1 Kings 7: Solomon's palace, and Hiram's bronze work for Yahweh's house

In plain English: Solomon was building his own house for thirteen years, and he finished all his house.

Good to know: "Thirteen years" is the text's own number for Solomon's own house, and 6:38 gives seven years for Yahweh's house. 9:10 speaks of "the end of twenty years, in which Solomon had built the two houses, Yahweh's house and the king's house".

In plain English: He built the House of the Forest of Lebanon. It was a hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high, on four rows of cedar pillars, with cedar beams on the pillars.

Good to know: The text does not explain the name "House of the Forest of Lebanon". It gives the size and says the house stood on four rows of cedar pillars; the cedar came from Lebanon (5:6). Later Solomon puts three hundred gold shields there (10:17).

In plain English: It was roofed (this Bible: covered) with cedar above, over the forty-five beams (or: side rooms; see the note) that were on the pillars, fifteen in a row.

The Hebrew word: "Beams" here is tsela, the word this Bible gives as "side rooms" in 6:5. The dictionary gives it as "a rib" and "a side", and in building a timber or plank.

What changes: Read as this Bible has it, there were forty-five beams above the pillars, fifteen in each row. Read as side rooms, there were forty-five rooms above the pillars, fifteen in a row. The text does not say more.

In plain English: There were window frames (this Bible: beams) in three rows, and window faced window, three times over (this Bible: in three ranks).

Good to know: Verses 4 and 5 are hard Hebrew. "Beams" in verse 4 is the word for window frames in 6:4, and "in three ranks" is word for word "three times". The text does not draw a picture, and it is not clear how the windows were set; it says that window faced window, in three rows.

In plain English: All the doorways and doorposts had square frames (this Bible: were made square with beams), and window faced window, three times over.

In plain English: He made the hall (this Bible: porch) of pillars. It was fifty cubits long and thirty cubits wide, with a porch in front of them, and pillars and a threshold (or: a covering beam) in front of them.

In plain English: He made the hall (this Bible: porch) of the throne where he was to judge, the hall of judgment, and it was covered (literally: paneled) with cedar from floor to floor.

In plain English: His own house where he was to live, in the other court further in from the hall, was made the same way. He also made a house like this hall for Pharaoh's daughter, whom Solomon had taken as his wife.

In plain English: All these were of costly stones, cut to measure and sawed with saws, inside and outside, from the foundation to the top (this Bible: the coping), and so on the outside to the great court.

In plain English: The foundation was of costly stones, great stones, stones of ten cubits and stones of eight cubits.

In plain English: Above were costly stones, cut to measure, and cedar.

In plain English: The great court all around had three rows of cut stone and a row of cedar beams, like the inner court of Yahweh's house and the porch of the house.

In plain English: King Solomon sent and brought Hiram from Tyre.

In plain English: He was the son of a widow from the tribe of Naphtali, and his father was a man of Tyre, a worker in bronze. He was filled with wisdom, understanding and skill (literally: knowledge) to do every kind of work in bronze. He came to King Solomon and did all his work.

Good to know: This Hiram is a worker in bronze, not Hiram king of Tyre of chapter 5. The text gives his mother as a widow of the tribe of Naphtali and his father as a man of Tyre. 2 Chronicles 2:13 and 2:14 call him "Huram-abi", "the son of a woman of the daughters of Dan", and say he could also work in gold, silver, iron, stone and timber. The text does not explain the two tribes.

In plain English: He formed (this Bible: fashioned) the two bronze pillars. Each pillar was eighteen cubits high, and a line of twelve cubits went around each of them (word for word: around the second pillar).

Good to know: "Eighteen cubits" is the text's own number. 2 Chronicles 3:15 has "two pillars thirty-five cubits high". Jeremiah 52:21 has eighteen cubits and a line of twelve cubits, and adds that the pillar was "four fingers" thick and "hollow". The text does not explain the different numbers.

In plain English: He made two capitals (the tops of the pillars) of cast bronze, to set on the tops of the pillars. One capital was five cubits high, and the other capital was five cubits high.

In plain English: There were nets of network and wreaths (or: tassels) of chain work for the capitals on top of the pillars: seven for one capital and seven for the other capital.

In plain English: So he made the pillars, with two rows of pomegranates all around on the one network, to cover the capitals on top of the pillars (the Hebrew has: on top of the pomegranates). He did the same for the other capital.

