Praying to the Temple: Divine Presence in Solomon's Prayer

217 Pages·2022·0.734 MB·English

by  I. Wilson

105
O BIBLICAL EXEGESIS & THEOLOGY
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Ian Wilson
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Praying to
the Temple:
Divine Presence
in Solomon’s
Prayer
PEETERS
PRAYING TO THE TEMPLE:
DIVINE PRESENCE IN SOLOMON’S PRAYER
CONTRIBUTIONS TO BIBLICAL EXEGESIS AND THEOLOGY
SERIES EDITORS
K. De Troyer (Salzburg)
G. Van Oyen (Louvain-la-Neuve)
ADVISORY BOARD
Reimund Bieringer (Leuven)
Lutz Doering (Münster)
Mark Goodacre (Duke)
Bas ter Haar Romeny (Amsterdam)
Annette Merz (Groningen)
Madhavi Nevader (St Andrews)
Thomas Römer (Lausanne)
Jack Sasson (Nashville)
Tammi Schneider (Claremont)
Ian Wilson
PRAYING TO THE TEMPLE:
DIVINE PRESENCE IN SOLOMON’S
PRAYER
PEETERS
LEUVEN – PARIS – BRISTOL, CT
2022
A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.
© 2022 — Peeters, Bondgenotenlaan 153, B-3000 Leuven
ISBN 978-90-429-4625-5
eISBN 978-90-429-4626-2
D/2022/0602/10
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechan-
ical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the
publisher.
CONTENTS
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . IX
ABBREVIATIONS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . XI
1. INTRODUCTION. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Why 1 Kings 8?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Differing notions within 1 Kings 8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
The purpose of the temple . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
The location of the Deity. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Mitigation of the differences. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
The focus of the present work. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Outline of the study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2. CURRENT EXPLANATIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
The temple as intermediary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
לא understood as “towards” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Non-occurrence of prayer לא YHWH לא the temple. . . . . 19
Lack of precedents for “praying לא” understood as “towards” 20
Putative precedents for the use of לא in a directional sense . . 23
An obvious way of expressing a directional sense . . . . . . . 26
The temple understood as a “channel” . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Inconsistency within the prayer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Equating prayer לא with prayer “at”/“in” . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
The use of תיבב in v. 33 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
The possibility of לא meaning “at”/”in” . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
The relative triviality of the distinction? . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
A more specific argument. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
3. SOLOMON’S PRAYER. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Prolegomenon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Metonymy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Recent developments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
The approach taken here . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
VI CONTENTS
Characteristics of referential metonymy . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Non-literal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Vehicle and target must be related . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
The relationship must exist in the external world. . . . . 42
The connection has to be well known. . . . . . . . . . . 42
Vehicle and target are interchangeable . . . . . . . . . . 43
The vehicle is an ellipsis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
The vehicle undergoes a change in reference not in sense 44
Procedure for understanding metonymies . . . . . . . . . . 45
Solomon’s Prayer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Recognition. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Praying to this place/house . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
“Praying to” as metaphor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
“This place/house” as metonym . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Architect or builder . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Owner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Proviso . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
Preposition ל . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Nouns expressing the nature of YHWH’s relationship to
the temple . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Nouns expressing the nature of the temple’s relationship
to YHWH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
Verbs. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Suffixes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Deuteronom(ist)ic name formulae. . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Occupant . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Precedents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
םוקמ (“place”) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
Gen. 20:13 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
1 Sam. 30:31b . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
תיבב (“house”) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
1 Sam. 31:9 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
4. THE OCCUPANT OF THE TEMPLE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
The target of the praying . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Identification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Vehicle and target must be related . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
CONTENTS VII
The relationship must exist in the external world . . . . . . 72
The connection must be well known . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
Compliance with the relevant selection restrictions . . . . . 76
Progress so far. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
The improbability of inconsistency within the prayer . . . . 77
The likely recipient of the prayers addressed to “this place/
house”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
The nature of the prayers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
The usual addressee of such prayers . . . . . . . . . . . 79
