1 Kings 9:28

And they came to Ophir,.... About which place there are various opinions; some take it to be the little island of Zocatora, on the eastern coast of Africa, at a small distance from the straits of

And they came to Ophir, and fetched from thence gold, four hundred and twenty talents, and brought it to king Solomon.

Ophir; a place famous for the plenty and fineness of the gold there; of which see ,12 Job 22:24 28:16 . It is manifest and agreed that it was a part of the East Indies, which though very remote from us, yet was far nearer to the Red Sea, from whence they might easily sail to it in these ancient times, because they needed not to go far from the coast to come to it, because they might (according to the manner of these first ages) sail all along near the coast, though the voyage was thereby more tedious, which was the reason why three years were spent in it. And here, and here only, were to bc had all the commodities which Solomon fetched from Ophir, . Four hundred and twenty talents: in all there came to the king four hundred and fifty talents, whereof it seems thirty talents were allowed by Solomon to Hiram and his men for the voyage, and so there were only four hundred and twenty that came clearly into the king’ s treasury.

1 Kings 9:28 And they came to Ophir, and fetched from thence gold, four hundred and twenty talents, and brought [it] to king Solomon.Ver. 28. And they came to Ophir,] i.e., To golden Chersonesus, saith Josephus; to Peru, or Hispaniola, say others, who hold that the newly found world, as we call America, was known to Solomon and the ancients; like as the Chinese say that they had the art of printing among them many hundreds of years before we had. The gold of this land is called gold of Parvaim, that is, of the two Perus, say they; the greater and the lesser. Four hundred and twenty talents.] At one time: as at another, four hundred and fifty, for every three years they made a voyage thither, it being distant from Jerusalem four thousand eight hundred miles, as some have computed it.

(28) Ophir.—All that can be certainly gathered from the mention of Ophir in the Old Testament is, first; that it was situated to the east of Palestine and approached by the Red Sea (as is clear from this passage, from 1 Kings 22:48, and from 2 Chronicles 8:18; 2 Chronicles 9:10), and next, that so famous was the gold imported from it, that the “gold of Ophir” became proverbial (Job 22:24; Job 28:16; Psalms 45:10; Isaiah 13:12; 1 Chronicles 4). All else is matter of speculation and tradition. Setting aside merely fanciful conjectures, substantial reasons have been given for fixing it geographically in Africa, Arabia, and India; and of these three positions, evidence strongly preponderates for the second or third. Tradition is in favour of India; the LXX. renders the name as Soufir, or Sofir, which is the Coptic word for “India; the Arabic versions actually render it “India;” and Josephus (Ant. viii. 6, 4) srates unhesitatingly that Ophir was in his day called “The Golden Chersonesus,” which is the Malay peninsula. On the other hand, it is urged that “Ophir,” in the ethnological list of Gen 10:29, is placed among the sons of Joktan, clearly indicating an Arabian position; and that the mention of Ophir (here and in 1 Kings 10:11), stands in close connection with the visit of the Queen of Sheba and the gold brought from Arabia. But neither of these considerations is conclusive. Looking to the products described as brought from Ophir, the “gold and precious stones” would suit either. but India better than Arabia (although, indeed, so far as gold is concerned, Western Africa would have better claim than either); while the “almug,” or “algum” wood is certainly the “sandal wood” found almost exclusively on the Malabar coast, and the very word “algum” appears to be a corruption of its Sanscrit name valguka. If the other imports mentioned in 1 Kings 10:22 were also from Ophir, this latter argument would be greatly strengthened. (See Note there.) But putting this aside as doubtful, the preponderance of evidence still appears to be in favour of India. The Tyrians, it may be added, are known to have had trading settlements on the Persian Gulf, and to have rivalled in the trade of the East the Egyptians, to whom it would more naturally have belonged. Various places have been named conjecturally as identical with Ophir: as in Arabia, Zaphar or Saphar, Doffir, and Zafari; in Africa, Sofala; and in India, Abhira, at the mouth of the Indus, and a Soupara mentioned by ancient Greek geographers, not far from Goa.

