Bible Verses About The First Temple

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.

He cast two pillars of bronze, each eighteen cubits high and twelve cubits in circumference.

He also made two capitals of cast bronze to set on top of the pillars, each capital five cubits high.

For the capitals on top of the pillars he made a network of lattice, with wreaths of chainwork, seven for each capital.

Likewise, he made the pillars with two rows of pomegranates around each grating to cover each capital atop the pillars.

And the capitals atop the pillars in the portico were shaped like lilies, four cubits high.

On the capitals of both pillars, just above the rounded projection next to the network, were the two hundred pomegranates in rows encircling each capital.

Thus he set up the pillars at the portico of the temple. The pillar to the south he named Jachin, and the pillar to the north he named Boaz.

And the tops of the pillars were shaped like lilies. So the work of the pillars was completed.

At that time Solomon assembled before him in Jerusalem the elders of Israel—all the tribal heads and family leaders of the Israelites—to bring up the ark of the covenant of the LORD from Zion, the City of David.

And all the men of Israel came together to King Solomon at the feast in the seventh month, the month of Ethanim.

When all the elders of Israel had arrived, the priests took up the ark,

and they brought up the ark of the LORD and the Tent of Meeting with all its sacred furnishings. So the priests and Levites carried them up.

There, before the ark, King Solomon and the whole congregation of Israel who had assembled with him sacrificed so many sheep and oxen that they could not be counted or numbered.

Then the priests brought the ark of the covenant of the LORD to its place in the inner sanctuary of the temple, the Most Holy Place, beneath the wings of the cherubim.

For the cherubim spread their wings over the place of the ark and overshadowed the ark and its poles.

The poles extended far enough that their ends were visible from the Holy Place in front of the inner sanctuary, but not from outside the Holy Place; and they are there to this day.

There was nothing in the ark except the two stone tablets that Moses had placed in it at Horeb, where the LORD had made a covenant with the Israelites after they had come out of the land of Egypt.

And when the priests came out of the Holy Place, the cloud filled the house of the LORD

so that the priests could not stand there to minister because of the cloud; for the glory of the LORD filled the house of the LORD.

Then Solomon declared: “The LORD has said that He would dwell in the thick cloud.

I have indeed built You an exalted house, a place for You to dwell forever.”

And as the whole assembly of Israel stood there, the king turned around and blessed them all

and said: “Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, who has fulfilled with His own hand what He spoke with His mouth to my father David, saying,