1 Kings 5:9

My servants shall bring them [No word in the Hebrew; "Timber of Cedar," etc; must be supplied or understood from the preceding verse] down [It is generally a steep descent from the cedar grove, and indeed all the Lebanon district, to the coast] from Lebanon unto the sea [This must have been a great undertaking. The cedars are ten hours distant from Tripoli, and the road must always have been a bad one. To the writer it appeared to be the most rugged and dangerous road in Palestine. It is possible that the timber was collected and floated at Gebal (Biblus. See note on 1 Kings 5:18 ). Beyrout, the present port of the Lebanon, is 27 hours distant via Tripoli. But cedars would then, no doubt, be found nearer the sea. And the ancients (as the stones of Baalbek, etc; prove) were not altogether deficient in mechanical appliances. The transport of cedars to the Mediterranean would be an easy undertaking compared with the carriage of them to Nineveh, and we know from the inscriptions that they were imported by the Assyrian kings] and I will convey them by se a in floats [Heb. " I will make (or put) them rafts in the sea." This was the primitive, as it was the obvious, way, of conveying timber, among Greeks and Romans, as well as among Eastern races. The reader will probably have seen such rafts on the Rhine or other river] unto the place which thou shalt appoint [Heb. send ] me [In 2 Chronicles 2:16 , Hiram assumes that this place will be Joppa, now Yafo, the port of Jerusalem, and 40 miles distant from the Holy City. The transport over these 40 miles, also of most rugged and trying road, must have involved, if possible, a still greater toil than that from Lebanon to the sea] and will cause them to be discharged there, and thou shalt receive them: and thou shalt accomplish [Heb. do , same word as in verse 8, and probably used designedly—"I will perform thy desire.; and thou shalt perform my desire." There shall be a strict quid pro quo ] my desire, in giving food for my household [Hiram states in his reply in what shape he would prefer the hire promised by Solomon (verse 6). The food for the royal household must be carefully distinguished from the food given to the workmen ( 2 Chronicles 2:10 ). The fact that 20,000 ears of wheat formed a part of each has led to their being confounded. It is noticeable that when the second temple was built, cedar wood was again brought to Jerusalem, rid Joppa, in return for "meat and drink and oil unto them of Zidon" ( Ezra 3:7 ). The selection of food as the hire of his servants by Hiram almost amounts to an undesigned coincidence. Their narrow strip of cornland, between the roots of Lebanon and the coast—Phoenicia proper ("the great plain of the city of Sidon," Josephus. Ant. 5.3, 1) is only 28 miles long, with an average breadth of one mile-compelled the importation of corn and oil. Ezekiel ( Ezekiel 27:17 ) mentions wheat, honey, oil, and balm as exported from Palestine to the markets of Tyre. It has been justly remarked that the fact that Phoenicia was thus dependent upon Palestine for its breadstuffs explains the unbroken peace that prevailed between the two countries.