The Babylonian Exile

and the outer chambers was twenty cubits wide all around the temple.

The side rooms opened into this area, with one entrance on the north and another on the south. The open area was five cubits wide all around.

Now the building that faced the temple courtyard on the west was seventy cubits wide, and the wall of the building was five cubits thick all around, with a length of ninety cubits.

Then he measured the temple to be a hundred cubits long, and the temple courtyard and the building with its walls were also a hundred cubits long.

The width of the temple courtyard on the east, including the front of the temple, was a hundred cubits.

Next he measured the length of the building facing the temple courtyard at the rear of the temple, including its galleries on each side; it was a hundred cubits. The outer sanctuary, the inner sanctuary, and the porticoes facing the court,

as well as the thresholds and the beveled windows and the galleries all around with their three levels opposite the threshold, were overlaid with wood on all sides. They were paneled from the ground to the windows, and the windows were covered.

In the space above the outside of the entrance to the inner sanctuary on all the walls, spaced evenly around the inner and outer sanctuary,

were alternating carved cherubim and palm trees. Each cherub had two faces:

the face of a man was toward the palm tree on one side, and the face of a young lion was toward the palm tree on the other side. They were carved all the way around the temple.

Cherubim and palm trees were carved on the wall of the outer sanctuary from the floor to the space above the entrance.

The outer sanctuary had a rectangular doorframe, and the doorframe of the sanctuary was similar.

There was an altar of wood three cubits high and two cubits square. Its corners, base, and sides were of wood. And the man told me, “This is the table that is before the LORD.”

Both the outer sanctuary and the inner sanctuary had double doors,

and each door had two swinging panels. There were two panels for one door and two for the other.

Cherubim and palm trees like those on the walls were carved on the doors of the outer sanctuary, and there was a wooden canopy outside, on the front of the portico.

There were beveled windows and palm trees on the sidewalls of the portico. The side rooms of the temple also had canopies.

Then the man led me out northward into the outer court, and he brought me to the group of chambers opposite the temple courtyard and the outer wall on the north side.

The building with the door facing north was a hundred cubits long and fifty cubits wide.

Gallery faced gallery in three levels opposite the twenty cubits that belonged to the inner court and opposite the pavement that belonged to the outer court.

In front of the chambers was an inner walkway ten cubits wide and a hundred cubits long. Their doors were on the north.

Now the upper chambers were smaller because the galleries took more space from the chambers on the lower and middle floors of the building.

For they were arranged in three stories, and unlike the courts, they had no pillars. So the upper chambers were set back further than the lower and middle floors.

An outer wall in front of the chambers was fifty cubits long and ran parallel to the chambers and the outer court.

For the chambers on the outer court were fifty cubits long, while those facing the temple were a hundred cubits long.