1 Kings 7

1Solomon spent thirteen years building his own palace, and he finished his entire palace.

2He built the House of the Forest of Lebanon. It was a hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide, and thirty cubits high, on four rows of cedar pillars, with cedar beams resting on the pillars.

3It was roofed with cedar above the beams that rested on the pillars, forty-five of them, fifteen to a row.

4There were window frames in three rows, with window facing window in three tiers.

5All the doorways and doorposts had square frames, with window facing window in three tiers.

6He made the Hall of Pillars fifty cubits long and thirty cubits wide. In front of it was a porch, with pillars and a canopy in front of them.

7He made the Hall of the Throne, the Hall of Judgment, where he was to judge, and it was paneled with cedar from floor to floor.

8His own house where he was to live, in the other courtyard set back from the hall, was of the same workmanship. Solomon also made a house like this hall for Pharaoh’s daughter, whom he had married.

9All these were made of costly stones, dressed stone cut to measure and trimmed with saws on the inside and outside, from the foundation to the coping, and on the outside as far as the great courtyard.

10The foundation was of costly stones, large stones, some ten cubits and some eight cubits long.

11Above were costly stones, dressed stone cut to measure, and cedar.

12The great courtyard all around had three courses of dressed stone and one course of cedar beams, like the inner courtyard of the house of Yahweh and the porch of the house.

13King Solomon sent for Hiram and brought him from Tyre.

14He was the son of a widow from the tribe of Naphtali, and his father was a man of Tyre, a bronze worker. Hiram was filled with wisdom, understanding, and skill to do any kind of work in bronze. He came to King Solomon and did all his work.

15He cast the two bronze pillars. Each pillar was eighteen cubits high, and it took a line of twelve cubits to measure around each one.

16He also made two capitals of cast bronze to set on the tops of the pillars. One capital was five cubits high, and the other capital was five cubits high.

17There were nets of latticework and wreaths of chainwork for the capitals on the tops of the pillars, seven for one capital and seven for the other capital.

18He made the pillars with two rows of pomegranates around each latticework to cover the capitals at the top of the pillars; he did the same for the other capital.

19The capitals on the tops of the pillars in the porch were of lily design, four cubits high.

20On the capitals of the two pillars, above and close to the rounded bulge next to the latticework, were two hundred pomegranates in rows all around; it was the same on the other capital.

21He set up the pillars at the porch of the main hall. He set up the pillar on the right and named it Jakin, and he set up the pillar on the left and named it Boaz.

22The tops of the pillars were of lily design. So the work on the pillars was finished.

23He made the Sea of cast metal, ten cubits from rim to rim. It was completely round, five cubits high, and it took a line of thirty cubits to measure around it.

24Under its rim all around were gourds encircling it, ten to a cubit, surrounding the Sea all around. The gourds were in two rows, cast in one piece with it.

25It stood on twelve oxen, three facing north, three facing west, three facing south, and three facing east. The Sea rested on top of them, and all their hindquarters were toward the inside.

26It was a handbreadth thick, and its rim was made like the rim of a cup, like a lily blossom. It held two thousand baths.

27He also made the ten bronze stands. Each stand was four cubits long, four cubits wide, and three cubits high.

28This is how the stands were made: they had panels, and the panels were set between the frames.

29On the panels between the frames were lions, oxen, and cherubim. On the frames, both above and below the lions and oxen, were wreaths of hanging work.

30Each stand had four bronze wheels with bronze axles, and its four feet had supports. The supports were cast beneath the basin, with wreaths at the side of each.

31Its opening inside the crown projected upward one cubit. Its opening was round, made like a pedestal, measuring a cubit and a half. Around its opening there were engravings, and their panels were square, not round.

32The four wheels were under the panels, and the axles of the wheels were fixed to the stand. Each wheel was a cubit and a half high.

33The wheels were made like chariot wheels; their axles, rims, spokes, and hubs were all of cast metal.

34There were four supports at the four corners of each stand; the supports were of one piece with the stand.

35At the top of the stand there was a round band half a cubit high. On the top of the stand, its braces and its panels were of one piece with it.

36On the surfaces of its braces and on its panels he engraved cherubim, lions, and palm trees, as the space on each allowed, with wreaths all around.

37In this way he made the ten stands. All of them were cast alike, with the same measurements and the same shape.

38He made ten bronze basins. Each basin held forty baths and measured four cubits. There was one basin on each of the ten stands.

39He put five of the stands on the right side of the house and five on the left side of the house. He put the Sea on the right side of the house, toward the southeast.

40Hiram also made the basins, the shovels, and the sprinkling bowls. So Hiram finished all the work he did for King Solomon on the house of Yahweh:

41the two pillars; the bowl-shaped capitals on top of the two pillars; the two sets of latticework to cover the two bowls of the capitals on top of the pillars;

42the four hundred pomegranates for the two sets of latticework, two rows of pomegranates for each lattice, to cover the two bowls of the capitals on the pillars;

43the ten stands, and the ten basins on the stands;

44the one Sea, and the twelve oxen under the Sea;

45and the pots, the shovels, and the sprinkling bowls. All these utensils that Hiram made for King Solomon for the house of Yahweh were of burnished bronze.

46The king cast them in the plain of the Jordan, in the clay ground between Succoth and Zarethan.

47Solomon left all the utensils unweighed, because there were so very many; the weight of the bronze was never determined.

48Solomon also made all the furnishings that were in the house of Yahweh: the golden altar; the golden table on which was the bread of the Presence;

49the lampstands of pure gold, five on the right and five on the left in front of the inner sanctuary; the flowers, the lamps, and the tongs of gold;

50the cups, wick trimmers, sprinkling bowls, dishes, and firepans of pure gold; and the gold sockets for the doors of the inner house, the Most Holy Place, and for the doors of the house, the main hall.

51So all the work that King Solomon did on the house of Yahweh was completed. Then Solomon brought in the things his father David had dedicated—the silver, the gold, and the utensils—and he put them in the treasuries of the house of Yahweh.