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1Ki_9:28; 1Ki_10:11
Now, seriously, this argument, or something very like it, has been used to prove that Peru was the Ophir of Solomon; and arguments of the same kind, and not stronger when strictly analyzed, have been used in favor of places not physically so improbable. In this case, the physical improbability of the allocation, makes us sensible of the absurdity of this process of argumentation; but surely the argument is not less inconclusive when the allocation is less certainly impossible, if that argument is all that can be produced in its favor. Yet this sort of reasoning, as applied to more possible sites, forms the basis of two thirds of all the attempts which have been made to identify the Ophir of Solomon.
It seems to us that the way to a correct, or rather to a proximate, solution of the difficulty, is to look to the practical results of the expedition, and deduce from the commodities it brought the countries it had visited. This process is obvious. There is scarcely a ship that comes into the port of London from a distant voyage, whose cargo does not indicate the quarter from which it comes—even though the diffusion of commodities and products, which has arisen from the intercourse of nations, renders the process less easy now than in former times, when products, animal or vegetable, were more confined to the countries in which they were indigenous. If the ship is laden with tea, we know it comes from China; if with sugar, from the West Indies; if with cotton, from North America; if with silver or gold, from South America; if with figs, from the Levant; if with spices, from the India Sea; and so on. Still, the conclusion may not be quite certain in every case—seeing that some of these commodities may, in small quantities, come from other quarters than those from which they are principally received—and it is possible that the cargo may have been taken on board at some intermediate commercial port. But if we find curious animals on board for the Zoological Gardens, our conclusions are materially assisted, for these have assigned habitats—and not being objects of commerce, are all but invariably, even now, and still more in ancient times, brought direct from the countries to which they belong. If there be a hippopotamus, we conclude that the ship comes from the mouth of the Nile; if a lion, a zebra, a gnu, or a koodoo, from the Cape; if a tiger, or zebu, from India; if a reindeer, glutton, or white bear, from the Arctic Seas; if a bison, or raccoon, from North America; if a macaw, or humming-bird, or kinkajou or llama, or armadillo, from South America; if an orang-outang, a paradoxure, or a napu, from Borneo, Sumatra, or Java; if a kangaroo, or ornithorhynchus, from Australia; if a babiroussa, from the Molucca Isles; and so of any others who inhabit definable localities.
Now, we must apply this to the case in hand.
A favorite opinion of late is, that Ophir was on the east coast of Arabia in Oman—because the name of Ofor has been found there, and because it can be made out that gold was once yielded in that quarter. This makes the great voyage a mere creeping round the Arabian coast—and affords only one of the products, gold. Granting that gold was got here—where else, where further, did the fleet go to get ivory, apes, peacocks, and algum wood—none of which were ever found in any part of Arabia?
Another hypothesis sends the fleet not eastward at all, but southward along the African shore. Now, certainly, had the fleet taken this direction, a very large proportion of the objects named—gold, apes, ivory—might have been obtained, and even some kinds of spices in the ports of Abyssinia. But in this quarter could not be found the peacocks or the algum-trees; and so long as any one creature or object is on board the fleet which cannot be ascribed to the assigned country, we are bound to seek another. The one or two things wanting, then, become the tests for the true country—the more valuable inasmuch as the scope of the inquiry becomes more limited and distinct—and the more important according to the degree in which the object in question becomes more singular, distinct, and remarkable. For the purposes of this inquiry, it may be well to dismiss the algum trees for the moment, for two reasons—because the tree is of disputed identification, and because it cannot with certainty be affirmed that it was not a tree growing in Africa or Arabia. There is, then, nothing left but the peacock; and on this we must take our stand.
But, first, are we sure that the word in the Hebrew text, which is Thukyim, does really denote peacocks? We think it certain. There is hardly any bird named in Scripture, respecting which there is more general agreement among interpreters; and there is some strong objection to every other bird which has been indicated. Then, where is the native country of the peacock? It is in India; and it could have been found both wild and domesticated by navigators upon the coasts from Camboge to Ceylon; and, which is of great importance, the bird would, better than any of its congeners, or, indeed, than any other bird which has been suggested, bear a long voyage in such crowded ships as those of the ancients. Moreover, the name itself, Thuki Note: The final im, as above quoted, being the sign of the plural.—which is evidently not Hebrew, but a foreign name imported along with the bird, Note: Probably imitated from its note or cry; but we do not know, for we never heard it.—has much analogy to the native name of the peacock, as found in those parts—which is in Malabaric togei, in Sanscrit sikhi. Now, we would not contend that this is the region of Ophir; but we do contend that the voyage to Ophir, wherever that lay, although it may not necessarily have been the remotest point of the voyage—must have extended to the place where peacocks were found; and we have indicated the nearest place where they might then have been obtained—though not bound to do so, for peacocks might be found at remoter parts of India and its isles; we might even, if we liked, go as far as the peninsula of Malacca—the Aurea Chersonesus of the ancients, where we find that the inhabitants to this day call their gold mines ophirs—and where, most certainly, all the products brought to Solomon might be found in rich abundance. But they might all likewise be found at the nearer point we have indicated; and therefore the prefer this, for the sake of the tender consciences which might shrink from the longer voyage. But, for our own part, we find no difficulty even in that; for we know that an intercourse even with China was open not much later, and probably much before, the age of Solomon—articles of China manufacture, with legible Chinese characters upon them, being at this day found in the ancient tombs of Egypt.
But, adhering to the nearer parts of the Indian coast, we find that these would furnish all that was obtained. This includes even the algum-trees; for although we have declined to rely upon it, for the reasons stated, we consider that it has been satisfactorily shown by Dr. Royle Note: Cyclop. of Biblical Literature, art. Algum. to have been the fragrant white sandal wood, Note: Santalum album. so highly prized in the East, which is a native of the mountainous parts of the coast of Malabar, where large quantities are at this day cut for export to China, to different parts of India, and to the Persian and Arabian Gulfs.
We therefore think the fleet went so far as India—touching, perhaps, at Arabian and African ports on its way. This also agrees with the length of the voyage; for although, as we showed yesterday, the indication of time is not necessarily to be understood of three years, we think it could not have been much less in this case; for the time consumed is mentioned as something extraordinary, which would scarcely have been the case with anything less than two years under the slow processes of ancient navigation.
Yet, as we have said, we do not contend that Ophir was a place on the Indian coast. Nay more, we do not insist that it was any particular place. It seems to its that Heeren is quite right in his remark that “Ophir, like the name of all other distant places or regions of antiquity—as Thule, Tartessus, and others—denotes no particular spot, but only a certain region or part of the world, such as the East and West Indies in modern geography. Hence Ophir was a general name for all the countries lying on the African, Arabian, or Indian Seas, so far as at that time known.”