And it came to pass in the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel were come out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon's reign over Israel, in the month Zif, which is the second month, that he began to build the house of Jehovah.
Two dates anchor this verse: 480 years since Israel walked out of Egypt, and the fourth year of Solomon's reign. Why does Scripture date the temple from a rescue almost five centuries earlier? And why did God wait so long for a settled house?
The clock does not start with David's plans or Solomon's crowning. It starts with Israel's rescue from Egypt. The month named here also carries a meaning:
The Holy Spirit in 1 Kings 6:1 dates the building of the Temple from Israel's deliverance from Egypt. In this way He shows that the Lord was about to make His home among a people saved by sovereign grace. Solomon started the work in the fourth year of his reign, "in the month of Ziv, which is the second month." This month lines up with May. Ziv means "splendour." Spring was in its glory, physically and otherwise.
What Israel sang at the Red Sea now stood in stone. Two men brought it there: one prepared, the other built. That pair pictures Christ's own work:
Four hundred and eighty years have passed since the exodus from Egypt; the Lord's purpose in delivering His people has been reached. What Israel had sung on the shore of the Red Sea is at last realised: "You will bring them in and plant them on your own mountain, the place, O LORD, which you have made for your abode, the sanctuary, O Lord, which your hands have established" (Ex. 15:17). The two things named there are pictured by David and by Solomon. To prepare is not the same as to build. It was David who had prepared everything for the construction of the temple (1 Chr. 22:14)... Solomon built. The Saviour "prepares"; the Lord "establishes by His hands." God prepared the materials for His dwelling with men and for carrying out all His purposes. They are the fruit of the sufferings and rejection of the true David.
Israel had no temple through the desert years, the wars of Canaan, the judges, or David's reign. The reason is not delay, but what a settled home requires:
David could not build this house. There had to be peace first (v. 3), before the Lord could make His lasting home among His people. As long as they wandered in the desert, the Lord joined Himself to them in the tabernacle, sharing their life as pilgrims and travellers. Then followed the wars of Canaan under Joshua and the judges; these had not ceased until the reign of David. God cannot dwell in rest where there is war... It is the same, spiritually, for the Church. When the "good news of peace" is announced, the house of God, the holy temple in the Lord, is built up. That work goes on until the full rest of glory.
The 450 years named in Acts 13 are hard to fit inside the 480 years counted here. Commentators differ on how to settle it. One reads the gap as deliberate — years God refused to count:
The building of Solomon's temple runs on the line of God's intentions for His people. He had redeemed them so that they might live wholly to Himself and prepare a home for Him (Ex. 15:2). But during the ninety-three years in which they served His enemies and theirs, they were not living to Him. This was not His purpose for them — and as a result, He could not reckon these sad years in His calendar.
Others say the problem lies in the translation of Acts 13:20, not in the numbers:
In Acts 13:20 the older English version reads that God gave them judges for about 450 years, until Samuel the prophet. That does not agree with the 480 years of 1 Kings 6:1. But Acts 13 has a different reading, and editors of the Greek New Testament have adopted it. They did so for reasons that have nothing to do with chronology. It reads, "...he gave them their land as an inheritance. All this took about 450 years. And after that he gave them judges." So the 450 years are not applied to the length of the judges' rule.
(The first reading comes from an older English Bible. The words in quotation marks are the ESV of Acts 13:19–20.)
The temple was a real fulfilment, but not the final one:
Israel needed all that time to reach the height of their power and splendour. Sadly, it did not last very long. Yet it fulfilled God's promise to take Israel out of Egypt and establish them in great blessing in the land of promise. The permanent fulfilment of this promise awaits the coming of the Messiah in power and glory.
- Rescued — the count starts at the exodus. God was about to settle among a people saved by grace.
- Reckoned — the 480 years may leave out the ninety-three years Israel served God's enemies. Those years could not enter His calendar. Others settle the numbers through the reading of Acts 13:20.
- Rested — David could not build. God makes no settled home where there is still war. Peace comes first, then the house.
- Reared — David prepared, Solomon built. So the Saviour prepares and the Lord establishes with His own hands. The same work goes on in His Church through the good news of peace.
- Reserved — Israel's height of splendour under Solomon faded fast. The lasting fulfilment waits for the Messiah in power and glory.
