STORY OF EGYPT PART II

STORY OF EGYPT PART II



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Upon Thutmose's coronation, Nubia rebelled against Egyptian rule
 Thutmose travelled down the Nile and fought in the battle, personally killing the Nubian king. Upon victory, he had the Nubian king's body hung from the prow of his ship, before he returned to Thebes.After that campaign, he led a second expedition against Nubia in his third year in the course of which he ordered the canal at the first cataract - which had been built under Sesostris III of the 12th Dynasty

 the second year of Thutmose's reign,    fought a campaign in Syria;         he crossed the Euphrates River. During this campaign, the Syrian princes declared allegiance to Thutmose                                                tales of the Euphrates, "that inverted water which flows upstream when it ought to be flowing downstream." The Euphrates was the first major river which the Egyptians had ever encountered which flowed from the north, which was downstream on the Nile, to the south, which was upstream on the Nile. Thus the river became known in Egypt as simply, "inverted water."

Major Battles in Ancient Egypt

Kadesh battle

In 1479 B.C., at the Battle of Megiddo, Pharaoh Tuthmosis III had over 20,000 men under his command to do battle against Syria’s 15,000 man army. The Egyptians won the battle, capturing over two hundred chariots and two thousand horses from the defeated Syrians.

Another famous Egyptian battle took place in 1288 B. C. in the city of Kadesh in Syria. Kadesh was under Hittite control and taking the city was key to controlling Syria. The Egyptians were led by Ramesses II, who commanded an army of 20,000 men divided into four divisions. Each division was named after a major Egyptian deity: Amun, Ptah, Ra, and Sutekh.

This was considered a great victory for the Egyptians, but it appears the Egyptians never took the city. They instead signed a peace treaty with the Hittites.


When Abram visited Egypt, impelled by the famine in Canaan, it was already a powerful monarchy. This was about 1921 years before Christ,  when the kings of the 15th dynasty reigned. These dynasties of ancient kings are difficult to be settled, and rest upon traditions rather than well defined historical grounds,—or rather on the authority of Manetho, an Egyptian priest, who lived nearly 300 years before Christ.   Menes nor his successors of the first dynasty left any monuments. Memphis was built by them, and possibly hieroglyphics were invented during their reigns


 The country to which Moses refers, in connection with the Hebrew history, is Egypt. This favored land was the seat of one of the oldest monarchies of the world.   Egypt was  the primeval seats of the race of Ham. Mizraim, the Scripture name for the country, indicates that it was settled by a son of Ham. But the tide of emigration from Armenia passed to the southeast through Syria and Palestine, and hence the descendants of Ham had  occupied the land of Canaan before they crossed the desert between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean. I doubt if Egypt had older cities than Damascus, Hebron, Zoar, and Tyre

But Egypt certainly was a more powerful monarchy than any existing on the earth in the time of Abraham

ts language, traditions, and monuments alike point to a high antiquity. It was probably inhabited by a mixed race, Shemitic as well as Hamite; though the latter had the supremacy. The distinction of castes indicates a mixed population, so that the ancients doubted whether Egypt belonged to Asia or Africa. The people were not black, but of a reddish color, with thick lips, straight black hair, and elongated eye, and sunk in the degraded superstitions of the African race.

The geographical position indicates not only a high antiquity, but a state favorable to great national wealth and power. The river Nile, issuing from a great lake under the equator, runs 3,000 miles nearly due north to the Mediterranean. Its annual inundations covered the valley with a rich soil brought down from the mountains of Abyssinia, making it the most fertile in the world. The country, thus so favored by a great river, with its rich alluvial deposits, is about 500 miles in length, with an area of 115,000 square miles, of which 9,600 are subject to the fertilizing inundation. But, in ancient times, a great part of the country was irrigated, and abounded in orchards, gardens, and vineyards. Every kind of vegetable was cultivated, and grain was raised in the greatest abundance, so that the people lived in luxury and plenty while other nations were subject to occasional famines.

