Consecration of the Temple

BY J. JAMES TISSOT. REPRODUCED BY COURTESY

OF THE AMERICAN TISSOT SOCIETY OF NEW YORK,

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"The priests could not stand to minister by reason of the cloud: for the glory of the Lord had filled the house of God."-II. Chron., 5, 14.

THEN after seven years of labor the Temple and

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its decorations were at last complete, then came the grand ceremonial of its consecration to God. The Bible devotes much space to the details of this happy dedication feast. Enormous sacrifices were made of sheep and oxen “that could not be told or numbered for multitude." The ark of Moses was brought into the "Holy of Holies" as its final resting place. Then King Solomon standing up before all the multitude offered an earnest prayer, one of the most marvellous and beautiful passages of the Bible. He entreated the Lord to listen to the Israelites in each of a nation's sorest trials, in time of famine and of drought, of war and of pestilence, in moments of private misery, or grief, or shame, or repentance, and to hearken also to the strangers who besought Him, as well as to the Israelites.

When the king closed his petition, a cloud filled the Temple, "the glory of the Lord" entered the Holy of Holies, and the people "bowed themselves with their faces to the ground upon the pavement, and worshipped, and praised the Lord, saying, For he is good; for his mercy endureth for ever."

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singers unto the LORD, and that should praise the beauty of holiness, as they went out before the army, and to say, Praise the LORD; for his mercy endureth for ever.

22 ¶ And when they began to sing and to praise, the LORD set ambushments against the children of Ammon, Moab, and mount Seir, which were come against Judah; and they were smitten.

23 For the children of Ammon and Moab stood up against the inhabitants of mount Seir, utterly to slay and destroy them: and when they had made an end of the inhabitants of Seir, every one helped to destroy another.

24 And when Judah came toward the watch tower in the wilderness, they looked unto the multitude, and, behold, they were dead bodies fallen to the earth, and none escaped.

25 And when Jehoshaphat and his people came to take away the spoil of them, they found among them in abundance both riches with the dead bodies, and precious jewels, which they stripped off for themselves, more than they could carry away; and they were three days in gathering of the spoil, it was so much.

26 And on the fourth day they assembled themselves in the valley of Berachah; for there they blessed the LORD: therefore the name of the same place was called, The valley of Berachah, unto this day.1

27 Then they returned, every man of Judah and Jerusalem, and Jehoshaphat in the forefront of them, to go again to Jerusalem with joy; for the LORD had made them to rejoice over their enemies.

28 And they came to Jerusalem with psalteries and harps and trumpets unto the house of the LORD.

29 And the fear of God was on all the kingdoms of those countries, when they had heard that the LORD fought against the enemies of Israel.

30 So the realm of Jehoshaphat was quiet: for his God gave him rest round about.

31 And Jehoshaphat reigned over Judah: he was thirty and five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty and five years in Jerusalem. And his mother's name was Azubah the daughter of Shilhi.

32 And he walked in the way of Asa his father, and departed not from it, doing that which was right in the sight of the LORD,

33 Howbeit the high places were not taken away: for as yet the people had not prepared their hearts unto the God of their fathers.

34 Now the rest of the acts of Jehoshaphat, first and last, behold, they are written in the book of Jehu the son of Hanani, who is mentioned' in the book of the kings of Israel.

'Berachah means blessing. The Revised Version says "which is inserted."