And the house that king Solomon built for Jehovah was sixty cubits in length, and twenty in breadth, and thirty cubits in height.
Scripture gives only three figures for the house Solomon built for the LORD: sixty, twenty and thirty cubits. They raise two questions: why was God's house so small, and what do the measurements teach?
The first surprise is how small the building was. One writer sets it beside the huge temples of Egypt:
At first glance the proportions of the temple are surprising, because they are so restrained. Even unbelievers have noticed it. There is a great difference between the size of Solomon's temple and the huge sanctuaries of Egypt. Size is not what marks His house. Holiness, perfect order, righteousness, and glory mark it — that is to say, the balance and harmony of all the perfections of God.
Another writer puts the cubit into inches:
The size of the temple was fairly small, though nothing surpassed its splendour… The cubit is understood to be between 18 and 22 inches.
These numbers are not new. They come from the tabernacle, the portable tent Israel carried through the wilderness:
The temple was exactly double the tabernacle in length, in width, and in height. But the proportions of the different parts stayed the same. While Israel crossed the wilderness, the tabernacle might have seemed a small thing next to what the house of God was to be in glory. Yet all God's plan, all the order of His house, was already in that temporary building, and was to be shown there. It is the same with the Church. In glory the order of the government of the house will be fully shown, as we see in the description of the New Jerusalem in relation to the kingdom (Rev. 21).
So the hunt for foreign models behind the design misses the point:
Look closely at the way the temple was built. Beyond the striking likeness between its dimensions and those of the tabernacle, you see that the temple followed no model but that one. We stress this because men who disbelieve God's revelation, often without a second thought, will go to great lengths to find out whether Tyrian, Assyrian, Egyptian, or Babylonian temples served more or less as models for Solomon's. In fact it served as its own model. Is this not worthy of the True Architect of the temple, who revealed all its details to David, just as He had earlier revealed those of the tabernacle to Moses?
The verse gives thirty cubits for the height, though the house itself stood lower. One writer accounts for the extra ten cubits with rooms above:
The whole length was 60 cubits, the breadth 20 cubits, and the height also 20 cubits… The upper chambers were 10 cubits high, which is why the height of the whole building is given as 30 cubits.
Another writer gives the same measurements, and draws a lesson from the shape of the innermost room:
In the temple, the measurements were double those of the tabernacle, but in the same relative proportions. The whole building was 60 cubits long, 20 broad, and 20 high. Of this the holy place was 40 cubits long and the holiest 20 — again a perfect cube, its breadth and length and height equal. How easy it is to recognise here that God's mind is perfectly realised only in the holiest.
The building has a meaning past its stone and cedar:
Finally, the temple is Christ. "Destroy this temple," He said, "and in three days I will raise it up." Here below He was the temple in which the Father dwelt. But if the temple as a whole is Christ, then each of its parts shows Him in a different character… everything, just as in the tabernacle in the wilderness, speaks to us of Him. Everything shows His glories, the effectiveness of His work, the light of His Spirit, the fragrance of His Name, the value of His blood, and the purity, holiness and glory of His Person.
This house had its place in God's dealings with an earthly people:
Once God had an earthly people, a tabernacle or a temple was necessary, and it became the centre of all their political and religious life. When God declared the people "Lo-ammi" — "not my people" — the glory of the LORD left the temple. The temple itself finally disappeared, after being destroyed and rebuilt many times. But when the LORD sets up His sure relationship with His people again, under the new covenant of grace, the temple will reappear, more glorious than it has ever been.
- Small — sixty by twenty by thirty cubits is a modest building. Holiness, order, righteousness and glory mark God's house, not size.
- Doubled — the plan is the wilderness tent at twice the size, with every proportion kept. That temporary tent already held the whole order of God's house.
- Original — the temple copied no Tyrian, Egyptian or Babylonian design; it served as its own model.
- Perfect — upper rooms account for the thirty; inside, the holiest is a cube of twenty, where God's mind is perfectly realised.
- Christ — every part of the house speaks of Him, the true temple in whom the Father dwelt. The house itself will yet reappear, more glorious than ever.
And the porch, in front of the temple of the house, was twenty cubits in length, in front of the house broadways, [and] ten cubits was its breadth, in front of the house.
The verse moves from the main building to the porch, or vestibule, across its front. The numbers read like builder's notes. Yet God gave them, and commentators find the Person and work of Christ pictured in them.
