1 Kings, Chapter 7 (part 2) - From War to Holy | Prophets of Israel Daily

[music] >> Shalom friends and welcome back to the Prophets of Israel daily. This is the book of Kings >> [music] >> chapter 7 part two brought to you by the Land of Israel network at the landofisrael.com. So yesterday we opened chapter 7 13 years for Solomon's Palace seven for the house of God. We met Hiram the craftsman with one foot inside Israel and one foot outside of it whose hands shaped the vessels of the temple and we ended standing between two free standing bronze pillars at the entrance of the sanctuary Yakhin and Boaz holding nothing up and announcing so much. And and we left you with one question. Where did all that bronze come from? Now I'm going to try to answer that today but the text makes us walk past one more object first and I don't think it's an accident. Verse 23. And he made the molten sea 10 cubits from brim to brim round in form. And I don't mean sea like the Mediterranean Sea. The sea we're talking about here was a massive round basin cast of bronze. 10 cubits across resting on 12 bronze oxen. It stood upon this is verse 25. It stood upon 12 oxen three facing north three facing west three facing south and three facing east 12 oxen. And while the text doesn't explicitly tell us they represent 12 tribes it's almost impossible for an Israelite reader not to hear that echo. 12 tribes facing outward in every direction carrying the waters of purification on their back. And why call it why call a basin a sea because of its extraordinary size. It was It was essentially a vast reservoir of water standing in the temple courtyard. And that's the main reason and that image is extraordinary. The The tribes of Israel turned outward in every direction bearing the water that makes the service possible. >> You know Ari, I want to stay on those oxen for just a second because the direction they're facing is doing something. They're not facing in, they're not gathered around the water admiring it. They're standing with their backs to it facing out northwest, southeast, every direction a person could come from which means the water that makes the service of the house possible is being carried by 12 tribes who are oriented toward the world. And that's the argument of this entire chapter. The cedars from Lebanon, a craftsman whose father came from Tyre, a pillar named for the man who married Ruth. And now the tribes themselves positioned facing outward in all four directions. The children of Israel are carrying a burden, carrying the load. What are we carrying? The water. The Torah, the life-giving water pointed in all directions to bring the living waters of Torah, of purity, of life, and everything else the water represents to the world. And I think about how much of Jewish history the Jewish people have spent with our backs to the world. And we had reasons. We had to survive. We had 2,000 years of very good reasons, but we're not in that chapter of history anymore. We're back in the land of Israel. We're back in the mountains of Judea, and the posture the temple describes is 12 tribes facing outward, carrying water. That's not a memory. I believe that's an assignment. >> I believe that, too, Jeremy. And that is pretty much what's brought us together for the last 300 years? How long have we been partners? >> 25, 36, 75. How old are you? >> Yeah, that's true, you know. And And now And now here's the detail that changed this entire chapter for me. Where did the bronze come from? Well, the Book of Chronicles tells us plainly, "From Tibhath and from Cun, the cities of Hadadezer, David took a great quantity of bronze. With it Solomon made the bronze sea, the pillars, and the bronze vessels." That's from chapter 18 of the Book of Chronicles, the First Book of Chronicles. And now, do you understand, Jeremy, what that means? The metal standing at the gate of the temple, Jachin and Boaz, the basin, the vessels, came from David's wars. It was the spoils of battle, the hard, bloody material cost of securing this kingdom. And Solomon took that bronze, melted it down, and poured it into the vessels of holiness. And that is um I don't think that's a metaphor. That's transformation that That's transformation that we actually see with our eyes, that physically happened. The bronze that came through the wars is the same bronze that ended up standing in the presence of God. And I don't know how anyone reads that in our generation and doesn't feel it like a knot in their chest, like feel it in your stomach, because we have been going through 2 years of war. We have buried people we love, families have been shattered, soldiers have carried things home with them in their hearts and in their minds that nobody can can imagine. An entire generation has been fundamentally changed and scarred on on so many levels by what we've been through. And and the the question in front of us right now today is precisely Solomon's question. What do we pour all of that into? Because pain can become hardness or anger or resentment or it can become grief, it can become cynicism. That is actually that's the path of least resistance. That's the I think the natural way. From my experience it seems like that's the most