1 Kings 6:8

8 The entrance to the bottom ^[a] floor was on the south side of the temple. A stairway led up to the middle level, and from there to the third floor.

1 Kings 6:8 Meaning and Commentary

1 Kings 6:8

The door of the middle chamber [was] in the right side of the
house
The south side of it:

and they went up with winding stairs into the middle [chamber];
which were outside the chambers, and which winded about for the sake of taking up less room, and which led up to the door of the middle chamber, on the south of which they went into it; according to the Vulgate Latin and Tigurine versions, they went up in the forth of a cockle, or the shell of a snail; in like manner as was the ascent of the temple of Pan at Alexandria, as Strabo ^F21 relates:

and out of the middle into the third;
the third chamber, and by winding stairs up to that; and the like might be on the north side, though not expressed, and on the west: the Jews say ^F23, that in the second temple, these winding stairs went from the northeast to the northwest, whereby they went up to the roof of the chambers, and so to the south and west; with this compare ( Ezekiel 41:7 ) ; and which may represent the windings and turnings of God's people in this present state, their many afflictions and tribulations, through which they pass from one state to another.

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FOOTNOTES:

F21 Geograph. l. 17. p. 547.
F23 Misn. Middot, c. 4. sect. 5. See Lightfoot's Prospect of the Temple c. 12. p. 1071.

1 Kings 6:8 In-Context

6 The bottom floor was five cubits wide, the middle floor six cubits, and the third floor seven cubits. He also placed offset ledges around the outside of the temple, so that nothing would be inserted into its walls.

7 The temple was constructed using finished stones cut at the quarry, so that no hammer or chisel or any other iron tool was heard in the temple while it was being built.

8 The entrance to the bottom floor was on the south side of the temple. A stairway led up to the middle level, and from there to the third floor.

9 So Solomon built the temple and finished it, roofing it with beams and planks of cedar.

10 He built chambers all along the temple, each five cubits high and attached to the temple with beams of cedar.

Footnotes

• [a]. LXX and Targum; Hebrew middle