The absence of requests to a localized םשׁ . . . . . . . . 81
Verdict . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
The nature of the target/vehicle relationship . . . . . . . . . 83
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Using a metonym. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
What it conveys. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
Why a metonym is used . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
The two main options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Praying towards the temple . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Praying to the occupant of the temple. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92
Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
5. REPERCUSSIONS WITHIN 1 KINGS 8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
The prayer locates YHWH in two places at once . . . . . . . . . 98
The interpretation of 1 Kings 8:27 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101
A possible resolution. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
The use of בשׁי to qualify םימשׁ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
The problem . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
Possible approaches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
The example of Og . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
YHWH as subject of בשׁי elsewhere . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108
Humans as subject of בשׁי. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
Rationale . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
Application. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
Verdict. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
6. REPERCUSSIONS FURTHER AFFIELD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
Impact on Divine Presence . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
Impact of Metonymy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
VIII CONTENTS
Impact on Interpretation of the Divine Name. . . . . . . . . . . . 117
The two different uses of the divine םשׁ encountered in this
study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117
The םשׁ as a (semi-)independent entity. . . . . . . . . . . . 117
The םשׁ as equivalent to YHWH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119
The need for criteria . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
Impact on the deuteronom(ist)ic view of the temple . . . . . . . . 124
Its conception. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
Its function/purpose . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
A house of prayer? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
A denigration of the cult? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
The nature of the prayer. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
The nature of the Israelites’ anticipated predicaments . . 131
Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132
Impact on the name formulae . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
Variations in the interpretation of the divine םשׁ . . . . . . . . 133
Deficiencies in the understanding of the divine םשׁ . . . . . . . 134
A possible way forward . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Impact on the Books of Kings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
YHWH’s presence within the temple . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140
2 Kings 19:14–19. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
1 Kings 12:26–33. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
The focus of prayers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144
The operation of the cult. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
The relevance of the “high places” . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146
Other texts. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149
The divine םשׁ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
Final Reflections. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151
BIBLIOGRAPHY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
INDICES. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This study owes its genesis to Tryggve Mettinger and the late Timo
Veijola, both of whom considered that I should have dealt with 1 Kings 8
in an earlier monograph on divine presence.
Regarding its actual substance, two people deserve special mention.
Elizabeth Magba graciously allowed me to draw on her expertise in
linguistics during countless conversations centred around the crux of the
argument. This proved to be an invaluable safeguard while I ventured
into a field somewhat outside my own comfort zone. Graham Davies not
only pointed out a significant hole in my thinking, but also kindly agreed
to glance over the several thousand words eventually generated to address
the omission.
Thanks are also due to a number of folk whose greater translation
skills saved this enterprise from taking even longer than it actually did.
Jenny Smith, Elizabeth and Gwen Montgomery saved me precious time
by rendering much German into English, while Hans Meissner did the
same for Dutch. Once the research and writing had been completed, I was
grateful for a number of anonymous readers whose comments and sug-
gestions about an earlier draft served radically to improve the present
volume, not least by significantly shortening its length. Elizabeth and my
wife Margaret ploughed through and helpfully commented on that earlier,
much longer draft, while Philip Johnston and Tom Lundskaer-Nielson
read and effectively copy-edited the final version. All four agreed that
complex sentences, of which there were many, but which I considered
not only to be well written, but also perfectly understandable, would not
go down well with any readers who were unaccustomed to a plethora of
subordinate clauses. Towards the end I particularly appreciated Sandra
Richter’s enthusiasm for the project, as well as her concern that I repre-
sent her views accurately.
I am especially grateful to Tyndale House for providing me with a
study desk throughout the long duration of this project, and also to its
librarians, Simon Sykes, Elizabeth and Kate Arhel, for their friendship
and willingness to order obscure volumes at a moment’s notice. A num-
ber of friends have supported us financially over the years. Without their
generous sponsorship this study would have remained on the drawing
board. Thanks are also due to Walter Moberly for drawing my attention