Verse 28. And they came to Ophir] No man knows certainly, to this day, where this Ophir was situated. There were two places of this name; one somewhere in India, beyond the Ganges, and another in Arabia, near the country of the Sabaeans, mentioned by Job, Job 22:24: Then shalt thou lay up gold as dust; and the gold of Ophir as the stones of the brooks. And Job 28:16: It cannot be valued with the gold of Ophir, with the precious onyx, or the sapphire. Calmet places this country at the sources of the Euphrates and Tigris. But there are several reasons to prove that this was not the Ophir of the Bible, which it seems was so situated as to require a voyage of three years long to go out, load, and return. Mr. Bruce has discussed this subject at great length; see his Travels, vol. ii., chap. iv., p. 354, c. He endeavours to prove 1. That Ezion-geber is situated on the Elanitic branch of the Arabian Gulf or Red Sea. 2. That Tharshish is Moka, near to Melinda, in the Indian Ocean, in about three degrees south latitude. 3. That Ophir lies somewhere in the land of Sofala, or in the vicinity of the Zimbeze river, opposite the island of Madagascar, where there have been gold and silver mines in great abundance from the remotest antiquity. And he proves, 4. That no vessel could perform this voyage in less than THREE years, because of the monsoons that more time need not be employed, and that this is the precise time mentioned in 1Kg 10:22. 5. That this is the country of the queen of Sheba, or Sabia, or Azeba, who on her visit to Solomon, brought him one hundred and twenty talents of gold, and of spices and precious stones great store, 1Kg 10:10. And that gold, ivory, silver, c., are the natural productions of this country. To illustrate and prove his positions he has given a map on a large scale, "showing the track of Solomon's fleet in their three years' voyage from the Elanitic Gulf to Ophir and Tharshish" to which, and his description, I must refer the reader.

28. they came to Ophir] There is not sufficient evidence to decide where Ophir was. The most probable conjectures have been Africa, India and Arabia. But on account of the productions named in connexion with the place in chap. 1 Kings 10:11 Africa has been almost universally given up. And in the decision between India and Arabia, the latter seems the more likely, partly because it is nearer to reach from Ezion-geber, which is a consideration not without weight in questions connected with early navigation, and partly because the first mention of Ophir (Genesis 10:29) makes it refer to the descendants of Joktan, whose home was in Arabia. There is no necessity to conclude that the commodities brought from Ophir, gold, almug-trees and precious stones, were products of the land. Almug-wood has been supposed to be the same with sandal-wood, but the evidence on this point seems very inconclusive, and if it were proved, it might well be that the wood, produced in India, was brought to some mart on the Arabian coast for sale. The ports of Yemen and the Persian Gulf were great entrepots of commerce from the earliest times. With precious stones also this could easily be done, and with gold too. But the gold of Sheba (i.e. Arabia) is noted as famous in Psalms 72:15; Isaiah 60:6. There appears therefore to be more in favour of some place on the coast of Arabia than for any other suggested site of Ophir. Josephus however says it was in India (Ant. viii. 6. 4), and that a more modern name is ×ñõóῆ ãῆ. four hundred and twenty talents] The sum seems enormous, £2,250,000. What could a country like Palestine furnish in exchange? Perhaps the sum represents the total of many expeditions. The parallel passage in 2 Chron. (1 Kings 8:18) says ‘four hundred and fifty talents,’ Josephus ‘about four hundred.’ The LXX. (Vat.) gives ‘one hundred and twenty talents.’ The expedition appears to have been all for Solomon’s benefit, as we hear nothing of any share of the adventure given to the Tyrian king.

On Ophir, see the marginal reference note. Among the various opinions three predominate; all moderns, except a very few, being in favor of Arabia, India, or Eastern Africa. Arabia’s claims are supported by the greatest number.

28. Ophir — Endless have been the conjectures as to the locality of Ophir; but there are no sufficient data to bring the question to a positive decision. India, Africa, and Arabia have each been urged with much plausibility.