1 Kings 6:14-34

14 Solomon built and completed The Temple.
15 He paneled the interior walls from floor to ceiling with cedar planks; for flooring he used cypress.
16 The thirty feet at the rear of The Temple he made into an Inner Sanctuary, cedar planks from floor to ceiling - the Holy of Holies.
17 The Main Sanctuary area in front was sixty feet long.
18 The entire interior of The Temple was cedar, with carvings of fruits and flowers. All cedar - none of the stone was exposed.
19 The Inner Sanctuary within The Temple was for housing the Chest of the Covenant of God.
20 This Inner Sanctuary was a cube, thirty feet each way, all plated with gold. The Altar of cedar was also gold-plated.
21 Everywhere you looked there was pure gold: gold chains strung in front of the gold-plated Inner Sanctuary
22 - gold everywhere - walls, ceiling, floor, and Altar. Dazzling!
23 Then he made two cherubim, gigantic angel-like figures, from olivewood. Each was fifteen feet tall.
24 The outstretched wings of the cherubim (they were identical in size and shape) measured another fifteen feet. He placed the two cherubim, their wings spread, in the Inner Sanctuary. The combined wingspread stretched the width of the room, the wing of one cherub touched one wall, the wing of the other the other wall, and the wings touched in the middle.
28 The cherubim were gold plated.
29 He then carved engravings of cherubim, palm trees, and flower blossoms on all the walls of both the Inner and the Main Sanctuary.
30 And all the floors of both inner and outer rooms were gold plated.
31 He constructed doors of olivewood for the entrance to the Inner Sanctuary; the lintel and doorposts were five-sided.
32 The doors were also carved with cherubim, palm trees, and flowers, and then covered with gold leaf.
33 Similarly, he built the entrance to the Main Sanctuary using olivewood for the doorposts but these doorposts were four-sided.
34 The doors were of cypress, split into two panels, each panel swinging separately.

1 Kings 6:14-34 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO FIRST KINGS 6

This chapter gives an account of the building of the temple, for which preparations were before made and begins with the time of its building, 1Ki 6:1; gives the dimensions of it and the porch before it, 1Ki 6:2,3; observes the windows in it and chambers about it, 1Ki 6:4-10; and while it was building, Solomon had a word from the Lord relative to it, 1Ki 6:11-14; and then the account goes on concerning the walls of the house, and the flooring of it, 1Ki 6:15-18; and the oracle in it, and the cherubim in that, 1Ki 6:19-30; and the doors into it, and the carved work of them, 1Ki 6:31-36; and the chapter is concluded with observing the time when it was begun and finished 1Ki 6:37,38.

Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.