Among the fruits, were dates, grapes, figs, pomegranates, apricots, peaches, oranges, citrons, lemons, limes, bananas, melons, mulberries, olives. Among vegetables, if we infer from what exist at present, were beans, peas, lentils, luprins, spinach, leeks, onions, garlic, celery, chiccory, radishes, carrots, turnips, lettuce, cabbage, fennel, gourds, cucumbers, tomatoes, egg-plant. What a variety for the sustenance of man, to say nothing of the various kinds of grain,—barley, oats, maize, rice, and especially wheat, which grows to the greatest perfection.


In old times the horses were famous, as well as cattle, and sheep, and poultry. Quails were abundant, while the marshes afforded every kind of web-footed fowl. Fish, too, abounded in the Nile, and in the lakes. Bees were kept, and honey was produced, though inferior to that of Greece.


The  ten generations from Shem to Abram. Either the generations were made longer than in our times, or the seventeen dynasties, usually supposed to have reigned 

 Egypt was settled immediately after the Flood, 


gyptian kings  Sesertesen, or Osirtasin I., the founder of the twelfth dynasty of kings, B.C. 2080. He was a great conqueror, and tradition confounds him with the Sesostris of the Greeks, 

 The real Sesostris was Ramenes the Great, of the nineteenth dynasty. By the kings of this dynasty (the twelfth) Ethiopia was conquered, the Labyrinth was built, and Lake Moevis dug, to control the inundations. Under them Thebes became a great city. The dynasty lasted 100 years, but became subject to the Shepherd kings. These early Egyptian monarchs wore fond of peace, and their subjects enjoyed repose and prosperity.

The Shepherd kings, who ruled 400 years, were   Phœnicians  a roving body of conquerors, who easily subdued the peaceful Egyptians. They  settled in Lower Egypt where the land was most fertile, and where conquests would be most easily retained.

It was under their rule that Abram probably visited Egypt when driven by a famine from Canaan. And they were not expelled till the time of Joseph, by the first of the eighteenth dynasty. The descendants of the old kings, we suppose, lived in Thebes, and were tributary princes for 400 years, but gained sufficient strength, finally, to expel the Shemite invaders,


But it was under the Shepherd kings that the relations between Egypt and the Hebrew patriarchs took place.  The Phœnicians belonged to the same Shemitic stock ]from which Abraham came.  Abram and Joseph WERE accepted as a minister and governor. 

Meanwhile, the older dynasties under whom Thebes was built, probably B.C. 2200, gathered strength in misfortune and subjection. They reigned, during five dynasties, in a subordinate relation, tributary and oppressed. The first king of the eighteenth dynasty seems to have been a remarkable man—the deliverer of his nation. His name was Aah-mes, or Amo-sis, and he expelled the shepherds from the greater part of Egypt, B.C. 1525. In his reign . He built temples both in Thebes and Memphis, and established a navy. This was probably the king who knew not Joseph. His successors continued the work of conquest, and extended their dominion from Ethiopia to Mesopotamia, and obtained that part of Western Asia formerly held by the Chaldeans. 


The grandest period of Egyptian history begins with the nineteenth dynasty, founded by Sethee I., or Sethos, B.C. 1340. He built the famous “Hall of Columns,” in the temple of Karnak,. On the walls of this great temple are depicted his conquests, especially over the Hittites. But the glories of the monarchy, now decidedly military, culminated in Ramesis II.—the Sesostris of the Greeks. He extended his dominion as far as Scythia and Thrace, while his naval expeditions penetrated to the Erythræan Sea. The captives which he brought from his wars were employed in digging canals, which intersected the country, for purposes of irrigation, and especially that great canal which united the Mediterranean with the Red Sea. He added to the temple of Karnak, built the Memnonium on the western side of the Nile, opposite [pg 040]to Thebes, and enlarged the temple of Ptah, at Memphis, which he adorned by a beautiful colossal statue, the fist of which is (now in the British Museum) thirty inches wide across the knuckles. But the Rameseum, or Memnonium, was his greatest architectural work, approached by an avenue of sphinxes and obelisks, in the centre of which was the great statue of Ramesis himself, sixty feet high, carved from a single stone of the red granite of Syene.

