1 Kings 3 · a question people ask
Was it wrong for Solomon to sacrifice at the high places?
The chapter says two things side by side. It gives the people's reason: they sacrificed in the high places "because there was not yet a house built for the LORD’s name" (3:2). And it qualifies Solomon's love: "Solomon loved the LORD, walking in the statutes of David his father, except that he sacrificed and burned incense in the high places" (3:3). Christians read these verses in more than one way. All agree on what the chapter says: the LORD's house was not yet built (3:2), Gibeon was "the great high place" (3:4), and there "the LORD appeared to Solomon in a dream by night" (3:5).
How Christians read it
Where Christians differ, Favor sets out the main views side by side and doesn't pick one.
Allowed until the house was built
Those who read it this way start from 3:2's reason, "because there was not yet a house built for the LORD’s name" (3:2). Deuteronomy ties the one place of sacrifice to a time to come, when the LORD "gives you rest from all your enemies around you" (Deuteronomy 12:10): "then it shall happen that to the place which the LORD your God shall choose… there you shall bring all that I command you: your burnt offerings" (Deuteronomy 12:11). It is later that Solomon says, "But now the LORD my God has given me rest on every side" (5:4). Chronicles says that "the LORD’s tabernacle, which Moses made in the wilderness, and the altar of burnt offering, were at that time in the high place at Gibeon" (1 Chronicles 21:29), and Samuel went up to a high place where the people would not eat until he came, "because he blesses the sacrifice" (1 Samuel 9:13-14). On this reading 3:3's "except" notes a practice of the time before the house, and the LORD appearing to Solomon at Gibeon (3:5) shows that he received him there.
1 Kings 3:2 · Deuteronomy 12:10-11 · 1 Kings 5:4 · 1 Chronicles 21:29 · 1 Samuel 9:12-14 · 1 Kings 3:5
A shortfall even then
Those who read it this way start from 3:3's "except": the verse sets the high places beside Solomon's love for the LORD as the thing that fell short. The Law had said, "Be careful that you don’t offer your burnt offerings in every place that you see; but in the place which the LORD chooses in one of your tribes, there you shall offer your burnt offerings" (Deuteronomy 12:13-14). The ark was already in David's city, in the tent David had pitched for it (2 Samuel 6:12, 6:17), and when Solomon woke he came to Jerusalem "and stood before the ark of the LORD’s covenant, and offered up burnt offerings" (3:15). Later the book says even of kings who did "that which was right in the LORD’s eyes" (15:11, 22:43) that "the high places were not taken away" (15:14, 22:43), and Solomon himself "built a high place for Chemosh" (11:7). On this reading 3:3 notes, at the start of his reign, something the book comes back to.
1 Kings 3:3 · Deuteronomy 12:13-14 · 2 Samuel 6:12 · 2 Samuel 6:17 · 1 Kings 3:15 · 1 Kings 15:11 · 1 Kings 15:14 · 1 Kings 22:43 · 1 Kings 11:7
The verses
“However, the people sacrificed in the high places, because there was not yet a house built for the LORD’s name. Solomon loved the LORD, walking in the statutes of David his father, except that he sacrificed and burned incense in the high places. The king went to Gibeon to sacrifice there, for that was the great high place. Solomon offered a thousand burnt offerings on that altar. In Gibeon, the LORD appeared to Solomon in a dream by night; and God said, “Ask for what I should give you.””