2 Chronicles Chapter 4 — Furnishing the Temple

¹Then he made an altar of bronze, twenty cubits*A cubit is the length from the tip of the middle finger to the elbow on a man’s arm, or about 18 inches or 46 centimeters. long, twenty cubits wide, and ten cubits high.

²Also he made the molten sea†or, pool, or, reservoir of ten cubits from brim to brim. It was round, five cubits high, and thirty cubits in circumference.

³Under it was the likeness of oxen, which encircled it, for ten cubits, encircling the sea. The oxen were in two rows, cast when it was cast.

⁴It stood on twelve oxen, three looking toward the north, three looking toward the west, three looking toward the south, and three looking toward the east; and the sea was set on them above, and all their hindquarters were inward.

⁵It was a handbreadth thick. Its brim was made like the brim of a cup, like the flower of a lily. It received and held three thousand baths.‡A bath is about 5.6 U. S. gallons or 21.1 liters, so 3,000 baths is about 16,800 gallons or 63.3 kiloliters.

⁶He also made ten basins, and put five on the right hand and five on the left, to wash in them. The things that belonged to the burnt offering were washed in them, but the sea was for the priests to wash in.

⁷He made the ten lamp stands of gold according to the ordinance concerning them; and he set them in the temple, five on the right hand and five on the left.

⁸He made also ten tables, and placed them in the temple, five on the right side and five on the left. He made one hundred basins of gold.

⁹Furthermore he made the court of the priests, the great court, and doors for the court, and overlaid their doors with bronze.

¹⁰He set the sea on the right side of the house eastward, toward the south.

¹¹Huram made the pots, the shovels, and the basins.

¹²the two pillars, the bowls, the two capitals which were on the top of the pillars, the two networks to cover the two bowls of the capitals that were on the top of the pillars,

¹³and the four hundred pomegranates for the two networks—two rows of pomegranates for each network, to cover the two bowls of the capitals that were on the pillars.

¹⁴He also made the bases, and he made the basins on the bases—

¹⁵one sea, and the twelve oxen under it.

¹⁶Huram-abi§“abi” means “his father” also made the pots, the shovels, the forks, and all its vessels for King Solomon, for the LORD’s house, of bright bronze.

¹⁷The king cast them in the plain of the Jordan, in the clay ground between Succoth and Zeredah.

¹⁸Thus Solomon made all these vessels in great abundance, so that the weight of the bronze could not be determined.

¹⁹Solomon made all the vessels that were in God’s house: the golden altar, the tables with the show bread on them,

²⁰and the lamp stands with their lamps to burn according to the ordinance before the inner sanctuary, of pure gold;

²¹and the flowers, the lamps, and the tongs of gold that was purest gold;

²²and the snuffers, the basins, the spoons, and the fire pans of pure gold. As for the entry of the house, its inner doors for the most holy place and the doors of the main hall of the temple were of gold.