THE TWENTIETH DYNASTY  OF EGYPT
The twentieth dynasty was founded by Sethee II., B.C. 1220 (or 1232 B.C., ), when Gideon ruled the Israelites and Theseus reigned at Athens and Priam at Troy. 





tHE BURNING OF THE CITY OF TROY HAPPENED IN THIS TIME. 




The third king of this dynasty—Ramesis III.—built palaces and tombs scarcely inferior to any of the Theban kings, but under his successors the Theban power declined. Under the twenty-first dynasty, which began B.C. 1085, Lower Egypt had a new capital, Zoan, and gradually extended its power over Upper Egypt. It had a strong Shemetic element in its population, and strengthened itself by alliances with the Assyrians.

The twenty-second dynasty OF EGYPT was WHEN Assyrians,  began to attack about 1009 B.C. It was hostile to the Jews, and took and sacked Jerusalem.

From this period the history of Egypt is obscure. Ruled by Assyrians, and then by Ethiopians, the grandeur of the old Theban monarchy had passed away. On the rise of the Babylonian kingdom, over the ruins of the old Assyrian Empire, Egypt was greatly prostrated as a military power. Babylon became the great monarchy of the East, and gained possession of all the territories of the Theban kings, from the Euphrates to the Nile.

Theobscure and uninteresting history of Egypt, occu at the time of conquest by Alexander, B.C. 332, with no great kings even, with the exception of Necho, of the twenty-sixth dynasty, B.C. 611,

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DURING THE TIME OF JOSEPH:







JOSEPH BECAME GOVERNOR OF EGYPT


When Joseph was sold by the Midianites to Potiphar, Egypt was probably ruled by the Shepherd kings, who were called Pharaoh, like all the other kings,  Pitiphar (Pet-Pha, dedicated to the sun) was probably the second person in the kingdom. 

Joseph, the Hebrew slave, found favor in his sight, and was gradually promoted to the oversight of his great household. Cast into prison, from the intrigues of Potiphar's wife, whose disgraceful overtures he had virtuously and honorably rejected, he found favor with the keeper of the prison, who intrusted him with the sole care of the prisoners, although himself a prisoner,—a striking proof of his transparent virtue. In process of time two other high officers of the king, having offended him, were cast into the same prison. They had strange dreams. Joseph interpreted them, indicating the speedy return of the one to favor, and of the other to as sudden an execution. These things came to pass. After two years the king himself had a singular dream, and none of the professional magicians or priests of Egypt could interpret it. It then occurred to the chief butler that Joseph, whom he had forgotten and neglected, could interpret the royal dream which troubled him. He told the king of his own dream in prison, and the explanation of it by the Hebrew slave. Whereupon Joseph was sent for, shaven and washed, and clothed with clean raiment to appear in the royal palace, and he interpreted the king's dream, which not only led to his promotion to be governor over Egypt, with the State chariots [pg 044]for his use, and all the emblems of sovereignty about his person—a viceroy whose power was limited only by that of the king—but he was also instrumental in rescuing Egypt from the evils of that terrible famine which for seven years afflicted Western Asia. He was then thirty years of age, 1715 B.C., and his elevation had been earned by the noblest qualities—fidelity to his trusts, patience, and high principle—all of which had doubtless been recounted to the king.


