Summary

The verses before us give us two pieces of information. The first of these is the kind of sacrifices that Solomon and the people offered. The second is the number of each kind of animal that they offered.

The offerings are named peace offerings in our translation, but Paul House suggests they may be called fellowship offerings.¹ House also suggests that the nature of the sacrifices indicates that in addition to the dedication, the occasion was also the Feast of Tabernacles (perhaps better known as the Feast of Booths).

In the book of Exodus, we find that this kind of offering was made as a contribution to the priests, and the regulations associated with these offerings are found in Leviticus 3:1–17 and Leviticus 7:1–38.

The emphasis of this kind of sacrifice appears to be a covenantal one; this centred on the unity that existed through the covenant between God and his people. Even though the word sin or trespass is not given to the peace offering, it was recognized as a blood sacrifice in which the death of a victim occurred. As such, it along with the other blood sacrifices pointed to Jesus Christ and the shedding of his blood as the blood of the new covenant.

The number of animals mentioned may seem overwhelming. This fact has caused some commentators to regard the numbers as an overstatement or a scribal insertion that was not found in the original text. There is, however, no reason to accept these suggestions, since the Bible reports other occasions of great numbers of sacrificial offerings. In addition, the very next verse records the consecration of the middle of the court for the very reason that the number of offerings exceeded the capacity of the bronze altar to handle the sacrifices.