2 Chronicles 4

1 He made the Bronze Altar thirty feet long, thirty feet wide, and ten feet high.
2 He made a Sea - an immense round basin of cast metal fifteen feet in diameter, seven and a half feet high, and forty-five feet in circumference.
3 Just under the rim, there were two parallel bands of something like bulls, ten to each foot and a half. The figures were cast in one piece with the Sea.
4 The Sea was set on twelve bulls, three facing north, three facing west, three facing south, and three facing east. All the bulls faced outward and supported the Sea on their hindquarters.
5 The Sea was three inches thick and flared at the rim like a cup, or a lily. It held about 18,000 gallons.
6 He made ten Washbasins, five set on the right and five on the left, for rinsing the things used for the Whole-Burnt-Offerings. The priests washed themselves in the Sea.
7 He made ten gold Lampstands, following the specified pattern, and placed five on the right and five on the left.
8 He made ten tables and set five on the right and five on the left. He also made a hundred gold bowls.
9 He built a Courtyard especially for the priests and then the great court and doors for the court. The doors were covered with bronze.
10 He placed the Sea on the right side of The Temple at the southeast corner.
11 He also made ash buckets, shovels, and bowls. And that about wrapped it up: Huram completed the work he had contracted to do for King Solomon:
12 two pillars; two bowl-shaped capitals for the tops of the pillars; two decorative filigrees for the capitals;
13 four hundred pomegranates for the filigrees (a double row of pomegranates for each filigree);
14 ten washstands with their basins;
15 one Sea and the twelve bulls under it;
16 miscellaneous buckets, forks, shovels, and bowls.
17 The king had them cast in clay in a foundry on the Jordan plain between Succoth and Zarethan.
18 These artifacts were never weighed - there were far too many! Nobody has any idea how much bronze was used.
19 Solomon was also responsible for the furniture and accessories in The Temple of God: the gold Altar; the tables that held the Bread of the Presence;
20 the Lampstands of pure gold with their lamps, to be lighted before the Inner Sanctuary, the Holy of Holies;
21 the gold flowers, lamps, and tongs (all solid gold);
22 the gold wick trimmers, bowls, ladles, and censers; the gold doors of The Temple, doors to the Holy of Holies, and the doors to the main sanctuary.

2 Chronicles 4 Commentary

Chapter 4

The furniture of the temple.

- Here is a further account of the furniture of God's house. Both without doors and within, there was that which typified the grace of the gospel, and shadowed out good things to come, of which the substance is Christ. There was the brazen altar. The making of this was not mentioned in the book of Kings. On this all the sacrifices were offered, and it sanctified the gift. The people who worshipped in the courts might see the sacrifices burned. They might thus be led to consider the great Sacrifice, to be offered in the fulness of time, to take away sin, and put an end to death, which the blood of bulls and goats could not possibly do. And, with the smoke of the sacrifices, their hearts might ascend to heaven, in holy desires towards God and his favour. In all our devotions we must keep the eye of faith fixed upon Christ. The furniture of the temple, compared with that of the tabernacle, showed that God's church would be enlarged, and his worshippers multiplied. Blessed be God, there is enough in Christ for all.

2 Chronicles 4 Commentaries

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.