The course which Joseph pursued toward the Egyptians was apparently hard. The hoarded grain of seven years' unexampled plenty was at first sold to the famishing people, and when they had no longer money to buy it, it was only obtained by the surrender of their cattle, and then by the alienation of their land, so that the king became possessed of all the property of the realm, personal as well as real, except that of the priests. But he surrendered the land back again to the people subsequently, on condition of the payment of one-fifth of the produce annually (which remained to the time of Moses)—a large tax, but not so great as was exacted of the peasantry of France by their feudal and royal lords. This proceeding undoubtedly strengthened the power of the Shepherd kings, and prevented insurrections

The severity of the famine compels the brothers of Joseph to seek corn in Egypt. Their arrival of course, is known to the governor, who has unlimited rule. They appear before him, and bowed themselves before him, as was predicted by Joseph's dreams. But clothed in the vesture of princes, with a gold chain around his neck, and surrounded by the pomp of power, they did not know him, while he knows them. He speaks to them, through an interpreter, harshly and proudly, accuses them of being spies, obtains all the information he wanted, and learns that his father and Benjamin are alive. He even imprisons them for three days. He releases them on the condition that they verify their statement; as a proof of which, he demands the appearance of Benjamin himself.


hey return to Canaan with their sacks filled with corn, and the money which they had brought to purchase it, secretly restored, leaving Simeon as surety for the appearance of Benjamin. To this Jacob will not assent. But starvation drives them again to Egypt, the next year, and Jacob, reluctantly is compelled to allow Benjamin to go with them. The unexpected feast which Joseph made for them, sitting himself at another table—the greater portions given to Benjamin, the deception played upon them by the secretion of Joseph's silver cup in Benjamin's sack, as if he were a thief, the distress of all the sons of Jacob, the eloquent pleadings of Judah, the restrained tears of Joseph, the discovery of himself to them, the generosity of Pharaoh, the return of Jacob's children laden not only with corn but presents, the final migration of the whole family, to the land of Goshen, in the royal chariots, and the consummation of Joseph's triumphs, and happiness of Jacob—all these facts and incidents are told by Moses in the most fascinating and affecting narrative ever penned by man. It is absolutely transcendent, showing not only the highest dramatic skill, but revealing the Providence of God—that overruling power which causes good to come from evil, which is the most impressive lesson of all history, in every age. That single episode is worth more to civilization than all the glories of ancient Egypt
Joseph remained the favored viceroy of Egypt until he died, having the supreme satisfaction of seeing the prosperity of his father's house, and their rapid increase in the land of [pg 046]Goshen, on the eastern frontier of the Delta of the Nile,—a land favorable for herds and flocks. The capital of this district was On—afterward Heliopolis, the sacred City of the Sun, a place with which Joseph was especially connected by his marriage with the daughter of the high priest of On. Separated from the Egyptians by their position as shepherds, the children of Jacob retained their patriarchal constitution. In 215 years, they became exceedingly numerous, but were doomed, on the change of dynasty which placed Ramesis on the throne, to oppressive labors. Joseph died at the age of 110—eighty years after he had become governor of Egypt. In his latter years the change in the Egyptian dynasty took place. The oppression of his people lasted eighty years; and this was consummated by the cruel edict which doomed to death the infants of Israel; made, probably, in fear and jealousy from the rapid increase of the Israelites.






But a deliverer was raised up by God in the person of Moses, the greatest man in human annals, when we consider his marvelous intellectual gifts, his great work of legislation, his heroic qualities, his moral excellence, and his executive talents. His genius is more powerfully stamped upon civilization than that of any other one man—not merely on the Jews, but even Christian nations. He was born B.C. 1571, sixty-four years after the death of Joseph. Hidden in his birth, to escape the sanguinary decree of Pharaoh he was adopted by the daughter of the king, and taught by the priests in all the learning of the Egyptians. He was also a great warrior, and gained great victories over the Ethiopians. But seeing the afflictions of his brethren, he preferred to share their lot than enjoy all the advantages of his elevated rank in the palace of the king—an act of self-renunciation unparalleled in history. Seeing an Egyptian [pg 047]smite a Hebrew, he slew him in a burst of indignation, and was compelled to fly. He fled to Jethro, an Arab chieftain, among the Midianites. He was now forty years of age, in the prime of his life, and in the full maturity of his powers. The next forty years were devoted to a life of contemplation, the best preparation for his future duties. In the most secret places of the wilderness of Sinai, at Horeb, he communed with God, who appeared in the burning bush, and revealed the magnificent mission which he was destined to fulfill. He was called to deliver his brethren from bondage; but forty years of quiet contemplation, while tending the flocks of Jethro, whose daughter he married, had made him timid and modest. God renewed the covenant made to Abraham and Jacob, and Moses returned to Egypt to fulfill his mission. He joined himself with Aaron, his brother, and the two went and gathered together all the elders of the children of Israel, and after securing their confidence by signs and wonders, revealed their mission.