normal outcome of the at least the levels of pain and grief that we're talking about. Or through sheer will and unwavering faith and Hashem's help, it can be melted down and poured into something that holds the living waters of the temple itself. >> You know, Ari, I just have to stop here because that is actually the choice that's in front of our nation right now. It's not only a political choice, it's a spiritual choice. The danger after a war like this October 7th three-year war is that the pain hardens us. But there's a possibility, there's potential that it transforms us. And I've watching that transformation happen before our eyes. People showing up to Torah classes who never opened up a safer, they never opened up a book in their lives. Reservists coming home and making kiddush with their families when they didn't do that before. The pop music in Israel is so biblical now, so emunadic. Communities rebuilding in the exact places where they were attacked, but this time the village Kissufim, while they're rebuilding from the ashes that the Hamas left behind, they're building a synagogue at the very center of the community where a shul never existed before. People have been asking questions that they weren't asking on October 6th. Who are we? Why are we in this land? What is all of this for? That's bronze being melted. That's happening right now. And here's what I think is so important about the way the text tells it. Solomon didn't hide where the bronze came from. He didn't pretend the kingdom was built on nothing but song and prayer. The metal came from Hadadezer's cities. The cities in Syria that David went to war with, conquered, and everybody knew it. He didn't erase the war, he repurposed it. >> Yeah, yeah, that's right, he did. And and then the chapter ends with Solomon finishing what his father began. Verse 51. And all the work that King Solomon did for the house of the Lord was completed. And Solomon brought in the sacred things of David his father. Right, David gathered, Solomon built. David never got to see it, at least not with human physical eyes in this world. He wanted that house more than anyone. And when God told him that he wouldn't be the one to build it, David didn't say, "Fine, well then it's not my problem." He didn't say that. He gathered anyways, the silver, the gold, the bronze, everything he could place into the hands of a generation that would come after him. He spent his life preparing for a house that he himself would never walk into. >> You know, the that last verse is one of the most important lines about how the Geulah moves forward, about how redemption moves forward. Because David's being told in very plain language that the thing he wants most in the world is going to is just not going to happen. It's not going to happen to him. And he keeps gathering. That's the test. Not whether you'll work for something you believe in, it's whether you'll work for something you believe in when you already know you're not going to be in the room when it's finished. And that is the story of every generation that got us back here. The people who brought the swamp land that they never farmed. They just collected money in little pushkas and little blue boxes. And they bought land that they would never see. The ones who learned Hebrew as adults and spoke diligently to their children so their grandchildren could dream in Hebrew. The ones who fell in '48 and '67 and never saw what their children would build on the ground that they liberated. They gathered and we're building in Ari, we're gathering right now for people we're never going to meet. >> Maybe. Maybe we don't really know. There's a good chance what you're saying is true and maybe it could be tomorrow. But the point is what you're saying at its essence is one of the deepest lessons in this entire story. Because every one of us is holding something a previous generation gathered and never got to see completed. Our fathers gathered, they fought wars and buried friends. They built a state, an army, cities, roads, vineyards. They carried things through history that they themselves never got to see completed. And now some of that material is in our hands. And we're gathering things right now that maybe we won't see completed either. That's how redemption works. One generation gathers, another generation builds. So here's the question I think that chapter 7 perhaps leaves us with. What are we going to build with what was handed to us? Because redemption doesn't mean pretending the battles never happened. It doesn't mean forgetting the pain. It means taking everything the Jewish people have survived, every war, every exile, every sacrifice, every generation that gathered and dreamed and never got to see the house completed and building with it. David gathered, Solomon built. And now the question is whether we leave what we inherited as bronze from the battlefield or whether we melt it down and pour it into something holy, transforming it into the home of the living God of Israel. The choice [music] The choice is ours. Hashem, please bless us to choose wisely. Hazak u'barukh, my friends. B'ezrat Hashem, we'll see you tomorrow for chapter 8 with Jeremy, [music] where the ark finally comes home.