A feast necessarily accompanied such a sacrifice as Solomon was holding. Compare Leviticus 19:5. On the present occasion there was a double festival - first, the Feast of the Dedication, from the 8th to the 15th of the month Ethanim (or Tisri), and then the Feast of tabernacles, from the 15th to the 22nd 1 Kings 8:2. On the day after this, “the eighth day,” counting from the commencement of the second seven, and the twenty-third day of the month (margin reference “m”), Solomon dismissed the people to their homes.
The entering in of Hamath - Compare Numbers 13:21, note andmargin reference. The phrase marks the extreme northern boundary of the holy land.
The river of Egypt - The Wady-el-Arish, the only large water-course on this coast (margin reference).