whatever prayer and supplication is made by any man, or by all your people Israel, who shall each know the plague of his own heart, and spread out his hands toward this house,
Parallel Translations
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whatever prayer and supplication is made by any man, or by all your people Israel, who shall each know the plague of his own heart, and spread out his hands toward this house,
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What prayer and supplication soever be made by any man, or by all thy people Israel, which shall know every man the plague of his own heart, and spread forth his hands toward this house:
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what prayer and supplication soever be made by any man of all Thy people Israel, who shall know every man the plague of his own heart, and spread forth his hands toward this house;
Cross-references (20)
Passages linked to 1 Kings 8:38 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- 1 Kings 8:22 Solomon stood before Yahweh’s altar in the presence of all the assembly of Israel, and spread out his hands toward heaven;
- Psalms 73:21-22 For my soul was grieved. I was embittered in my heart. I was so senseless and ignorant. I was a brute beast before you.
- Amos 7:1-6 Thus the Lord Yahweh showed me: and behold, he formed locusts in the beginning of the shooting up of the latter growth; and behold, it was the latter growth after the king’s harvest. When they finished eating the grass of the land, then I said, “Lord Yahweh, forgive, I beg you! How could Jacob stand? For he is small.” Yahweh relented concerning this. “It shall not be,” says Yahweh. Thus the Lord Yahweh showed me and behold, the Lord Yahweh called for judgment by fire; and it dried up the great deep, and would have devoured the land. Then I said, “Lord Yahweh, stop, I beg you! How could Jacob stand? For he is small.” Yahweh relented concerning this. “This also shall not be,” says the Lord Yahweh.
- Philippians 4:6 In nothing be anxious, but in everything, by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God.
- 2 Chronicles 20:5-13 Jehoshaphat stood in the assembly of Judah and Jerusalem, in Yahweh’s house, before the new court; and he said, “Yahweh, the God of our fathers, aren’t you God in heaven? Aren’t you ruler over all the kingdoms of the nations? Power and might are in your hand, so that no one is able to withstand you. Didn’t you, our God, drive out the inhabitants of this land before your people Israel, and give it to the offspring of Abraham your friend forever? They lived in it, and have built you a sanctuary in it for your name, saying, ‘If evil comes on us—the sword, judgment, pestilence, or famine—we will stand before this house, and before you (for your name is in this house), and cry to you in our affliction, and you will hear and save.’ Now, behold, the children of Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir, whom you would not let Israel invade when they came out of the land of Egypt, but they turned away from them, and didn’t destroy them; behold, how they reward us, to come to cast us out of your possession, which you have given us to inherit. Our God, will you not judge them? For we have no might against this great company that comes against us. We don’t know what to do, but our eyes are on you.” All Judah stood before Yahweh, with their little ones, their wives, and their children.
- Psalms 42:6 My God, my soul is in despair within me. Therefore I remember you from the land of the Jordan, the heights of Hermon, from the hill Mizar.
- Psalms 42:9 I will ask God, my rock, “Why have you forgotten me? Why do I go mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?”
- Psalms 42:11 Why are you in despair, my soul? Why are you disturbed within me? Hope in God! For I shall still praise him, the saving help of my countenance, and my God.
- Psalms 50:15 Call on me in the day of trouble. I will deliver you, and you will honor me.”
- Psalms 91:15 He will call on me, and I will answer him. I will be with him in trouble. I will deliver him, and honor him.
- Psalms 142:3-5 When my spirit was overwhelmed within me, you knew my route. On the path in which I walk, they have hidden a snare for me. Look on my right, and see; for there is no one who is concerned for me. Refuge has fled from me. No one cares for my soul. I cried to you, Yahweh. I said, “You are my refuge, my portion in the land of the living.”
- Proverbs 14:10 The heart knows its own bitterness and joy; he will not share these with a stranger.
- Isaiah 1:15 When you spread out your hands, I will hide my eyes from you. Yes, when you make many prayers, I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood.
