1 Kings5:7–12

The same two kings, the same two woods, one chapter later verbal / quotation: confirmed

1 Kings 9:11 revisits this exact arrangement from the far end, recalling that Hiram king of Tyre had supplied Solomon with cedar and cypress logs and gold, as much as he desired. The Verifier records three shared lexemes, and two of them are uncommon: חִירָם (H2438, in 21 verses) and בְּרוֹשׁ (H1265, in 20 verses), alongside H8010 Solomon. ⚙ Chapter 9 then narrates what this section leaves out, that Solomon paid a further price in twenty Galilean cities which Hiram found unsatisfactory (9:12-13). Read together, the two passages give the alliance's full arc, from Hiram's delight in 5:7 to his displeasure in 9:12. This synthesis names the verbal link as the Verifier computed it and makes no claim of literary dependence in either direction; it is one author's vocabulary describing one continuing relationship.

1 Kings 9:11 · 1 Kings 9:12

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H2438 Chîyrâm (in 21 vv) and H1265 bᵉrôwsh (in 20 vv), both rare, plus H8010 Shᵉlômôh (in 263 vv). Two rare shared lexemes, not a quotation; the tier records verbal overlap only.

Hiram built David's house first structural / thematic: confirmed

Before Hiram sent cedar for the temple he sent cedar for a palace. 2 Samuel 5:11 and its parallel 1 Chronicles 14:1 both record that “Hiram king of Tyre sent messengers to David, along with cedar logs, carpenters, and stonemasons, and they built a palace for David.” The Verifier returns H2438 Chîyrâm (in 21 vv) and H6086 ʻêts (in 288 vv) as the shared basis. ⚙ The link is real but its evidential weight is modest: a shared proper name is weak ground for a verbal claim, and ʻêts is common. What the pairing does establish is the ground of Hiram's gladness in 5:7. Benson and Poole both say he rejoiced because he was “a faithful friend to David and to his house,” and this is the text that made him one. The relationship Solomon inherits is older than Solomon.

2 Samuel 5:11 · 1 Chronicles 14:1

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H2438 Chîyrâm (in 21 vv) and H6086 ʻêts (in 288 vv). Downgraded from verbal: the rare lexeme is a proper name and the other is common, so the link is one of shared subject matter, not of wording.

The other Hiram, the man of bronze structural / thematic: confirmed

The Verifier returns 1 Kings 7:13 and 7:40, 7:45 among the closest matches to this section, all on H2438 with H8010. But the Hiram of chapter 7 is a different man: a craftsman from Tyre, son of a widow of Naphtali, sent to cast the bronze work. K&D notices the seam from the other side, observing that Solomon had also asked for a skilled artisan according to 2 Chronicles 2, “which is passed over here, so that it is only in 1 Kings 7:13-14 that we find a supplementary notice that Hiram had sent one.” ⚙ The shared name is exactly why this pairing must not be tiered as a verbal link to the king: the Verifier's lexeme match is real, and the referent is not the same person. This is a case where a computed basis is true and the obvious inference from it would be false.

1 Kings 7:13 · 1 Kings 7:40

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H2438 Chîyrâm (in 21 vv) and H8010 Shᵉlômôh (in 263 vv). Deliberately not tiered verbal: the shared rare lexeme is a personal name borne by two different men (the king of Tyre and the bronze-worker), so lexical identity here does not establish referential identity.

Cedar for bread, again, five centuries later structural / thematic: confirmed

When the second temple's foundation was laid, the arrangement of 1 Kings 5 was repeated almost term for term: money to the masons and carpenters, and food, drink and oil to the Sidonians and Tyrians, to bring cedar logs from Lebanon to Joppa by sea (Ezra 3:7). Barnes names the parallel directly, saying “a similar course was taken on the building of the second temple”; Pulpit notes that cedar came again to Jerusalem via Joppa in return for “meat and drink and oil unto them of Zidon”; Poole and Gill both cite the same verse. ⚙ The repetition suggests the route and the barter were simply the standing way such a thing was done in that world, which makes the theological point sharper rather than duller: both houses of God were provisioned by Gentile hands on ordinary commercial terms.