In plain English: The capitals on top of the pillars in the porch were of lily work, four cubits.

In plain English: There were capitals on the two pillars, above, close to the rounded part (literally: the belly) beside the network. There were two hundred pomegranates in rows all around on the other capital.

The Hebrew word: "Belly" is beten, which the dictionary gives as "the belly" and "the bosom or body of anything". The STEPBible meaning for this verse gives "the bulge". "Two hundred pomegranates" is the text's own number; verse 42 gives four hundred for the two networks.

In plain English: He set up the pillars at the porch of the temple. He set up the right (or: south) pillar and named it Jachin, and he set up the left (or: north) pillar and named it Boaz.

Good to know: The text names the two pillars and does not explain the names. The dictionary gives Jachin as "the name of three Israelites and of a temple pillar"; one is a son of Simeon (Genesis 46:10). It gives Boaz as "the ancestor of David; also the name of a pillar in front of the temple": Boaz is in David's family line in Ruth 4:21 and 4:22. 2 Chronicles 3:17 gives the same names, "Jachin" on the right and "Boaz" on the left.

In plain English: On the tops of the pillars was lily work. So the work of the pillars was finished.

In plain English: He made the sea of cast metal (this Bible: the molten sea), ten cubits from brim to brim, round all around. It was five cubits high, and a line of thirty cubits went around it.

The Hebrew word: "Sea" is yam, the usual word for the sea; the dictionary says it is also used for a large man-made basin.

Good to know: The text gives ten cubits from brim to brim and a line of thirty cubits around it, and it does not say where each measure was taken. 2 Chronicles 4:2 gives the same numbers. Verse 26 says the sea was a hand's width thick, with a brim like the brim of a cup.

In plain English: Under its brim all around there were buds (or: gourds) going around it, for ten cubits (or: ten to a cubit; see the note), all around the sea. The buds were in two rows, cast when it was cast.

The Hebrew words: "For ten cubits" is word for word "ten by the cubit". The same words in verse 23 give the sea's ten cubits from brim to brim. "Buds" is peqa, the word in 6:18.

What changes: Read as this Bible has it, the buds went around the sea for ten cubits. Read as "ten to a cubit", there were ten buds to each cubit. 2 Chronicles 4:3 tells the same with another word: "Under it was the likeness of oxen, which encircled it, for ten cubits".

In plain English: It stood on twelve oxen: three facing north, three facing west, three facing south and three facing east. The sea was set on top of them, and all their back parts were toward the inside.

In plain English: It was a hand's width thick. Its brim was made like the brim of a cup, like a lily flower. It held two thousand baths.

Good to know: "Two thousand baths" is the text's own number. 2 Chronicles 4:5 says the sea "held three thousand baths". The text does not explain the two numbers. A bath is a measure for liquids; the text gives no size for it.

In plain English: He made the ten bronze stands (this Bible: bases). Each stand was four cubits long, four cubits wide and three cubits high.

The Hebrew word: "Bases" is mekonah, which the dictionary gives as "a pedestal". Here each one is a stand for a basin (verse 38). This Bible says "base" or "bases" in all 18 verses that use the word.

Good to know: Verses 27 to 37 use many rare words for the parts of the stands, and the text does not draw a picture of them. Where a word can be read two ways, the plain line gives both; where the Hebrew is unclear, the notes say so. 2 Kings 25:13 says that the Chaldeans later broke up "the pillars of bronze", "the bases and the bronze sea", and carried the bronze to Babylon.

In plain English: This is how the stands were made: they had panels, and the panels were between the frames (this Bible: ledges);

The Hebrew words: "Panels" is misgereth, which the dictionary gives as "something enclosing, i.e. a margin (of a region, of a panel)". "Ledges" is shalab, "a spacer or raised interval, i.e. the stile in a frame or panel", that is, an upright piece of a frame. Shalab is in only 2 verses of the Bible: here and verse 29. The text does not say more about how the parts fit together.

In plain English: and on the panels between the frames were lions, oxen and cherubim. On the frames there was a pedestal above, and beneath the lions and oxen were wreaths of hanging work.

The Hebrew word: "Hanging work" is morad, which the dictionary gives as "a descent", and in building "an ornamental appendage, perhaps a festoon", that is, a decoration that hangs down. In Joshua 7:5 this Bible gives the same word as "the descent". The text does not say more about how the wreaths looked.

