Temple Construction Begins

In the four hundred and eightieth year after the Israelites had come out of the land of Egypt, in the month of Ziv, the second month of the fourth year of Solomon’s reign over Israel, he began to build the house of the LORD.

The house that King Solomon built for the LORD was sixty cubits long, twenty cubits wide, and thirty cubits high. The portico at the front of the main hall of the temple was twenty cubits long, extending across the width of the temple and projecting out ten cubits in front of the temple.

He also had narrow windows framed high in the temple.

Against the walls of the temple and the inner sanctuary, Solomon built a chambered structure around the temple, in which he constructed the side rooms. The bottom floor was five cubits wide, the middle floor six cubits, and the third floor seven cubits. He also placed offset ledges around the outside of the temple, so that nothing would be inserted into its walls.

The temple was constructed using finished stones cut at the quarry, so that no hammer or chisel or any other iron tool was heard in the temple while it was being built.

The entrance to the bottom floor was on the south side of the temple. A stairway led up to the middle level, and from there to the third floor.

So Solomon built the temple and finished it, roofing it with beams and planks of cedar. He built chambers all along the temple, each five cubits high and attached to the temple with beams of cedar.

Then the word of the LORD came to Solomon, saying: “As for this temple you are building, if you walk in My statutes, carry out My ordinances, and keep all My commandments by walking in them, I will fulfill through you the promise I made to your father David. And I will dwell among the Israelites and will not abandon My people Israel.”

So Solomon built the temple and finished it. He lined the interior walls with cedar paneling from the floor of the temple to the ceiling, and he covered the floor with cypress boards.

He partitioned off the twenty cubits at the rear of the temple with cedar boards from floor to ceiling to form within the temple an inner sanctuary, the Most Holy Place. And the main hall in front of this room was forty cubits long.

The cedar paneling inside the temple was carved with gourds and open flowers. Everything was cedar; not a stone could be seen.

Solomon also prepared the inner sanctuary within the temple to set the ark of the covenant of the LORD there. The inner sanctuary was twenty cubits long, twenty cubits wide, and twenty cubits high. He overlaid the inside with pure gold, and he also overlaid the altar of cedar.

So Solomon overlaid the inside of the temple with pure gold, and he extended gold chains across the front of the inner sanctuary, which was overlaid with gold. So he overlaid with gold the whole interior of the temple, until everything was completely finished. He also overlaid with gold the entire altar that belonged to the inner sanctuary.

In the inner sanctuary he made two cherubim, each ten cubits high, out of olive wood. One wing of the first cherub was five cubits long, and the other wing was five cubits long as well. So the full wingspan was ten cubits. The second cherub also measured ten cubits; both cherubim had the same size and shape, and the height of each cherub was ten cubits.

And he placed the cherubim inside the innermost room of the temple. Since their wings were spread out, the wing of the first cherub touched one wall, while the wing of the second cherub touched the other wall, and in the middle of the room their wingtips touched. He also overlaid the cherubim with gold.

Then he carved the walls all around the temple, in both the inner and outer sanctuaries, with carved engravings of cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers. And he overlaid the temple floor with gold in both the inner and outer sanctuaries.

For the entrance to the inner sanctuary, Solomon constructed doors of olive wood with five-sided doorposts. The double doors were made of olive wood, and he carved into them cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers and overlaid the cherubim and palm trees with hammered gold.

In the same way he made four-sided doorposts of olive wood for the sanctuary entrance. The two doors were made of cypress wood, and each had two folding panels. He carved into them cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers; and he overlaid them with gold, hammered evenly over the carvings.

Solomon built the inner courtyard with three rows of dressed stone and one row of trimmed cedar beams.

The foundation of the house of the LORD was laid in the fourth year of Solomon’s reign, in the month of Ziv. In his eleventh year and eighth month, the month of Bul, the temple was finished in every detail and according to every specification. So he built the temple in seven years.