Ezra 3:7 · Ezekiel 27:17

basis: Not a Verifier candidate: this pair was not returned by the shared-lexeme search, and no computed lexical basis is claimed. The link rests on the explicit citation of Ezra 3:7 by Barnes, Pulpit, Poole and Gill, and on the matching sequence (Lebanon cedar, sea transport to Joppa, payment in food and oil to Tyre and Sidon).

Beaten oil for a Gentile court, beaten oil for the lamp structural / thematic: confirmed

The oil Solomon ships to Tyre is שֶׁמֶן כָּתִית (shemen kāṯîṯ, H8081 with H3795), “beaten oil.” Cambridge identifies the adjective as “the word used for describing the specially pure oil provided for the ever burning lamp in the tabernacle (Exodus 27:20),” made by pounding olives in a mortar and letting the oil trickle out. K&D and Pulpit describe the same process and note its whiter colour, purer flavour and clearer light. ⚙ The resonance is worth naming and worth not overstating. Nothing in the text says the oil is sanctified, and a king's table is a plausible destination for the best grade of anything. What the shared word does is place the sanctuary's vocabulary inside a trade invoice, which is the same movement the whole section makes.

Exodus 27:20 · Leviticus 24:2

basis: Not a Verifier candidate: no computed lexeme basis is claimed for this pair. The lexical identity of H3795 kâthîyth in both places is Cambridge's stated identification, reported here as his claim; the tier stays structural because a shared technical adjective for a grade of oil carries no quotation and no citation.

Tyre fed from the king's country, in Luke's account structural / thematic: confirmed

Four of the brief's voices reach for the same New Testament verse. Ellicott: the grant of food for Hiram's household “brings out that which is recorded so many ages afterwards in Acts 12:20 that the country of the Tyrians was ‘nourished’ by Palestine.” Benson, Poole and Gill cite it as well, Poole adding that Tyre's people “depended upon Solomon's country for relief, as is manifest from Acts 12:20.” In Luke's narrative the people of Tyre and Sidon sue Herod for peace “because their region depended on the king's country for food.” ⚙ This is a cross-Testament link and therefore cannot be a verbal one: Greek and Hebrew share no Strong's numbers, and neither passage cites the other. What holds is a durable economic fact about one coastline, visible in 1 Kings, in Ezekiel 27:17, and still visible a thousand years later in Acts.

Acts 12:20 · Ezekiel 27:17

basis: Cross-Testament (Greek to Hebrew): no shared Strong's lexeme is possible, so a verbal tier is excluded on principle. The basis is the recurring historical situation, Phoenicia provisioned from the Israelite hinterland, named explicitly at this verse by Ellicott, Benson, Poole and Gill.

Foreign hands on the walls: a figural reading, named as such typological

Geneva's marginal note on 5:7 says that in Hiram “is prefigured the calling of the Gentiles who would help build the spiritual temple,” and Henry, on 5:10-18, says the temple “was chiefly built by the riches and labour of Gentiles, which typified their being called into the church.” Isaiah promises the same thing in plain prophecy: foreigners will rebuild Zion's walls and their kings will serve her (Isaiah 60:10). Paul turns it into architecture, with the Gentiles no longer strangers but built into a holy temple in the Lord (Ephesians 2:19-22). ⚙ This thread is tiered typological rather than verbal or structural because it is a figural reading, not a lexical or narrative link: no shared word connects a Phoenician timber contract to Ephesians, and none is claimed. The reading is ancient and widely held, and it is also exactly the reading that the historically minded voices in this brief decline to draw from Hiram's blessing. Both positions are recorded here.

Isaiah 60:10 · Ephesians 2:19-22

basis: Figural, not lexical. Cross-Testament in part, so no shared Strong's basis is possible or claimed. Attestation: ancient and widely held, stated in this brief by Geneva (at 5:7) and Henry (at 5:10-18); the remaining voices neither affirm nor deny it, and several explicitly limit Hiram's blessing to diplomatic deference.

