"And he spoke of trees, from the cedar on Lebanon to the hyssop which grows upon the wall." The cedar and hyssop are placed in antithesis, the former as the largest and most glorious of trees, the latter as the smallest and most insignificant of plants, to embrace the whole of the vegetable kingdom. Thenius maintains that by אזוב we are not to understand the true hyssop, nor the Wohlgemuth or Dosten (ὀρίγανον), according to the ordinary view (see at Exodus 12:22), because they are neither of them such small plants as we should expect in an antithesis to the cedar, but "one of the wall-mosses growing in tufts, more especially the orthotrichum saxatile (Oken), which forms a miniature hyssop with its lancet-shaped leaves, and from its extreme minuteness furnishes a perfect antithesis to the cedar." There is much to favour this view, since we can easily imagine that the Hebrews may have reckoned a moss, which resembled the hyssop in its leaves, as being itself a species of hyssop. - "And of beasts and birds, of creeping things and fishes;" the four principal classes into which the Hebrews divided the animal kingdom. Speaking of plants and animals presupposes observations and researches in natural science, or botanical and zoological studies.

1 Kings 5:5 Parallel Commentaries

behold

2 Chronicles 2:1-4 And Solomon determined to build an house for the name of the LORD, and an house for his kingdom...

purpose [heb] say
as the Lord

2 Samuel 7:12,13 And when your days be fulfilled, and you shall sleep with your fathers, I will set up your seed after you...

1 Chronicles 17:12 He shall build me an house, and I will establish his throne for ever.

1 Chronicles 22:10 He shall build an house for my name; and he shall be my son, and I will be his father...

1 Chronicles 28:6,10 And he said to me, Solomon your son, he shall build my house and my courts: for I have chosen him to be my son...

Zechariah 6:12,13 And speak to him, saying, Thus speaks the LORD of hosts, saying, Behold the man whose name is The BRANCH...