2 Chronicles 3

1 Now Solomon began to build the house of the Lord at Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where the Lord had appeared to his father David, at the place that David had prepared on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

2 And he began to build on the second day of the second month in the fourth year of his reign.

3 This is the foundation which Solomon laid for building the house of God: The length was sixty cubits (by cubits according to the former measure) and the width twenty cubits.

4 And the vestibule that was in front of the sanctuary was twenty cubits long across the width of the house, and the height was one hundred and twenty. He overlaid the inside with pure gold.

5 The larger room he paneled with cypress which he overlaid with fine gold, and he carved palm trees and chainwork on it.

6 And he decorated the house with precious stones for beauty, and the gold was gold from Parvaim.

7 He also overlaid the house--the beams and doorposts, its walls and doors--with gold; and he carved cherubim on the walls.

8 And he made the Most Holy Place. Its length was according to the width of the house, twenty cubits, and its width twenty cubits. He overlaid it with six hundred talents of fine gold.

9 The weight of the nails was fifty shekels of gold; and he overlaid the upper area with gold.

10 In the Most Holy Place he made two cherubim, fashioned by carving, and overlaid them with gold.

11 The wings of the cherubim were twenty cubits in overall length: one wing of the one cherub was five cubits, touching the wall of the room, and the other wing was five cubits, touching the wing of the other cherub;

12 one wing of the other cherub was five cubits, touching the wall of the room, and the other wing also was five cubits, touching the wing of the other cherub.

13 The wings of these cherubim spanned twenty cubits overall. They stood on their feet, and they faced inward.

14 And he made the veil of blue, purple, crimson, and fine linen, and wove cherubim into it.

15 Also he made in front of the temple two pillars thirty-five cubits high, and the capital that was on the top of each of them was five cubits.

16 He made wreaths of chainwork, as in the inner sanctuary, and put them on top of the pillars; and he made one hundred pomegranates, and put them on the wreaths of chainwork.

17 Then he set up the pillars before the temple, one on the right hand and the other on the left; he called the name of the one on the right hand Jachin, and the name of the one on the left Boaz.

2 Chronicles 3 Commentary

Chapter 3

The building of the temple.

- There is a more particular account of the building of the ( 1 Kings 6 ) not only which he had purchased, but which he had fixed on by Divine direction. Full instructions enable us to go about our work with certainty and to proceed therein with comfort. Blessed be God, the Scriptures are enough to render the man of God thoroughly furnished for every good work. Let us search the Scriptures daily, beseeching the Lord to enable us to understand, believe, and obey his word, that our work and our way may be made plain, and that all may be begun, continued, and ended in him. Beholding God, in Christ, his true Temple, more glorious than that of Solomon's, may we become a spiritual house, a habitation of God through the Spirit.

Footnotes

• [a]. The main room of the temple; elsewhere called the holy place (compare 1 Kings 6:3)
• [b]. Following Masoretic Text, Septuagint, and Vulgate; Arabic, some manuscripts of the Septuagint, and Syriac omit one hundred and.
• [c]. Literally house
• [d]. Literally house
• [e]. Or eighteen (compare 1 Kings 7:15; 2 Kings 25:17; and Jeremiah 52:21)

