Page:02.BCOT.KD.HistoricalBooks.A.vol.2.EarlyProphets.djvu/1153

 make these vessels king Hiram had sent to Solomon, at his request (2Ch 2:6), a workman named Hiram of Tyre. 1Ki 7:13 contains a supplementary remark, in which ויּשׁלח must be rendered in the pluperfect (compare the remarks on Gen 2:19). King Solomon had sent and fetched Hiram from Tyre. This artisan bore the same name as the king, חירם or חירום (1Ki 7:40), in 2Ch 2:13 חוּרם (Huram), with the epithet אבי, i.e., my father, אב being a title of honour equivalent to master or counsellor, as in Gen 45:8. He was the son of a widow of the tribe of Naphtali, and his father was צרי אישׁ, i.e., a Tyrian by birth. According to 2Ch 2:13, his mother was “of the daughters of Dan,” i.e., of the tribe of Dan. Both statements may easily be united thus: she was a Danite by birth, and married into the tribe of Naphtali. When her husband died, she was married again as the widow of a Naphtalite, and became the wife of a Tyrian, to whom she bore a son, Hiram. This explanation is also adopted by Bertheau (on the Chronicles); and the conjecture of Lundius, Thenius, and others, that the mother was an Israelitish widow of the city of Dan in the tribe of Naphtali, which was quite close to Tyre, is less in harmony with the expression “of the daughters of Dan.” נחשׁה חרשׁ, “a brass-worker,” refers to הוּא (he), i.e., Hiram, and not to his father (Thenius). The skill of Hiram is described in almost the same terms as that of Bezaleel in Exo 31:3., with this exception, that Bezaleel's skill is attributed to his being filled with the Spirit of God, i.e., is described rather as a supernatural gift, whereas in the case of Hiram the more indefinite expression, “he was filled with wisdom, etc.,” is used, representing it rather as a natural endowment. In the account given here, Hiram is merely described as a worker in brass, because he is only mentioned at the commencement of the section which treats of the preparation of the brazen vessels of the temple. According to 2Ch 2:14, he was able to work in gold, silver, brass, iron, stone, wood, purple, etc. There is nothing improbable in this extension of his skill to wood and to