1 Kings 6
1 480 years after the Israeli people left Egypt, during the fourth year that Solomon ruled Israel, early in May, Solomon’s workers began to build the temple.
In the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel came out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year that Solomon was king of Israel, in the month Ziv, which is the second month, the building of the Lord's house was started.
2 Inside, [the main part of] the temple was 90 feet long, 30 feet wide, and 45 feet high.
The house which Solomon made for the Lord was sixty cubits long, twenty cubits wide and thirty cubits high.
3 The entrance room was 15 feet long and 30 feet wide, just as wide as the main part of the temple.
The covered way before the Temple of the house was twenty cubits long, as wide as the house, and ten cubits wide in front of the house.
4 There were windows in [the walls of] the temple. The windows were narrower on the outside than on the inside.
And for the house he made windows, with network across.
5 Against the two sides and against the back of the temple walls, they built a structure/building that had rooms in it. [This structure had three levels/stories and each was 7-1/2 feet high].
And against the walls all round, and against the walls of the Temple and of the inmost room, he put up wings, with side rooms all round:
6 [Each room in] the lowest level/story was 7-1/2 feet wide. [Each room in] the middle level/story was nine feet wide. [The rooms in] the top level/story were 10-1/2 feet wide. The wall of the temple at the top level/story was thinner than the wall at the middle level/story, and the wall of the middle level/story was thinner than the wall at the bottom level/story. The result was that the rooms could be supported by the wall underneath them, and did not require wooden beams to support them.
The lowest line of them being five cubits wide, the middle six cubits wide and the third seven cubits; for there was a space all round the outside walls of the house so that the boards supporting the rooms did not have to be fixed in the walls of the house.
7 The huge stones for [the foundation of] the temple were cut and shaped at the quarry [to become very smooth]. The result was that while the workers were building the temple there was no noise, because they did not use hammers or chisels or any other iron tools there.
(And the stones used in the building of the house were squared at the place where they were cut out; there was no sound of hammer or axe or any iron instrument while they were building the house.)
8 The entrance to the bottom level/story [of that attached structure] was on the south side of the temple. There were stairs from the bottom level/story to the middle and top level/story.
The door to the lowest side rooms was in the right side of the house; and they went up by twisting steps into the middle rooms, and from the middle into the third.
9 So Solomon’s [workers] finished building the [framework of the] temple. They made the ceiling from cedar beams and boards.
So he put up the house and made it complete, roofing it with boards of cedar-wood.
10 They built the structure that had three levels/stories, that was against the walls of the temple. Each level/story was 7-1/2 feet high, and was joined to the temple with cedar beams.
And he put up the line of side rooms against the walls of the house, fifteen cubits high, resting against the house on boards of cedar-wood.
11 Then Yahweh said this to Solomon:
(And the word of the Lord came to Solomon, saying,
12 “[I want to tell you] about this temple that you are building. If you continually obey all my statutes and laws and commands, I will do for you what I promised to your father David.
About this house which you are building: if you will keep my laws and give effect to my decisions and be guided by my rules, I will give effect to my word which I gave to David your father.
13 I will live among the Israeli people, [in this temple, ] and I will never abandon them.”
And I will be ever among the children of Israel, and will not go away from my people.
14 Solomon’s [workers] finished building the temple.
So Solomon made the building of the house complete.)
15 On the inside, they lined/covered the walls with cedar boards. They lined/covered them from the floor to the ceiling. They made the floor from cypress boards.
The walls of the house were covered inside with cedar-wood boards; from the floor to the roof of the house they were covered inside with wood; and the floor was covered with boards of cypress-wood.
16 Inside the back part of the temple they built an inner room, called the Very Holy Place. It was 30 feet long. All the walls of this room were lined with cedar boards.
And at the back of the house a further space of twenty cubits was shut in with boards of cedar-wood, for the inmost room.
17 In front of the Very Holy Place there was a room that was 60 feet long.
And the house, that is, the Temple, in front of the holy place was forty cubits long.
18 The cedar [boards on the walls] inside the temple were decorated with carvings of gourds and flowers. [The walls were] completely covered with cedar boards, with the result that the stones [of the walls behind them] could not be seen.
