2 Chronicles 1:1

I. THE UNITED KINGDOM FROM SOLOMON TO THE DIVISION (2 Chronicles 1-10)

2 Chronicles 1:1-6

SOLOMON AT GIBEON; GOD APPEARS IN A DREAM

"And Solomon the son of David was strengthened in his kingdom, and Jehovah his God was with him, and magnified him exceedingly. And Solomon spake unto all Israel, to the captains of thousands and of hundreds, and to the judges, and to every prince in all Israel, the heads of the fathers' houses. So Solomon and all the assembly with him, went to the high place that was at Gibeon; for there was the tent of meeting of God, which Moses the servant of God had made in the wilderness. But the ark of God had David brought up from Kiriath-jearim to the place that David had prepared for it; for he had pitched a tent for it at Jerusalem. Moreover the brazen alter that Bezalel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, had made, was there before the tabernacle of Jehovah: and Solomon and the assembly sought unto it. And Solomon went up thither to the brazen altar before Jehovah, which was at the tent of meeting, and offered a thousand burnt-offerings upon it."

"The brazen altar that Bezalel ... had made" (2 Chronicles 1:5). Continually throughout Chronicles we find an acute consciousness of all that was written in the Pentateuch in the times of Moses. The references here are from Exodus 17:10; 28:1-8; 31:2.

"Solomon offered a thousand burnt-offerings upon it" (2 Chronicles 1:6). This means that Solomon provided the burnt-offerings, not that he offered them personally, a duty that pertained to the priests. "This altar is mentioned as assurance that Gibeon was the proper place for sacrifice and worship."[1]

By beginning his record of Solomon's reign in this manner, the Chronicler apparently sought to focus the attention of Israel upon their ancient heritage of the favor and blessing of God, and upon his deliverance of them from Egypt by the hand of Moses.