Page:02.BCOT.KD.HistoricalBooks.A.vol.2.EarlyProphets.djvu/1076

 Solomon he might be thrown still more into the shade. For although Zadok was only high priest at the tabernacle at Gibeon, he appears to have taken the lead; as we may infer from the fact that he is always mentioned before Abiathar (cf. 2Sa 8:17; 2Sa 20:25, and 2Sa 15:24.). For we cannot imagine that Joab and Abiathar had supported Adonijah as having right on his side (Thenius), for the simple reason that Joab did not trouble himself about right, and for his own part shrank from no crime, when he thought that he had lost favour with the king.

Verse 8
If Adonijah had powerful supporters in Joab the commander-in-chief and the high priest Abiathar, the rest of the leading officers of state, viz., Zadok the high priest (see at 2Sa 8:17), Benaiah, captain of the king's body-guard (see at 2Sa 8:18 and 2Sa 23:20-21), the prophet Nathan, Shimei (probably the son of Elah mentioned in 1Ki 4:18), and Rei (unknown), and the Gibborim of David (see at 2Sa 23:8.), were not with him.

Verses 9-10
Adonijah commenced his usurpation, like Absalom (2Sa 15:2), with a solemn sacrificial meal, at which he was proclaimed king, “at the stone of Zocheleth by the side of the fountain of Rogel,” i.e., the spy's fountain, or, according to the Chaldee and Syriac, the fuller's fountain, the present fountain of Job or Nehemiah, below the junction of the valley of Hinnom with the valley of Jehoshaphat (see at 2Sa 7:17 and Jos 15:7). E. G. Schultz (Jerusalem, eine Vorlesung, p. 79) supposes the stone or rock of Zocheleth to be “the steep, rocky corner of the southern slope of the valley of Hinnom, which casts so deep a shade.” “The neighbourhood (Wady el Rubâb) is still a place of recreation for the inhabitants of Jerusalem.” To this festal meal Adonijah invited all his brethren except Solomon, and “all the men of Judah, the king's servants,” i.e., all the Judaeans who were in the king's service, i.e., were serving at court as being members of his own tribe, with the exception of Nathan the prophet, Benaiah, and the Gibborim. The fact that Solomon and the others mentioned were not included in the invitation, showed very clearly that Adonijah was informed of Solomon's election as successor to the throne, and was also aware of the feelings of Nathan and Benaiah. Adonijah's attempt was frustrated by the vigilance of the prophet Nathan.

Verses 11-13
Nathan informed Solomon's mother, Bathsheba (see at 2Sa 11:3), that Adonijah