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CONQUEST OF CANAAN TO THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE KINGDOM OF DAVID.

The only survivors of the generation that had escaped from Egypt were Caleb and Joshua. All the rest had offended God by murmurings, rebellion, idolatries, and sundry offenses, by which they were not deemed worthy to enter the promised land. Even Moses and Aaron had sinned against the Lord.

after forty years' wanderings, and the children of Israel were encamped on the plains of Moab, Moses finally addressed them, forbidding all intercourse with Jews with other nations, enjoining obedience to God, requiring the utter extirpation of idolatry, and rehearsing in general, the laws which he had previously given them, and which form the substance of the Jewish code, all of which he also committed to writing, and then ascended to the top of Pisgah, over against Jericho, from which he surveyed, all the land of Judah and Napthali, and Manasseh and Gilead unto Dan—the greater part of the land promised unto Abraham. He then died, at the age of 120, B.C. 1451 and no man knew the place of his burial.

The Lord then encouraged Joshua his successor, and the conquest of the country began—by the passage over the Jordan and the fall of Jericho. The manna, with which the Israelites for forty years had been miraculously fed, now was no longer to be had, and supplies of food were obtained from the enemy's country. None of the inhabitants of Jericho were spared except Rahab the harlot, and her father's household, in reward for [pg 057]her secretion of the spy which Joshua had sent into the city. At the city of Ai, the three thousand men sent to take it were repulsed, in punishment for the sin of Achan, who had taken at the spoil of Jericho, a Babylonian garment and three hundred sheckels of silver and a wedge of gold. After he had expiated this crime, the city of Ai was taken, and all its inhabitants were put to death. The spoil of the city was reserved for the nation.

The fall of these two cities alarmed the Hamite nations of Palestine west of the Jordan, and five kings of the Amorites entered into a confederation to resist the invaders. The Gibeonites made a separate peace with the Israelites. Their lives were consequently spared, but they were made slaves forever. Thus was fulfilled the prophecy that Canaan should serve Shem.

Meantime the confederate kings—more incensed with the Gibeonites than with the Israelites, since they were traitors to the general cause, marched against Gibeon, one of the strongest cities of the land. It invoked the aid of Joshua, who came up from Gilgal, and a great battle was fought, and resulted in the total discomfiture of the five Canaanite kings. The cities of Makkedah, Libnah, Gizu, Eglon, Hebron, successively fell into the hands of Joshua, as the result of their victory.

The following year a confederation of the Northern kings, a vast host with horses and chariots, was arrayed against the Israelites; but the forces of the Canaanites were defeated at the “Waters of Merom,” a small lake, formerly the Upper Jordan. This victory was followed by the fall of Hazor, and the conquest of the whole land from Mount Halak to the Valley of Lebanon. Thirty-one kings were smitten “in the mountains, in the plains, in the wilderness, in the south country: the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.” There only remained the Philistines, whose power was formidable. The conquered country was divided among the different tribes, half of which were settled on the [pg 058]west of Jordan. The tabernacle was now removed to Shiloh, in the central hill country between Jordan and the Mediterranean, which had been assigned, to the tribe of Ephraim. Jacob had prophetically declared the ultimate settlements of the twelve tribes in the various sections of the conquered country. The pre-eminence was given to Judah, whose territory was the most considerable, including Jerusalem, the future capital, then in the hands of the Jebusites. The hilly country first fell into the hands of the invaders, while the low lands were held tenaciously by the old inhabitants where their cavalry and war chariots were of most avail.