- Isaiah 37:4 It may be Yahweh your God will hear the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master has sent to defy the living God, and will rebuke the words which Yahweh your God has heard. Therefore lift up your prayer for the remnant that is left.’ ”
- Isaiah 37:15-21 Hezekiah prayed to Yahweh, saying, “Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, who is enthroned among the cherubim, you are the God, even you alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth. You have made heaven and earth. Turn your ear, Yahweh, and hear. Open your eyes, Yahweh, and behold. Hear all of the words of Sennacherib, who has sent to defy the living God. Truly, Yahweh, the kings of Assyria have destroyed all the countries and their land, and have cast their gods into the fire; for they were no gods, but the work of men’s hands, wood and stone; therefore they have destroyed them. Now therefore, Yahweh our God, save us from his hand, that all the kingdoms of the earth may know that you are Yahweh, even you only.” Then Isaiah the son of Amoz sent to Hezekiah, saying, “Yahweh, the God of Israel says, ‘Because you have prayed to me against Sennacherib king of Assyria,
- Joel 2:17 Let the priests, the ministers of Yahweh, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, “Spare your people, Yahweh, and don’t give your heritage to reproach, that the nations should rule over them. Why should they say among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?’ ”
- 2 Chronicles 6:29 whatever prayer and supplication is made by any man, or by all your people Israel, who will each know his own plague and his own sorrow, and shall spread out his hands toward this house;
- Job 7:11 “Therefore I will not keep silent. I will speak in the anguish of my spirit. I will complain in the bitterness of my soul.
- Psalms 32:3-4 When I kept silence, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy on me. My strength was sapped in the heat of summer.
- Romans 7:24 What a wretched man I am! Who will deliver me out of the body of this death?
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (11 sources)
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain For such are most meet to receive God’s mercies.
For such are most meet to receive God’s mercies.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 1Ki 8:38 What prayer and supplication soever be [made]…
1Ki 8:38 What prayer and supplication soever be [made] by any man, [or] by all thy people Israel, which shall know every man the plague of his own heart, and spread forth his hands toward this house:
Ver. 38. Which shall know every man the plague of his own heart.] His own iniquity; {Psa 18:23} the cause of his calamity; as he well understandeth, when sin and wrath meet in the soul, and make a wound in it: the cure whereof he seeketh of God by prayer, which hath a pacifying property, and fetcheth out the stain and sting of sin.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain The plague of his own heart, i.e. either,
The plague of his own heart, i.e. either,
1. His sin, which may be called the plague of his heart, in opposition to the other plagues here mentioned, which afflict only the body, or outward man; so the sense is, Who by their afflictions are brought to a true and serious sense of their worse and inward plague of their sins, which are most fitly called the plague of the heart, because that is both the principal seat of sin, and the fountain from whence all actual sins flow, Mat 15:19. Or rather,
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2. His affliction; for so this is explained in the parallel place, 2Ch 6:29, (which is the more considerable, because that book was written after this, to explain what was dark or doubtful, and to supply what was lacking in this,) when every one shall know his own sore, and his own grief; which is not unfitly called the plague of his heart, because it was that plague which his heart was most afflicted with, which pained him at the very heart, as the phrase is, Jer 4:19; compare Psa 55:4; which caused him most vexation or grief, which is a passion of the heart: and so the sense is, Who shall know, i.e. be duly and deeply sensible of his affliction, and the hand of God in it; and his sin as the cause of it; for words of knowledge in Scripture do very frequently note such a kind of knowledge as affects and changeth the heart, and reforms the whole course of a man’s life; for which cause, men of ungodly lives are frequently said in Scripture not to know God, or Christ, or his word, &c. And therefore no man knows his sore in a Scripture sense but he who bears the rod, who turneth unto him that smiteth him, and sincerely seeketh to the Lord for relief.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain What prayer and supplication soever,.... On account of any…
What prayer and supplication soever,.... On account of any of the above things, or any other:
be made by any man, or by all the people Israel; by a private man, for such an one might go to the temple and pray by himself; see Luk 18:10 or by the public congregation:
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which shall know every man the plague of his own heart; be sensible of his sin as the cause of his distress, and own it, though ever so privately committed, which none knows but God and his own heart; and which may be only an heart sin, not actually committed; as all sin is originally in the heart, and springs from it, that is the source of all wickedness; it may respect the corruption of nature, indwelling sin, which truly deserves this name, and which every good man is led to observe, confess, and bewail, Psa 51:4. In Ch2 6:29 it is,
shall know his own sore and his own grief; what particularly affects him, and gives him pain and sorrow, as every man best knows his own affliction and trouble, and so can best represent his own case to the Lord:
and spread forth his hands towards this house; pray with his face towards it, and his hands spread out, a prayer gesture, and what was now used by Solomon, Kg1 8:22.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain The plague - His sin, which may be called…
The plague - His sin, which may be called the plague of his heart, in opposition to the other plagues here mentioned; so the sense is, who, by their afflictions are brought to a true and serious sense of their worse and inward plague of their sins, which are most fitly called the plague of the heart, because that is both the principal seat of sin, and the fountain from whence all actual sins flow.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain 1Ki 8:38. What prayer and supplication soever be made…
1Ki 8:38. What prayer and supplication soever be made by any man — Distressed through national calamities, or private and personal troubles. He now comes to speak of the case of individual Israelites. If any man of Israel has an errand to thee, here let him find thee, here let him find favour with thee. He does not instance in particulars; so numerous, so various are the grievances of the children of men. Which shall know every man the plague of his own heart — His sinfulness, the corruption of his nature, which may be called the plague of his own heart, in opposition to the other plagues here mentioned: and so the sense is, Who by their afflictions are brought to a true and serious sense of the inward plague of their sins, which are most fitly called the plague of the heart, because the heart is both the principal seat of sin, and the fountain from whence all sinful thoughts, words, and actions flow. Now every true Israelite labours to know his heart, and the sinfulness and depravity of it, that he may resist and mortify the lusts, passions, and corrupt inclinations thereof, and may watch against the first risings of evil within him. Of these things he complains: these drive him to his knees and to the sanctuary, and, lamenting and seeking deliverance from these, he spreads forth his hands in prayer, as Hezekiah spread his letter before the Lord. Reader, is this thy practice?
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Know every man the plague of his own heart…
Know every man the plague of his own heart - i. e. perceive one’s sinfulness, or recognize one’s sufferings as divine chastisements, and sin as their cause.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Heart: his offence. Septuagint Greek: aphen, "touching, or compunction."…
Heart: his offence. Septuagint Greek: aphen, "touching, or compunction." (Haydock) --- Let a man go to the source of the evil, and be sorry for his sins. (Calmet)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 38. The plague of his own heart — That…
38. The plague of his own heart — That particular form of misfortune, pain, moral darkness, and confusion of spirit, which each man may recognise for himself as a Divine judgment upon him for his sins. Happy he who is able to discern the plague of his own heart, and by timely repentance escapes a hopeless ruin!
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 38. which shall know every man the plague of…
38. which shall know every man the plague of his own heart] i.e. The special infliction which is sent to him for his own correction, and for the relief of which he only can fitly pray.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain What prayer and supplication soever There is here a…
What prayer and supplication soever There is here a studied reference to the preceding words. Lit., every prayer, etc. We might render in ver. 37, "Whatsoever the plague," etc., and here, "Whatsoever the prayer," etc. be made by any man, or by all thy people Israel, which shall know every man the plague of his own heart Here again there is an unmistakeable reference to the "plague" (same word) of ver. 37. The plague of the heart is the inner smart of the conscience corresponding with and perhaps more painful than the smiting of the person. The meaning obviously is that the prayers will vary. according to the various mental and physical sufferings of men, and spread forth his hands see on ver. 22 toward this house.
HOMILIES BY J. WAITE Vers. 38, 39.
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The Praying King.
