house, not only with an extraordinary sacrifice, but with…
HIS PRAYER. (1Ki. 8:22-61)
Solomon stood before the altar--This position was in the court of the people, on a brazen scaffold erected for the occasion (Ch2 6:13), fronting the altar of burnt offering, and surrounded by a mighty concourse of people. Assuming the attitude of a suppliant, kneeling (Kg1 8:54; compare Ch2 6:24) and with uplifted hands, he performed the solemn act of consecration--an act remarkable, among other circumstances, for this, that it was done, not by the high priest or any member of the Aaronic family, but by the king in person, who might minister about, though not in, holy things. This sublime prayer [1Ki. 8:22-35], which breathes sentiments of the loftiest piety blend…
If there be in the land famine - pestilence - The Fourth case includes several kinds of evils:
1. Famine; a scarcity or total want of bread, necessarily springing from the preceding cause, drought.
2. Pestilence; any general and contagious disease.
3. Blasting; any thing by which the crops are injured, so that the ear is never matured; but instead of wholesome grain, there is a black offensive dust.
4. Mildew; any thing that vitiates or corrodes the texture of the stalk, destroys the flowers and blossoms, or causes the young shaped fruits to fall off their stems.
5. Locust, a well known curse in the East, a species of grasshopper that multiplies by millions, and covers the face of the earth…
The Church Fathers
"But Jesus did not commit Himself unto them." For they were the more perfect among His disciples, who came to Him not only because of His miracles, but through His teaching also. The grosser sort the miracles attracted, but the better reasoners His prophecies and doctrines; and so they who were taken by His teaching were more steadfast than those attracted by His miracles. And Christ also called them "blessed," saying, "Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed." But that these here mentioned were not real disciples, the following passage shows, for it saith, "Jesus did not commit Himself unto them." Wherefore? "Because He knew all things," "And needed not that any should testify of man, for He knew what was in man." The meaning is of this kind. "He who dwells in men's hearts, and enters into their thoughts, took no heed of outward words; and knowing well that their warmth was but for a season, He placed not confidence in them as in perfect disciples, nor committed all His doctrines to them as though they had already become firm believers." Now, to know what is in the heart of men belongs to God alone, "who hath fashioned hearts one by one," for, saith Solomon, "Thou, even Thou only, knowest the hearts"; He therefore needed not witnesses to learn the thoughts of His own creatures, and so He felt no confidence in them because of their mere, temporary belief. Men, who know neither the present nor the future, often tell and entrust all without any reserve to persons who approach them deceitfully and who shortly will fall off from them; but Christ did not so, for well He knew all their secret thoughts.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Prayer — Is converse with God; the intercourse of the soul with God, not in contemplation or meditation, but in direct address to him. Prayer may be oral or mental, occasional or constant, ejaculatory or…
Temple, Solomon’s — Before his death David had “with all his might” provided materials in great abundance for the building of the temple on the summit of Mount Moriah (1 Chr. 22:14; 29:4; 2 Chr. 3:1), on the east of the…
Christ Is God · As discerning the thoughts of the heart — As discerning the thoughts of the heart
Dedication · Subjects of: Temple of Solomon — Subjects of: Temple of Solomon
Heaven · GOD’S DWELLING PLACE — GOD’S DWELLING PLACE
Temple, The First · Solemnly dedicated to God by Solomon — Solemnly dedicated to God by Solomon
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Then hear thou in heaven thy dwellingplace,.... Which was more properly so than this Solomon had built, and the Lord had taken possession of:
and forgive; remove the calamity and distress, be it what it may:
and do, and give to every man according to his ways, whose heart thou knowest: that his prayer is cordial and sincere, his confession and repentance genuine, and that he is truly sensible of his sin, and sorry for it, and is pure in his intentions and resolutions, through divine grace, to depart from it for the future:
(for thou, even thou only knowest the hearts of all the children of men;) he knows all men, the hearts of them all, what is in them, what comes out of them, and is acco…
Second Act of the feast of dedication: Solomon's dedicatory prayer (cf. 2 Chron 6:12-42). - Kg1 8:22. "Then Solomon stood before the altar of Jehovah in front of all the assembly of Israel, and stretched out his hands towards heaven." It is evident from Kg1 8:54 that Solomon uttered the prayer which follows upon his knees. The Chronicles contain the same account as we have here, with this addition, that it is said to have taken place on a "scaffold," or kind of pulpit (כּיּור) specially erected for the purpose.
(Note: Bttcher is right in his assertion, that the opinion expressed by Thenius and Cappellus, that this passage in the Chronicles has been dropped out of our text through a copyist's…
Solomon prayed concerning various disasters caused by individual or corporate sin (Lev 26:16, 19-26; Deut 28:21-22, 38-40, 42, 58-61). Solomon again asked that if God’s people confessed and truly repented, God would deal justly so that all might live in reverence before him (Deut 8:6; 2 Chr 7:14; Prov 1:7; 9:10; 15:33).
Rashi on 1 Kings 8:37
Rot. When the wheat does not grow up on the stalk to make an ear.26You will hear and answer them even though they did not repent wholeheartedly, i.e., their repentance was not out of love.—Metzudas Dovid
