This verse apparently once followed Jeremiah 10:5. Like Jeremiah 10:7 and Jeremiah 10:8, it is omitted in the Septuagint. Silver spread into plates, etc. The silver and gold were meant for the coating of the wooden image (comp.
Isaiah 30:22; Isaiah 40:19). Tarshish; i.e. Tartessus, in south-west Spain, between the two mouths of the Baetis, or Guadal-quivir. Gold from Uphaz. A place bearing this name, or anything like it, is not known from other sources than the Old Testament writings; and hence a corruption of the text has naturally been suspected (Ophir into Uphaz).
As, however, r and z are not easily confounded, either in the earlier or the later Hebrew characters, this view must be abandoned, though it has the authority of several ancient versions of this passage (including the Peshite and the Targum).
The name occurs again in Daniel 10:5. The Peshite, moreover, curiously enough, translates zahab mufaz in 1 Kings 10:18 (Authorized Version, "the best gold") by "gold from Ophir." Blue and purple. The Hebrew has no word, strictly speaking, for either "blue" or "purple."
Both these words here used probably express coloring matter rather than colors (this is certain of the latter word, which properly designates a kind of mussel, the shell of which yielded dye). The first produced a violet purple, the second a reddish purple.