1 Kings 6:21

21 Solomon overlaid the temple on the inside [with] pure gold, and he drew across it with golden chains in front of the inner sanctuary, which he overlaid with gold.

1 Kings 6:21 Meaning and Commentary

1 Kings 6:21

So Solomon overlaid the house within with pure gold
The inside of the holy of holies with fine gold, which gold amounted to six hundred talents, ( 2 Chronicles 3:8 ) ; and these to 7,332,000 ducats of gold, or 3,045,000 pounds sterling:

and he made a partition by the chains of gold before the oracle;
between the holy and the most holy, and were instead of a vail in the tabernacle of Moses between them; here was also a vail beside the partition made by chains of gold across the oracle; for the partition was a wall of the thickness of a cubit, as Maimonides ^F2 says; and in ( 2 Chronicles 3:14 ) express mention is made of a vail of blue and in imitation of this had the Heathens their deities within vails ^F3:

and he overlaid it with gold;
the partition wall.

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FOOTNOTES:

F2 Hilchot Beth Habechirah, c. 4. sect. 2.
F3 Apulei Metamorph. l. xi. p. 176.

1 Kings 6:21 In-Context

19 Now [in] the inner sanctuary in the middle of the temple he prepared the inside to place the ark of the covenant of Yahweh there.

20 In front, the inner sanctuary [was] twenty cubits long and twenty cubits wide and twenty cubits high, and he overlaid it [with] pure gold and covered the altar [with] cedar.

21 Solomon overlaid the temple on the inside [with] pure gold, and he drew across it with golden chains in front of the inner sanctuary, which he overlaid with gold.

22 All of the temple he overlaid with gold until all of the temple [was] finished; all of the altar which belonged to the inner sanctuary he overlaid with gold.

23 He made two cherubim of olive wood for the inner sanctuary, ten cubits high.

Footnotes

• [a]. Or "house"