Cutting a covenant, and what was cut structural / thematic: confirmed

“They two made a league” renders וַיִּכְרְתוּ בְרִית, “and they cut a covenant” (H3772 kârath with H1285 bᵉrîyth). Pulpit gives the ritual behind the idiom: “Covenants were ratified by the slaughter of victims, between the parts of which the contracting parties passed,” citing Genesis 15:18 and Jeremiah 34:18-19; Strong's entry for bᵉrîyth derives the noun from that same passing between pieces of flesh. ⚙ Genesis 15 is the covenant with Abram, where God alone passes between the pieces. This section uses the identical verb and noun for a timber contract between two kings. The link is a shared idiom and a shared rite, not a quotation, and the comparison runs in only one direction: the ordinary treaty borrows the language that Genesis 15 had already filled.

Genesis 15:18 · Jeremiah 34:18

basis: Not returned by the Verifier for this pair; no computed lexeme basis claimed. The idiom kârath bᵉrîyth (H3772 with H1285) is shared, and the connection to Genesis 15:18 and Jeremiah 34:18-19 is Pulpit's explicit citation at this verse. No quotation or dependence is asserted.

Gentile hands on the house for the Name ancient/widely-held

Matthew Henry, commenting on this block, writes that “the temple was chiefly built by the riches and labour of Gentiles, which typified their being called into the church,” and adds that “all outward skill and advantages should be made serviceable to the interests of Christ's kingdom.” Geneva says it of Hiram personally: in him “is prefigured the calling of the Gentiles who would help build the spiritual temple.” Henry then draws the line the apostles drew, that believers are “as lively stones, built up a spiritual house, for a habitation of God through the Spirit,” which is Peter's image (1 Peter 2:5) and Paul's (Ephesians 2:19-22), where the Gentiles who were strangers are built into a holy temple. Isaiah had said the same thing prophetically: “Foreigners will rebuild your walls” (Isaiah 60:10). ⚙ The typology does not require anything of Hiram's inner life, and the commentators who deny his conversion are not contradicting it. The narrative fact is enough: the wood, the skill and the ships that raised the house of the LORD came from outside Israel, and the New Testament temple is built the same way.

Ephesians 2:19-22 · 1 Peter 2:4-5 · Isaiah 60:10

Wisdom given, and a greater than Solomon ancient/widely-held

The section is framed by wisdom. Hiram sees it from outside and calls Solomon châkâm (v. 7); the narrator names its source and calls it chokmâh given by the LORD, “as he promised him” (v. 12), which Pulpit identifies as the promise of 1 Kings 3:12. Barnes reads the gift as the very thing that made the temple contract possible. Pulpit hears the peace of v. 12 as its fruit and points to James 3:17, where the wisdom from above is “first pure, then peace-loving.” ⚙ Christ names Solomon's wisdom as a standard and then exceeds it: “The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment... for she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and now One greater than Solomon is here” (Matthew 12:42). Paul calls Christ “the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Corinthians 1:24). Hebrews sets the two builders side by side: Jesus “has been counted worthy of greater glory than Moses, just as the builder of a house has greater honor than the house itself” (Hebrews 3:3). The wisdom that here produced a treaty and a temple is, in the apostolic reading, a person.

Matthew 12:42 · 1 Corinthians 1:24 · Hebrews 3:3-6

Peace between the two, and a covenant cut novel

The section ends with two words that the New Testament will spend: shâlôwm between an Israelite king and a Gentile king, and a covenant cut. Paul writes that Christ “Himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has torn down the dividing wall of hostility... to create in Himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace” (Ephesians 2:14-15), and the writer to the Hebrews calls him the mediator of a new covenant ratified by blood (Hebrews 9:15-18), using the same logic of covenant-by-death that Pulpit describes behind kârath bᵉrîyth. ⚙ This reading is offered as the tool's own and marked novel: the commentators in this brief do not make it at 5:12, and 1 Kings 5 is a commercial treaty, not a redemptive act. What can be said honestly is that the vocabulary Paul needs, two parties made one and a peace that had to be cut, is already lying here in a trade agreement, and that the Scriptures teach their readers these words long before they spend them.

Ephesians 2:14-16 · Hebrews 9:15-18