AFTER JOSHUA:

Joshua, the great captain of the nation, died about the year 1426 B.C., and Shechem, the old abode of Abraham and Jacob, remained the chief city until the fall of Jerusalem. Here the bones of Joseph were deposited, with those of his ancestors.

The nation was ruled by Judges from the death of Joshua for about 330 years—a period of turbulence and of conquest. The theocracy was in full force, administered by the high priests and the council of elders. The people, however, were not perfectly cured of the sin of idolatry, and paid religious veneration to the gods of Phœnicia and Moab. The tribes enjoyed a virtual independence, and central authority was weak. In consequence, there were frequent dissensions and jealousies and encroachments.

The most powerful external enemies of this period were the kings of Mesopotamia, of Moab, and of Hazor, the Midianites, the Amalekites, the Ammonites, and the Philistines. The great heroes of the Israelites in their contests with these people were Othnie, Ehud, Barak, Gideon, Jepthna, and Samson. After the victories of Gideon over the Midianites, and of Jepthna over the ]Ammonites, the northern and eastern tribes enjoyed comparative repose, and when tranquillity was restored Eli seems to have exercised the office of high priest with extraordinary dignity, but his sons were a disgrace and scandal, whose profligacy led the way to the temporary subjection of the Israelites for forty years to the Philistines, who obtained possession of the sacred ark




SAMUEL

A deliverer of the country was raised up in the person of Samuel, the prophet, who obtained an ascendancy over the nation by his purity and moral wisdom. He founded the“School of the Prophets” in Kamah, and to him the people came for advice. He seems to have exercised the office of judge. Under his guidance the Israelites recovered their sacred ark, which the Philistines, grievously tormented by God, sent back in an impulse of superstitious fear. Moreover, these people were so completely overthrown by the Israelites that they troubled them no longer for many years.




 Israel then desired a king. Samuel warned them of the consequences of such a step, and foretold the oppression to which they would be necessarily subject; but they were bent on having a king, like other nations—a man who should lead them on to conquest and dominion. Samuel then, by divine command, granted their request, and selected Saul, of the tribe of Benjamin, as a fit captain to lead the people against the Philistines—the most powerful foe which had afflicted Israel.





SAULUM

Saul, who appeared reluctant to accept the high dignity, was fair and tall, and noble in appearance, patriotic, warlike, generous, affectionate—the type of an ancient hero, but vacillating, jealous, moody, and passionate. He was a man to make conquests, but not to elevate the dignity of the 
nation. Samuel retired into private life, and Saul reigned over the whole people.

His wars with the Philistine.

His first care was to select a chosen band of experienced warriors, and there was need, for the Philistines gathered together a great army, with 30,000 chariots and 6,000 horsemen, and encamped at Michmash. The Israelites, in view of this overwhelming force, hid themselves from fear, in caves and amid the rocks of the mountain fastnesses. In their trouble it was found necessary to offer burnt sacrifices; but Saul, impulsive and assuming, would not wait to have the rites performed according to the divine direction, but offered the sacrifices himself. By this act he disobeyed the fundamental laws which Moses had given, violated, as it were, the constitution; and, as a penalty for this foolish and rash act, Samuel pronounced his future deposition; but God confounded, nevertheless, the armies of the Philistines, and they were routed and scattered. Saul then turned against the Amalekites, and took their king, whom he spared in an impulse of generosity, even though he utterly destroyed his people. Samuel reproved him for this leniency against the divine command, Saul attempted to justify himself by the sacrifice of all the enemies' goods and oxen, to which Samuel said, “Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt sacrifices and offerings as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold! to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams; for rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness as iniquity and idolatry.” Most memorable words! thus setting virtue and obedience over all rites and ceremonies—a final answer to all ritualism and phariseeism.