Students of ancient buildings often hunt for whatever Solomon copied. One writer answers that the temple had only one model: the tabernacle, the tent God had shown Moses.
Look closely at the way the temple was built. Its dimensions are strikingly like those of the tabernacle. Beyond that, you see the temple was built on no model other than the tabernacle itself. We stress this point. Men who disbelieve the revelation of God, often without a thought, will go to great lengths to ask whether Tyrian, Assyrian, Egyptian, or Babylonian temples served more or less as models for Solomon's. In fact it served as its own model. Is this not worthy of the True Architect of the temple? He revealed all its details to David, just as He had earlier revealed the tabernacle's details to Moses. And now something no human project could ever do: every one of these details had a divine meaning. Each one would draw our thoughts by faith to the Person and work of Christ.
The porch stood at the front because there was no other way in. One writer sets its great height beside Psalm 24.
The porch of the temple was its only entrance. Its proportions differed from the tabernacle's. 2 Chronicles 3:4 tells us it was 120 cubits high. It was four times as high as the house. In figure it matches the passage in Psalm 24: "Who shall ascend the hill of the LORD? And who shall stand in His holy place? … Lift up your heads, O gates! … that the King of glory may come in." This true arch of triumph was worthy of the King of glory, the LORD of hosts, strong and mighty. Solomon was only a faint picture of Him.
Commentators differ on that height. Others read the number in 2 Chronicles as a copying mistake.
The text gives the height of the porch as 120 cubits. That is clearly a copyist's error. It should be twenty cubits, or maybe thirty.
The porch's length matched the width of the house. The holiest — the innermost room — measured twenty cubits across as well. One writer builds everything on that match.
Here is the first measurement I notice. The length of the porch, the way into the temple, matches the width of the holiest — twenty cubits. The holy house stood for the presence of God. And the porch, the way into that presence, matched the divine presence itself… The way, or porch, is equal to the holiest. Jesus is the way, and He is equal to the divine presence, for He is God… The length of the porch equalled the width of the holiest. And what a height it had! What boldness we have in Jesus to enter!
The same twenty cubits appears again inside, in the wingspan of the cherubim — the winged figures in the holiest. The same writer lays the three measurements side by side.
Scripture takes the greatest care to show that the span of the cherubim's wings was the exact width of the holiest… Not one cubit short of the width of the holiest. Can anything give more solid peace than this? The consuming judgment of God on sin matched God's own measure of sin. Not our thought of sin, not our measure, but the divine presence itself — the twenty cubits of the holiest. Twenty cubits, the length of the porch. Twenty cubits, the width of the holiest. Twenty cubits, the span of the cherubim's wings.
The temple was small beside the great sanctuaries of other nations. One writer says that comparison misses the point of the building.
At first glance the proportions of the temple seem astonishing, for they are very restrained. This has struck even unbelievers. There is a great difference between the dimensions of Solomon's temple and those of the gigantic sanctuaries of Egypt. Size is not what marks His house. Holiness, perfect order, righteousness, and glory mark it — the balance and harmony of all the perfections of God.
- Designed — the temple copied no foreign building. Its Architect revealed every detail, and every detail points to Christ.
- Entered — the porch was the one way in, a triumphal front fit for the King of glory to come through.
- Measured — the porch matched the width of the holiest. The way into God's presence equals that presence, because Jesus is God.
- Matched — the cherubim's wings spanned the same twenty cubits. God judged sin by His own measure, not by ours.
- Proportioned — the house was small by world standards. Holiness, order and harmony mark God's house, not size.
And for the house he made closed windows with fixed lattices.
The list of measurements in 1 Kings 6 pauses at a single small detail: the openings in the wall of the house Solomon built for God. Why does a record this sacred bother with window frames, and what light was meant to pass through them?
The phrase behind "recessed frames" points to a window that was not the same size on both sides of the wall. One writer follows the margin of an older translation. He places these openings in the Holy Place, the main room of the house:
"Windows of narrow lights" — that is, wide on the inside and narrow on the outside (see the margin of 1 Kings 6:4). These appear to be for the Holy Place.
A window in that world was not what we picture now:
The Hebrew has several words for "window." Windows were openings to let in light and air. They had no glass, only lattice work. People could look through it and see what was going on outside, while no one outside saw them. Some had shutters attached.