(All the inside of the house was cedar-wood, ornamented with designs of buds and flowers; no stonework was to be seen inside.)
19 At the back of the temple they made the Very Holy Place, where the Sacred Chest would be put.
And he made ready an inmost room in the middle of the house, in which to put the ark of the agreement of the Lord.
20 That room was 30 feet long, 30 feet wide, and 30 feet high. They covered the walls with [very thin sheets of] pure gold. [For burning incense] they also made an altar of cedar [boards].
And the inmost room was twenty cubits square and twenty cubits high, plated over with clear gold, and he made an altar of cedar-wood, plating it with gold.
21 Solomon told them to cover the other walls inside the temple with [very thin sheets of] pure gold and to fasten gold chains across the entrance to the Very Holy Place.
Solomon had all the inside of the house covered with gold, and he put chains of gold across in front of the inmost room, which itself was covered with gold.
22 They covered all the walls of the temple and the altar that was outside the Very Holy Place with [very thin sheets of] gold.
Plates of gold were put all through the house till it was covered completely (and the altar in the inmost room was all covered with gold).
23 Inside the Very Holy Place, they made from olive tree wood [large statues of] two creatures with wings. Each one was 15 feet tall.
In the inmost room he made two winged beings of olive-wood, ten cubits high;
24 They each were the same size and had the same shape. They each had two wings [which were spread out]. Each wing was 7-1/2 feet long, with the result that the distance between the outer ends of the two wings was 15 feet.
With outstretched wings five cubits wide; the distance from the edge of one wing to the edge of the other was ten cubits.
The two winged ones were ten cubits high, of the same size and form.
The two of them were ten cubits high.
27 They put those statues next to each other in the Very Holy Place so that the wing of the one touched the one wing of the other in the center of the room, and the outer wings touched the walls.
These were placed inside the inner house, their outstretched wings touching the walls of the house, one touching one wall and one the other, while their other wings were touching in the middle.
28 They covered the statues with [very thin sheets of] gold.
These winged ones were plated over with gold.
29 [Solomon told them to] decorate the walls of the main room and the Very Holy Place by carving representations of winged creatures and palm trees and flowers.
And all the walls of the house inside and out were ornamented with forms of winged ones and palm-trees and open flowers.
30 They also covered the floor of both rooms with [very thin sheets of] gold.
And the floor of the house was covered with gold, inside and out.
31 They made a set of doors from olive tree wood, and placed them at the entrance to the Very Holy Place. The doorposts joined at the top to form a pointed arch.
For the way into the inmost room he made doors of olive-wood, the arch and the door supports forming a five-sided opening.
32 The doors were decorated by carving on them representations of winged creatures, palm trees, and flowers. All of these things were covered with [very thin sheets of] gold.
On the olive-wood doors were cut designs of winged ones and palm-trees and open flowers, all of them, with the doors, plated with gold.
33 They made a rectangular door frame from olive tree wood, and put it [between the entrance room and] the main room.
Then he made pillars of olive-wood for the way into the Temple; the pillars were square:
34 They made two folding doors from cypress wood [and fastened them to the door frame].
And two folding doors of cypress-wood, with two leaves.
35 The doors were also decorated with wood carvings of winged creatures, palm trees, and flowers, and they were also covered evenly with [very thin sheets of] gold.
These were ornamented with designs of winged ones and palm-trees and open flowers, plated over with gold.
36 They built a courtyard in front of the temple. The walls around the courtyard were made of cedar and stone; to make the walls, between each layer of cedar beams they put down two layers of stone.
And the inner space was walled with three lines of squared stones and a line of cedar-wood boards.
37 They laid the foundation of the temple of Yahweh in early May, in the fourth year [that Solomon ruled].
In the fourth year the base of the house was put in its place, in the month Ziv.
38 In the eleventh year [that he ruled], in the middle of October, they finished building the temple and all of its parts, doing exactly what Solomon told them to do. It required seven years to build it.
And in the eleventh year, in the month Bul, which is the eighth month, the building of the house was complete in every detail, as it had been designed. So he was seven years building it.