Chapter Summary

INTRODUCTION TO 2 CHRONICLES 3 & 4

These two chapters give an account of the building of the temple, of the materials, parts, and form of it, and of things belonging to it, and which agrees with 1Ki 6:1-7:51 see the notes there; only here, 1Ch 3:1, mention is made of the particular place where it was built, Mount Moriah; of which see the notes on Ge 22:2, 1Ch 22:1. The dimensions of the house, as the Targum rightly explains, 2Ch 3:3, are said to be after the first measure, either of that of the tabernacle by Moses, or rather of that of the pattern David gave to Solomon, 1Ch 28:11, though some understand it of the greater cubit: the holy place is called the greater house, 2Ch 3:5, being twice as long as the holy of holies; in 2Ch 3:6, we are informed what the precious stones were for, which David and his princes gave for the temple, 1Ch 29:2,8, that they were to decorate the house; and also what sort of gold was used in overlaying it, gold of Parvaim, which some interpret of Peru {h}, in America; but it is a question whether that was then known, or, if it was, must go by another name, since Peru is a late name given by the Spaniards, at their conquest of it. Bochart {i} takes it to be Taprobane, an island in the Indian sea, as if it was Taph Parvan or Provan, the shore of Parvan. Kircher {k} is of opinion it is the same with Javaim, the isles of Java in the same sea, from whence was gold, which is not very likely. Waserus {l} thinks Parvaim is the name of a town which is by Pliny {m} corruptly called Parbacia, which was in the land of Havilah, or the kingdom of the Charazenes, where was the best gold, Ge 2:11,12 though others suppose it to be the same with Ophir, by removing the first letter of the word, to which Pfeiffer {n} inclines, and is as probable as any; and much more probable than what the Jews {o} say, that this gold was so called, because it was red like the blood of "parim", oxen: in 2Ch 3:8, the quantity of gold, with which the most holy place was overlaid, is given, six hundred talents: of which \\see Gill on "1Ki 6:21"\\, In 2Ch 3:9 we read of the nails with which the plates of gold were fastened to the boards, nowhere else mentioned, except in the Vulgate Latin version of 1Ki 6:21, "he fastened the plates with golden nails"; which version perhaps is most correct; the weight of which were fifty shekels of gold; that is, according to the Septuagint and Vulgate Latin versions, each nail weighed so much, which amounted to seventy five pounds of our money {p}. Eupolemus, an Heathen writer {q} speaks of these nails, which he makes to be silver ones; and says they were of the weight of a talent, in the form of a woman's breast, and in number four, with which the plates of gold were fastened, which were of five cubits; I suppose he means there were four of these nails in every plate of five cubits: in 2Ch 4:1 an account is given of an "altar of brass", made by Solomon, we have not elsewhere, only referred to 1Ki 8:64, 9:25 whether this was only covered with brass, as that made by Moses was, as some {r} think; or whether of massy brass, as Dr. Lightfoot {s} because not to be removed as that was, is not certain; the altar of the second temple was of stones unpolished, according to the Misnah {t}, with which agrees

``46 And laid up the stones in the mountain of the temple in a convenient place, until there should come a prophet to shew what should be done with them. 47 Then they took whole stones according to the law, and built a new altar according to the former;'' (1 Maccabees 4)

and so Philo {u}: "twenty cubits was the length thereof, and twenty cubits the breadth thereof, and ten cubits the height thereof"; it was four times as big in its square as that of Moses, and three times higher, and a cubit over, \\see Gill on "Ex 27:1"\\. Hecataeus {w}, an Heathen writer, speaks of this altar as four square, and made of whole and unpolished stones, each side of which was twenty cubits, but the height of it he makes to be twelve cubits, in which he mistakes. It weighed, according to Jacob Leon {x} 7000 arobas of brass, each aroba containing twenty five pounds. The rest of the chapter agrees with the account in the book of Kings.

\\See Gill on "1Ki 6:1"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:2"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:3"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:4"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:5"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:6"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:7"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:8"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:9"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:10"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:11"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:12"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:13"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:14"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:15"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:16"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:17"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:18"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:19"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:20"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:21"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:22"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:23"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:24"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:25"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:26"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:27"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:28"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:29"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:30"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:31"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:32"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:33"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:34"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:35"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:36"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:37"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 6:38"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:1"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:2"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:3"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:4"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:5"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:6"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:7"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:8"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:9"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:10"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:11"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:12"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:13"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:14"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:15"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:16"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:17"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:18"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:19"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:20"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:21"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:22"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:23"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:24"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:25"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:26"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:27"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:28"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:29"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:30"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:31"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:32"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:33"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:34"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:35"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:36"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:37"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:38"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:39"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:40"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:41"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:42"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:43"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:44"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:45"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:46"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:47"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:48"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:49"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:50"\\ \\See Gill on "1Ki 7:51"\\

{h} Erasm. Schmid. de America Orat. ad Calc. Pindar. p. 261. Montani Phaleg. in Calc. Jac. Capellus in loc. {i} Phaleg. l. 2. c. 27. & Canaan, l. 1. c. 46. col. 692. Braunius de Vest. Sacred. Heb. p. 221. {k} Prodrom. Copt. c. 4. p. 119. {l} De Antiqu. Num. Heb. l. 1. c. 6. {m} Nat. Hist l. 6. c. 28. {n} Difficil. Script. Sacr. cent. 3. loc. 16. p. 247. {o} T. Bab. Yoma, fol. 45. 1. Hieros. Yoma, fol. 41. 4. Shemot Rabba, sect. 39. fol. 136. 4. {p} Brerewood de Ponder. &c. c. 5. {q} Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 34. p. 450. {r} Cunaeus de Rep. Heb. l. 2. c. 5. {s} Prospect of the Temple, ch. 34. p. 2029. So Villalpandus. {t} Middot, c. 3. sect. 4. {u} De Victimis, p. 850. {w} Apud Euseb. Evangel. Praepar. l. 9. c. 4. p. 408. {x} Relation of Memorable Things in the Temple, ch. 4. p. 20. 19189-950107-1827-2Ch3.2