In plain English: Each stand had four bronze wheels and bronze axles, and its four feet had supports (literally: shoulders). The supports were cast beneath the basin, with wreaths at the side of each.

In plain English: Its opening (literally: its mouth) inside the capital and upward was a cubit. Its opening was round, made like a pedestal, a cubit and a half. On its opening there were carvings, and their panels were square, not round.

Good to know: The Hebrew of this verse is hard, and it is not clear what each part is. Word for word it begins "its mouth, from inside to the capital and upward, by the cubit". "Opening" is peh, "the mouth", and "capital" is the word used for the tops of the pillars in verse 16. The plain line follows this Bible.

In plain English: The four wheels were under the panels, and the axles (literally: the hands) of the wheels were in the stand. Each wheel was a cubit and a half high.

In plain English: The wheels were made like chariot wheels. Their axles, rims, spokes and hubs were all of cast metal.

In plain English: There were four supports (literally: shoulders) at the four corners of each stand. Its supports were part of the stand itself.

In plain English: At the top of the stand there was a round band half a cubit high. On the top of the stand, its supports (literally: hands) and its panels were of one piece with it (this Bible: were the same).

In plain English: On the plates of its supports (literally: hands) and on its panels he engraved cherubim, lions and palm trees, each in its own space, with wreaths all around.

In plain English: He made the ten stands this way: all of them had one casting, one measure and one shape.

In plain English: He made ten bronze basins. Each basin held forty baths, and each basin was four cubits. There was one basin on each of the ten stands.

In plain English: He set the stands, five on the right side of the house and five on the left side of the house. He set the sea on the right side of the house, to the east, toward the south.

In plain English: Hiram made the pots (the Hebrew here has the word for the basins of verse 38; see the note), the shovels and the basins. So Hiram finished all the work he did for King Solomon in Yahweh's house:

The Hebrew word: "Pots" here is kiyyor, the word this Bible gives as "basin" in verse 38; the dictionary gives it as a round vessel, for cooking or for washing. In verse 45 the list has sir, "a pot", and this Bible reads "pots" in both verses. 2 Chronicles 4:11 also has "the pots".

What changes: Read as "pots", Hiram made pots here, as verse 45 says. Read as the Hebrew letters of this verse have it, he made basins, and verse 38 has already told of the ten basins.

In plain English: the two pillars; the two bowls of the capitals on top of the pillars; the two networks to cover the two bowls of the capitals on top of the pillars;

In plain English: the four hundred pomegranates for the two networks, two rows of pomegranates for each network, to cover the two bowls of the capitals on the pillars;

In plain English: the ten stands, and the ten basins on the stands;

In plain English: the one sea, and the twelve oxen under the sea;

In plain English: the pots, the shovels and the basins. All these vessels that Hiram made for King Solomon for Yahweh's house were of polished (this Bible: burnished) bronze.

In plain English: The king cast them in the plain of the Jordan, in the clay ground (literally: the compact soil of the ground; or: in clay molds) between Succoth and Zarethan.

In plain English: Solomon left all the vessels unweighed, because there were so very many. The weight of the bronze was not found out.

In plain English: Solomon made all the vessels that were in Yahweh's house: the gold altar, and the gold table that the bread of the presence (this Bible: show bread) was on;

Good to know: "Show bread" is the bread of the presence: see the note on Exodus 25:30. The tabernacle had one lampstand of pure gold (Exodus 25:31); here verse 49 gives ten, five on the right and five on the left, and 2 Chronicles 4:7 gives the same.

In plain English: the lampstands of pure gold, five on the right and five on the left, in front of the inner sanctuary; and the flowers, the lamps and the tongs, of gold;

In plain English: the cups, the snuffers, the basins, the spoons and the fire pans, of pure gold; and the hinges, of gold, both for the doors of the inner house, the most holy place, and for the doors of the house, the temple.

In plain English: So all the work that King Solomon did in Yahweh's house was finished. Solomon brought in the things David his father had dedicated (literally: the holy things of David his father): the silver, the gold and the vessels. He put them in the treasuries of Yahweh's house.

Good to know: David's dedicated things are told in 2 Samuel 8:11: "King David also dedicated these to Yahweh, with the silver and gold that he dedicated of all the nations which he subdued".