I Kings 8: Party on Shlomo

It is party time in Jerusalem. The Temple iscomplete. The Ark and some of the vessels are now in their new (hopefully)permanent home in the Temple. Shlomo composes an epic prayer asking God tolisten to the supplications of the people in the Temple. The people gathertogether in the Temple courtyard and sacrifice so many animals that everyoneloses count. “So Solomon and all Israel with him—a great assemblage, [coming]from Lebo-hamath to the Wadi of Egypt—observed the Feast at that time beforethe LORD our God, seven days and again seven days, fourteen days in all” (verse65).  Why does the verse say they ate anddrank for seven days and yet another seven days? Why not just say fourteendays? The Talmud in Moed Katan 9a explains that these were two distinct sevenday periods. The first was for the dedication of the Temple, and the secondseven was for the Holiday of Sukkot. The reason the two weeks are separate isto teach the principle of not mixing two happy occasions together. For example,one should not schedule a wedding on a holiday. The Talmud posits that perhapsthe fact that Shlomo did not have the dedication ceremony on Sukkot was becausethe Temple was finished earlier, and slowing down the building would be aviolation of the principle that one should not delay in doing mitzvot. In theend, the Talmud concludes that the fact that the verse lists the two seven-dayperiods separately is proof that the issue here is mixing happy occasions. Itis also possible that the celebration was meant to last seven days. Both thePassover and Sukkot holidays are seven days, as was the dedication of theTabernacle. Perhaps the text is explaining that the people were so overjoyedwith the completion of the Temple that they decided to stay an additional sevendays. This structure would mimic the idea of Shmini Atzeret- a holiday that isadded on to Sukkot as a bonus day for celebration. Here, the book of Chroniclesprovides a little more context: “On the twenty-third day of the seventh monthhe dismissed the people to their homes, rejoicing and in good spirits over thegoodness that the LORD had shown to David and Solomon and His people Israel” (IIChronicles 7:10). Radak, Metzudat David, and Malbim all emphasize that theverse deliberately preserves the distinction between the two seven-day periods.The people were not simply celebrating for fourteen consecutive days. Rather,they experienced two different occasions of joy: first the dedication of theTemple and then the festival of Sukkot. Perhaps this is why the Navi resistscombining them into a single number. The completion of the Temple was not meantto replace the existing holidays of the Torah, but to stand alongside them. Thepeople therefore celebrated the new House of God for seven days and thenimmediately turned to celebrate one of God's oldest festivals for anotherseven. In this way, the Temple was woven into the existing fabric of Jewishlife rather than becoming a celebration unto itself