1 Kings 8:47

Yet if they shall bethink themselves [Heb. as marg; bring back to their heart . Same phrase, Deuteronomy 4:39 ; Deuteronomy 30:1 . The latter passage, it should be noticed, treats of the captivity, so that Solomon, consciously or unconsciously, employs some of the very words used by Moses in contemplating this contingency. These repeated coincidences lead to the belief that the prayer was based upon and compiled from the Pentateuch] in the land whither they were carried captives, and repent, and make supplication unto thee in the land of them that carried them captives, saying, We have sinned, and have done perversely, we have Committed wickedness. [This verse is full of paronomasia, שבו נשבו השיבו , etc. Words almost identical with this confession were used ( Daniel 9:5 ; Psalms 106:6 ) by the Jews in their captivity at Babylon, from which it has been concluded that this part of the prayer must belong to the time of the captivity. But surely it is, to say the least, just as likely that the Jews, when the captivity of which Solomon spoke befel them, borrowed the phrase in which their great king by anticipation expressed their penitence. Seeing in the captivity a fulfilment of his prediction, they would naturally see in this formula, which no doubt had been preserved in the writings of the prophets, a confession specially appropriate to their case, and indeed provided for their use.