Charles Ellicott Commentary 1 Kings 8:2

"And all the men of Israel assembled themselves unto king Solomon at the feast, in the month Ethanim, which is the seventh month." — 1 Kings 8:2 (ASV)

The month Ethanim (called Tisri after the Captivity) corresponded with the end of September and the beginning of October. The name is thought (by Thenius) to be properly, as in the Septuagint, Athanim, and to mean the “month of gifts,” so called because it brought with it the gathering in of the vintage and of the last of the crops. According to the Chaldee Targum, it was formerly the beginning of the civil year, as Abib was of the ecclesiastical year.

The feast in this month was the Feast of Tabernacles—of all feasts of the year the most joyful—marking the gathering in of all the fruits of the land, commemorating the dwelling in tabernacles in the wilderness, and thanking God for settlement and blessing in the land (Leviticus 23:33–44). It was, perhaps, the time when the Israelites could best be absent from their lands for a prolonged festival; but there was also a special appropriateness in giving it a higher consecration in this way, by celebrating on it the transference of the ark from the movable tabernacle to a fixed and splendid habitation. In this instance, the festival was doubled in duration, from seven to fourteen days (See 1 Kings 8:65).