Solomon & The Temple

All these buildings were made of expensive stone blocks, cut to measure and finished by saws on the inner surfaces as well as the outer ones. These stones were used from the foundation to the eaves and outward from the buildings all the way to the Great Courtyard.

The foundation was of expensive stone blocks, very large ones - stones fourteen to eighteen feet long.

Above these were costly stones, cut to measure, and cedar-wood.

The surrounding Great Courtyard had three rows of cut stone and a row of cedar beams like the inner courtyard of the house of ADONAI and the courtyard by the hall of the house.

King Shlomo sent for Hiram and brought him from Tzor.

He was the son of a widow from the tribe of Naftali, but his father was from Tzor, a bronze-worker filled with wisdom, understanding and skill for all kinds of bronze craftsmanship. He came to King Shlomo and did all his bronzework.

He made the two bronze columns, each one thirty-one-and-a-half feet high and twenty-one feet in circumference.

He made two capitals of melted bronze to set on the tops of the columns; each capital was eight-and-three-quarters feet high;

he also made checker-work nets and chained wreaths, seven for the top of each capital.

When he made the columns, he made two rows of pomegranates to put at the top of each column around the netting covering its capital.

The capitals on the columns in the hall had shapes like lilies and were seven feet high.

As for the capitals on the two columns, there were 200 pomegranates in rows around each capital near the molding by the netting.

He erected the columns in the hall of the temple; on erecting the right column he gave it the name "Yakhin," and on erecting the left column he named it "Bo'az."

On the tops of the columns were shapes like lilies; thus the work of the columns was finished.

He made the cast metal "Sea" circular, seventeen-and-a-half feet from rim to rim, eight-and-three quarter feet high and fifty-two-and-a-half feet in circumference.

Under its rim, three hundred gourds encircled it in two rows; they were cast when the Sea was cast.

It rested on twelve oxen, three looking north, three looking west, three looking south and three looking east, all with their hindquarters toward the center. The Sea was set on top of them.

It was a handbreadth thick, its rim was made like the rim of a cup, like the flower of a lily; and its capacity was 11,000 gallons.

He made ten bronze trolleys, each one seven feet long, seven feet wide, and five-and-a-quarter feet high.

They were designed with panels that were set between the corner-posts,

and on the panels between the corner-posts were lions, oxen and k'ruvim. The corner-posts above were similarly designed. Below the lions and oxen were wreaths of hammered work.

Every trolley had four bronze wheels and bronze axles, and its four legs each had cast supports which were under the basin, with wreaths next to each.

The opening of the stand into which the basin was inserted was eighteen inches high; the stand was round, resembling a pedestal, and it was two-and-a-half feet in diameter. On the stand were carvings, and the outside was square, not round.

The four wheels were under the panels, and the axles for the wheels were attached to the trolleys; each wheel was two-and-a-half feet.

The wheels were made like chariot wheels; their axles, rims, spokes and hubs were all cast metal.