Bible Strands
1 Kings 3:4
Now the king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there, for it was the great high place. Solomon offered a thousand burnt offerings on the altar there.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The narrator reports King Solomon traveling to Gibeon to perform sacrifices at the precise moment he has begun his reign and demonstrated a commitment to walking in David’s statutes. This action immediately precedes the Lord’s appearance to Solomon in a dream to invite a request.
The words — The Hebrew verb וַיֵּלֶךְ (va.yēlēkh) literally means “and he went,” marking Solomon’s deliberate movement to the site. The noun הַבָּמָה (ha-bāmāh) translates to “the high place,” identifying the specific elevated altar location where the sacrifices occurred.
The thread — The account connects to 1 Chronicles 16:39, which records David leaving Zadok and his priests at the Gibeon high place, and 2 Chronicles 1:3, which confirms Solomon and the assembly traveled there to the location of God’s Tent of Meeting. The sacrifice narrative continues in 2 Chronicles 7:5, where Solomon offers 22,000 oxen and 120,000 sheep during the dedication.
Why it lands — The text records a factual movement and a specific sacrifice count before describing the subsequent divine encounter, requiring the reader to observe the sequence of royal action and divine response. It demands a plain acknowledgment that physical worship at a designated site preceded and framed the revelation.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And the king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there; for that was the great high place: a thousand burnt offerings did Solomon offer upon that altar.
Cross-references
- 1 Chronicles 16:39 And David left Zadok the priest and his fellow priests before the tabernacle of the LORD at the high place in Gibeon
- 2 Chronicles 1:3 And Solomon and the whole assembly went to the high place at Gibeon because it was the location of God’s Tent of Meeting, which Moses the servant of the LORD had made in the wilderness.
- 2 Chronicles 7:5 And King Solomon offered a sacrifice of 22,000 oxen and 120,000 sheep. So the king and all the people dedicated the house of God.
- 1 Chronicles 21:29 For the tabernacle of the LORD that Moses had made in the wilderness and the altar of burnt offering were presently at the high place in Gibeon,
- 2 Chronicles 1:6 Solomon offered sacrifices there before the LORD on the bronze altar at the Tent of Meeting, where he offered a thousand burnt offerings.
- Joshua 9:3 But the people of Gibeon, having heard what Joshua had done to Jericho and Ai,
- Isaiah 40:16 Lebanon is not sufficient for fuel, nor its animals enough for a burnt offering.
- 1 Kings 8:63 And Solomon offered as peace offerings to the LORD 22,000 oxen and 120,000 sheep. So the king and all the Israelites dedicated the house of the LORD.
- 2 Chronicles 29:32 The number of burnt offerings the assembly brought was seventy bulls, a hundred rams, and two hundred lambs; all these were for a burnt offering to the LORD.
- 2 Chronicles 30:24 For Hezekiah king of Judah contributed a thousand bulls and seven thousand sheep for the assembly, and the officials contributed a thousand bulls and ten thousand sheep for the assembly, and a great number of priests consecrated themselves.