1 Kings 9:15

This is the reason of the levy, &c. That the raising of a great tribute upon the people, and employing so many men in his works, might not seem strange, the sacred writer here shows the cause of it; which was, his great and numerous buildings, suitable to the high dignity to which God had advanced him. The Hebrew word, מס, mass, here rendered levy, as Mr. Selden hath shown, by many instances, is not only used for pecuniary tribute, but also for bodily labour; it means a levy of men as well as a levy of money. And he thus interprets this clause: This is the cause of requiring the labour of so many men; it was to build, &c. Having thus declared the cause, the historian proceeds (1Ki 9:20) to relate who they were that he employed in this service. And Millo David had built round about Zion, from Millo inward, (2 Samuel 5:9,) but had left the structure of Millo itself imperfect, which Solomon now completed, with a particular respect to Pharaoh's daughter, whose house was near it, 1 Kings 9:24. It seems, from 1 Kings 11:27, and 2 Chronicles 32:5, to have been an eminent, large, and strong fort, or castle, in that part of Jerusalem termed the city of David, where the fortress which David took from the Jebusites anciently stood. Here, it is thought, the people of Israel assembled when there was any consultation to be made about public affairs. The name מלוא, Millo, appears to be derived from the word מלא, malee, which signifies full. Kimchi thinks it was so called because it was frequently full of people, being “locus amplus et latus, comitiis et conventibus publicis destinatus,” a large and open place, appointed for holding public courts and assemblies. And the wall of Jerusalem Which was a great structure: for there were three walls, one within another, as Abarbinel and Joseph Ben-Gorion explain it; the inner wall encompassing the house of God and the house of the king; the middle wall encompassing the houses of great persons; (termed the College, 2 Kings 22:14;) and the third the houses of all the people. And Hazor Which had been a very eminent city, and the head of some kingdoms before the conquest of Canaan, (Joshua 11:10,) and was given to the tribe of Naphtali, Joshua 19:36. Megiddo A city in the tribe of Manasseh, Joshua 17:11. And Gezer In the tribe of Ephraim, Joshua 21:21.