Ophir Was in India by Max Muller

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 28, 1865

Ophir Was in India

By Max Muller

OPHIR WAS IN INDIA.—“You remember the fleet of Tarshish which Solomon had at sea, together with the navy of Hiram, and which came once in three years, bringing gold and silver, ivory, apes, and peacocks. The same navy is said to have fetched gold from Ophir, and great plenty of almug trees. A great deal has been written to find out where this Ophir was; but there can be no doubt that it was in India. The names for apes, peacocks, ivory, and almug trees, are foreign words in Hebrew, as much as gutta-percha or tobacco are in English. Now, if we wished to know from what part of the world gutta-percha was first imported into England, we might safely conclude that it came from that country where the name gutta-percha formed part of the spoken language (Malay.) If, therefore, we can find a language in which the names for peacocks, apes, ivory, and almug-tree, which are foreign to the Hebrew, are indigenous, we may be certain that the country in which that language was spoken must have been the Ophir of the Bible. That language is no other than Sanscrit.”—Max Muller.