One of the most remarkable features of this scene of the dedication of the temple is the place occupied, the part performed, in it by Solomon himself. He is the central figure, the chief actor. Both priest and prophet give place to him. The dedicatory prayer is a spontaneous effusion of his own devout feeling, and it is he who pronounces afterwards the benediction on the people. He stands before us here as a true type of that greater "Son of David," who is our Prophet, Priest, and King. There is a great deal in the tone of this prayer that betokens a soul fully alive to the solemn and momentous meaning of what was taking place in Jerusalem that day. It is not, indeed, to the service of the ancient Jewish temple that we should look for the most perfect models of devotion. New Testament revelations multiply and strengthen immeasurably our motives to prayer, enlarge its scope, open to us new grounds of assurance in it. "One greater than Solomon" has taught us how to pray, and revealed to us the path to acceptance in the merit of His own mediation. But as the life of religion in the soul of man is essentially the same in all ages, so the principles involved in prayer as the expression of it are the same. Two such rudimentary principles appear in this passage, viz., the sense of need prompting the suppliant to look heavenwards, and the recognition of something out of himself as the ground of hope for acceptance.
I THE SENSE OF NEED, etc. It is the "plague of the heart the burden resting heavy there, the haunting sense of want or sadness in the secret soul, coupled with some kind of faith in Divine power that moves men to pray. All true prayer is the utterance of these inward impressions. If much of our so called praying were subjected to this test, it is to be feared that it would be found very hollow and unreal, mere "words," a mere formal homage to custom no deep, earnest, irrepressible longing of the soul inspiring it. Solomon begins to enumerate different calamities that may impel the people to pray, and then, as if overpowered by the mere vague, distant imagination of these possibilities, he says, "Whatsoever plague, whatsoever sickness," etc. How soon are we lost in the attempt to realize the manifold troubles of human life. We can understand and sympathize with individual griefs, but who can comprehend at all adequately the general sum of human woe, and take the weight of it sympathetically upon himself? Every man, however, knows where the universal evil specially touches himself. "Every heart knows its own bitterness." And with God there is both an infinite acquaintance with the whole and a special sympathy with each. There are some griefs that you lock up in your own bosom as secrets that none else must look upon.
"Not e"en the dearest heart, and next our own, Knows half the reasons why we smile or sigh.
But there is no grief you can conceal from Him. He became in the person of His Son "the man of sorrows and acquainted with grief," that we might feel how He follows us, or rather, goes before us, in every path of suffering. There is room in the great fatherly heart of God for us all, with all our burdens, and we can never measure the uplifting and sustaining power that comes to us by casting ourselves and them upon it everything by prayer and supplication," etc.; (Php_4:6, 7) "Cast thy burden upon the Lord," etc. (Psa_55:22) But this expression, "to plague of his own heart," has a deeper meaning. It opens to us all the dark sad mystery of personal sinfulness, the moral disease that lurks within. There are times when the most careless, reckless spirit has glimpses of the unwelcome truth that this, after all, is the deepest cause of its disquietude. The multiform, mysterious evil of the world has its central root in the world"s heart. Something of that "root of all bitterness" is in every human heart. Here lies the fatal mischief. It is not the tribulations of outward life, it is yourself you have most reason to mourn over. Not so much from them, but from something in yourself you have need to pray to be delivered. Christ always taught, By word and deed, the vital connection between the external calamities and the internal "plague." He took upon Him our sicknesses and sorrows, not only to show us how they may be nobly borne, but that He might bring His power as the Great Physician of souls to Bear upon the seat of our deadly disease, and by the efficacy of His blood might heal and save us all. Go penitently in His name to the mercy seat with the "plague of your heart," and you shall be redeemed from it.