DAUDUM

David, of the tribe of Judah, after his encounter with Goliath, was the favorite of the people, and was rewarded by a marriage with the daughter of Saul—Michal, who admired his gallantry and heroism. Saul too had dissembled his jealousy, and heaped honors on the man he was determined to destroy. By the aid of his wife, and of Jonathan, and especially protected by God, the young warrior escaped all the snares laid for his destruction, and even spared the life of Saul when he was in his power in the cave of Engedi. He continued loyal to his king, patiently waiting for his future exaltation.

On the death of Saul, he was anointed king over Judah, at Hebron; but the other tribes still adhered to the house of Saul. A civil war ensued, during which Abner, the captain-general of the late king, was treacherously murdered, and also Ishboseth, the feeble successor of Saul. The war lasted seven and a half years, when all the tribes gave their allegiance to David, who then fixed his seat at Jerusalem, which he had wrested from the Jebusites, and his illustrious reign began, when he was thirty years of age, B.C. 1048, after several years of adversity and trial


 Bathsheba
David, the greatest warrior that his nation has produced. In successive campaigns, extending over thirty years, he reduced the various Canaanite nations that remained unconquered—the Amalekites, the Moabites, the Philistines, the Edomites, and the Syrians of Tobah. Hiram, king of Tyre, was his ally. His kingdom extended from the borders of Egypt to the Euphrates, and from the valley of Cœlo-Syria to the eastern gulf of the Red Sea. But his reign, if glorious and successful, was marked by troubles. He was continually at war; his kingdom was afflicted with a plague as the punishment for his vanity in numbering the people; his son Amnon disgraced him; Absalom, his favorite son, revolted and was slain; he himself was expelled for a time from his capital




SOLOMON
The reign of Solomon is most distinguished for the magnificent Temple he erected in Jerusalem, after the designs furnished by his father, aided by the 
friendship of the Phœnicians. This edifice, “beautiful for situation—the joy of the whole earth,” was the wonder of those times, and though small compared with subsequent Grecian temples, was probably more profusely ornamented with gold, silver, and precious woods, than any building of ancient times. We have no means of knowing its architectural appearance, in the absence of all plans and all ruins, and much ingenuity has been expended in conjectures, which are far from satisfactory. It most probably resembled an Egyptian temple, modified by Phœnician artists. It had an outer court for worshipers and their sacrifices, and an inner court for the ark and the throne of Jehovah, into which the high priest alone entered, and only once a year. It was erected upon a solid platform of stone, having a resemblance to the temples of Paestum. The portico, as rebuilt, in the time of Herod, was 180 feet high, and the temple itself was entered by nine gates thickly coated with silver and gold. The inner sanctuary was covered on all sides by plates of gold, and was dazzling to the eye. It was connected with various courts and porticoes which gave to it an imposing appearance. Its consecration by Solomon, amid the cloud of glories in which Jehovah took possession of it, and the immense body of musicians and singers, was probably the grandest religious service ever performed. That 30,000 men were employed by Solomon, in hewing timber on Mount Lebanon, and 70,000 more in hewing stones, would indicate a very extensive and costly edifice. The stones which composed the foundation were of extraordinary size, and rivaled the greatest works of the Egyptians. The whole temple was overlaid with gold—a proof of its extraordinary splendor, and it took seven years to build it.

Queen of Sheba
The palace of Solomon must also have been of great magnificence, on which the resources of his kingdom were employed for thirteen years. He moreover built a palace for his wife, the daughter of Pharaoh, composed of costly stones, the foundation-stones of which were fifteen feet 
in length, surrounded with beautiful columns. But these palaces did not include all his works, for the courts of the temple were ornamented with brazen pillars, with elaborate capitals, brazen seas standing upon bronze oxen, brazen bases ornamented with figures of various animals, brazen layers, one of which contained forty baths, altars of gold, tables, candelabras, basins, censers and other sacred vessels of pure gold,—all of which together were of enormous expense and great beauty.