Chapter 4
1 Then Solomon made a bronze altar twenty cubits long, twenty cubits wide, and ten cubits high. 2 After that, he made the sea of cast metal. It was circular in shape, ten cubits from rim to rim, and five cubits high.
3 Under the sea and completely encircling the thirty cubits of its circumference there was a ring of figures of oxen in two rows, ten to the cubit. 4 It stood on twelve oxen, three facing north, three facing west, three facing south, and three facing east. The hindquarters of each faced inward, and the sea was set on them. 5 It was a hand’s breadth in thickness, and its rim was like that of a cup—lily-shaped. It could hold three thousand baths.[a]
6 He also made ten basins for washing, placing five on the right and five on the left. These were to be employed to rinse what would be used for the burnt offerings. However, the sea was for the priests to wash in.
7 Then he made ten lampstands of gold as prescribed and placed them in the temple, five on the right side and five on the left. 8 He also made ten tables and placed them in the temple, five on the right and five on the left, as well as one hundred basins of gold.[b]
9 Next he made the court of the priests and the great courtyard with its gates. After he had overlaid the doors with bronze, 10 he placed the sea off to the southeast on the right-hand side of the temple.
11 Meanwhile Huram made the pots, the shovels, and the basins. He thus completed all the work he had undertaken for King Solomon on the temple of God: 12 the two pillars, the bowls, and the two capitals that were on the top of the pillars; the two sets of filigree to cover the two bowls of the capitals that were on the top of the pillars; 13 the four hundred pomegranates for the two networks, with two rows of pomegranates for each network, to cover two bowl-shaped capitals surmounting the two pillars; 14 the ten stands and the basins on the stands; 15 the one sea and the twelve oxen that supported it; 16 likewise the pots, the shovels, and the basins—all of these articles Huram-abi made of burnished bronze cast for King Solomon for the house of the Lord.
17 Then the king had them cast in the foundry between Succoth and Zeredah in the plain of the Jordan. 18 Solomon made all these objects in great quantities, and as a result, the weight of the bronze was not determined.
19 Solomon had all of these articles made for the Lord God: the golden altar, the tables for the bread of the Presence, 20 [c]the lampstands and their lamps of pure gold to burn before the inner sanctuary as prescribed; 21 the flowers, the lamps, and the tongs of the purest gold; 22 the snuffers, the bowls, the ladles, and the firepans of pure gold. As for the entrance to the temple, the inner doors to the Most Holy Place and the doors to the nave of the temple were of gold.
Footnotes
- 2 Chronicles 4:5 Baths: a liquid measure equaling approximately 40 quarts. The number of baths stated in 1 Ki 7:26 is 2000.
- 2 Chronicles 4:8 The interior courtyard where the altar of holocausts was placed.
- 2 Chronicles 4:20 There is no such thing as too much gold when it came to building a permanent place for the Israelites to worship the Lord. This was a testimony to their great love and respect, and perhaps their guilt for worshiping idols. Later these detailed plans would be used to reconstruct the temple that would be destroyed by the Babylonians.