OPHIR’S WEALTH

Otago Witness, Issue 3525, 4 October 1921, Page 21

OPHIR’S WEALTH

The enormously rich mines of Ophir, from which King Solomon, the Queen of Sheba, and other rulers of Old Testament days obtained Die wealth of gold that mad* their cities places of dazzling magnificence, have been found again (says Popular Science Siftings), awl ere proving one of the world's most valuable sources of supply oi file precious yellow metal. The thousand* o shafts which were sunk into these veins oi goldbearing quartz a thousand years before Bio Christian era, and which have ioi centuries Lain idle and forgotten, are fast being reopened and: new ones dug. Where armies of black slaves formerly toiled under the pitilcss lush of the overseers, high explosives and mncUrn labour-saving machinery now do the work, producing in a few days more gold than was possible by years of painful laborious effort" in King Solomon's time. As archaeologists have found cut, the land of Ophir so frequently mentioned in the Old Testament, was a vast region in South-eastern yf,.p a —a part of which is now Rhodesia,. Although the ancients worked the mines hero for centuries, they were able with their pri-mil-ive methods to do no more than scratch, the surface oi the gold deposits Engineers in charge of the reopening of the long-lost mines declare that the Queen of Sheba and Kiim Solomon showed excellent judgment in selecting them as the chief source of the ancient'world’s gold supply. Their veins of m>]d-l>earing quartz seem practically inexhaustible, and tho fine quality of Die ora furnishes ample justification for tue Old Testament's suggestion that gold from Ophir was something superlative, quite beyond comparison. The gold diggers of Ophir greatly enriched tho kingdom of Saba. ihey were in active operation for several centuries tiefore Solomon was born, and wo are_ told ltt Die Bible that David, the father of Solomon, obtained supplies of the yellow metal frontArabia One is not surprised, tlien, that tlio Queen of Sheba should have been ab,e to bring with her to Jerusalem nearly half a n f gold for a gift to the king. All obtainable evidence points to the conclusion that the exploitation oi the land of GfiTr for gold came to a sudden end. It would be interesting to know with certainty lust why mid when this great and profitable mining industry was abandoned. Apparently it was relinquished within a century after King , • rea<*n, or about 900 8.c., when, in the time of Jehoshapliat the fleets of Israel and Saba were destroyed! at Ezion-Geber, at the head of tho Red Sea.