II THE RECOGNITION OF SOMETHING OUT OF ONE"S SELF AS THE GROUND OF HOPE. This essential element in true prayer is suggested by the words, "And shall stretch forth his hands towards this place." An interesting view is here given us of the relation of the temple to the individual religious life of the people. It was intended to be a witness to the unseen, a help to faith, an incentive to all holy thought and feeling. It stood through all the changes of time, the shifting lights and shadows of the world around it, as an impressive symbol of the "everlasting covenant." It enshrined the "sure mercies of David." Within its hallowed enclosure were gathered the sacred historic records and relies, and the types and shadows of "better things to come." It told both of what God had done and what He had promised the monument of the glorious past, the prophecy of the brighter future. There was deep meaning, then, in the suppliant "stretching forth his hands towards that house," as expressive of the attitude of his soul towards that which it symbolized. When some lonely worshipper in a distant corner of the land, some patient sufferer, some soldier in his agony on the field of battle, some captive, like Daniel, in a strange country, directed his eyes towards the holy place, it was a sort of pathetic appeal to God s own faithfulness, a silent but eloquent plea that He would not forget His covenant, would fulfil the hopes that He Himself had awakened, and not for their sakes alone, but for His own truth and mercy"s sake, would hear and save. In all this the temple was a type of something nobler, diviner than itself. The temple was the shadow, the substance is in Christ. "In him are hid all the treasures," etc. The cross of Christ, in which all the promises are confirmed and sealed; the cross, which is both the altar of the Redeemer"s sacrifice and the throne of His sovereignty, is the shrine of "truth and grace" to men. The glory alike of the past and of the future is centred, focussed there.
"All the light of sacred story Gathers round its head sublime," and from it there streams forth an ever-brightening radiance into the otherwise dark futurity. It stands the connecting link between heaven and earth, the meeting place of God and man, the key to all human history, the basis of our immortal hope. Here, then, on this central object alike of Divine and human interest, must the eye of the suppliant be fixed. It is that pledge of Divine love and faithfulness, external to ourselves, embodied in the cross of Christ, that we must plead if we would find acceptance in our prayer. When God has thoroughly taught us what the "plague of our own heart" means, and has unveiled to us the blessed mystery of His mode of curing it, it will be the sustained habit of our life to stand as suppliants before Him "in the name of Jesus." Thus alone can we so link ourselves with the sanctities of a higher world as to make our common life Divine. W.
HOMILIES BY E. DE PRESSENSE Ver. 38.
The consecration of the temple was the grandest religious ceremony of the old covenant. It is important
I BECAUSE IT CENTRALIZES THE WORSHIP OF THE THEOCRACY.
II BECAUSE IT SUPPLIES A TYPE OF THE SPIRITUAL TEMPLE which is to be reared in the Church and in every Christian soul. Solomon, as the king chosen of God, represents in this service of consecration the entire theocracy. The temple is essentially a house of prayer, as is manifest from the words of the consecration. "What prayer and supplication soever be made by any man, or by all thy people Israel, which shall know every man the plague of his own heart hear thou in heaven." It is the sanctuary of the invisible God, and its gates stand open to the multitude, who come to worship and to offer sacrifice. Instead of a statue, such as was found in the idol temples, the priests of the true God place in their sanctuary the ark of the covenant, containing the law, the Divine expression of the holy will of God. The altar of sacrifice, placed in front of the sanctuary, reminds the people of their transgressions, while at the same time the sacrifice of the victims is prophetic of the future redemption. The consecrating prayer opens and closes with adoration. It spreads before God all the wants of the people, and asks from Him deliverance in every time of need. (1Ki_9:8) It enumerates first temporal distresses, but the whole petition culminates in the ever-recurring pleading for forgiveness. This is the burden of the whole temple service, and this character is reproduced in Christian worship. In the time of its highest spirituality there were no properly consecrated Christian temples. Aras non habemus said Minutius Felix. A temple is nevertheless a necessity of worship; and we are free to recognize this apart from any superstitious notion, and remembering that while the heaven of heavens cannot contain the Most High, He yet condescends to dwell in the humble and contrite heart. There has been no longer a sanctuary in the old exclusive sense, since the blood was shed which has redeemed the whole earth to God. Our houses of prayer are not now more holy in themselves than our homes. Let us consecrate them by consecrating ourselves to God, and rendering to Him the worship which is His due the sacrifice of our whole being. Let our prayers, like that of Solomon, begin and end with adoration, and let the burden of them be the expression of our repentance for sin. Let them have, like the prayer of the theocratic king, s breadth of intercession for the whole people of God, and let them lay at the foot of the cross the burden of the woes of humanity and the needs of the Church. E. de P.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.