Before the temple, Israel worshipped in a tent called the tabernacle. One writer points out what lit its inner room:
There was no window in the Tabernacle. No light of nature entered the Holy Place. The light of the Golden Lampstand, and that alone, was the light of the Holy Place. It reminds us of the Scripture, "And the city has no need of sun or moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and its lamp is the Lamb" (Revelation 21:23).
You could read a window frame as ordinary building practice, copied from the nations nearby. One writer presses the opposite:
Look carefully at the way the temple was built. Its dimensions are strikingly like those of the tabernacle. And the temple followed no model other than that one. We insist on this point. Men often disbelieve the revelation of God without even a thought. They will go to great lengths to find out whether Tyrian, Assyrian, Egyptian, or Babylonian temples served more or less as models for Solomon's. But it served as its own model. Is this not worthy of the True Architect of the temple? He revealed all its details to David, just as He had earlier revealed the tabernacle's details to Moses.
If the design came from God, then no measurement is filler. The same writer takes the whole structure, down to its walls, as a picture of Christ:
Finally, the temple is Christ. "Destroy this temple," He said, "and in three days I will raise it up." Here below He was the temple in which the Father dwelt (John 14:10). But if in a general way the temple is Christ, all its parts present Him in different characters... all the way to the walls and foundations of the building — all, absolutely everything, just as in the tabernacle in the wilderness, speaks to us of Him.
Commentators differ on the view these windows gave. Newberry reads them as real windows in the Holy Place. Another writer, describing the palace Solomon built later, ties looking out to government rather than worship:
There were windows in this building (verses 4-5), though not in the temple, for government looks out to consider the welfare of the people, while in the temple everything speaks of God's glory, with no outward vision at all.
- Narrow — the frames were wider inside than outside. Windows then had no glass, only lattice, to let in light and air.
- Designed — the temple copied no foreign building. Its pattern came from God to David, as the tabernacle's came to Moses.
- Lit — the tent before it had no window at all. No natural light reached the Holy Place; the lampstand alone lit it.
- Christ — every part, down to walls and foundations, speaks of Him. That is why Scripture records even a window frame.
- Inward — commentators differ on the view these windows gave. One holds that looking out belongs to government, while in the house everything speaks of God's glory.
And against the wall of the house he built floors round about, [against] the walls of the house, round about the temple and the oracle; and he made side-chambers round about.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
The lowest floor was five cubits broad, and the middle one was six cubits broad, and the third was seven cubits broad; for in the [thickness of the wall of] the house he made resets round about outside, that nothing should be fastened in the walls of the house.
Verse 6 pauses on a building detail. Three tiers of side rooms wrapped the temple, and each level was a cubit wider than the one below. They rested on ledges in the outer wall, so no beam was ever driven into the house itself. Why did Solomon build outward instead of into the wall, and why does Scripture record it?
As the wall rose, it stepped back. Each step became a shelf.
The account in 1 Kings 6 may help us to better understand the structure of the side chambers. These were in three stories too, and each one was a cubit wider than the one below: 5, 6, and 7 cubits. This means that the wall of the house stepped back at each story. Each step formed a resting place for the floor beams. The beams were not set into the wall. They rested on the one-cubit ledge that the stepped-back wall made.
These rooms were homes. They mark a change from the tent Israel carried through the wilderness.
The side chambers ran all around the temple, except of course at its entrance. They were the homes of the priests. There was nothing like this in the tabernacle in the wilderness. There God was surely willing to stoop down and live among an earthly people, but only on one condition: He would hide Himself in thick darkness. He could not let man come and live with Him. Man dwelling with God is what is realized here under Solomon's glorious reign, and it will be realized for us when the Lord brings us into the Father's house. Already that house is open to our faith, and we may dwell there while we are still in this world.
2 Chronicles leaves these chambers out of its account. One writer sees a purpose in the gap:
1 Kings 6:5-10 mentions the chambers all around the house, and 2 Chronicles leaves them out… This fact, with other small details, makes it plain that 1 Kings describes the dwelling place of God and His close fellowship with His people. Second Chronicles however depicts the place where one can come near to God to worship Him.
The ledges matter for what they prevented. Solomon housed men against the sanctuary without cutting into it once.
The priests' homes could not be separated from the house. They formed one whole with it, and they spoiled no part of it. The temple walls had offsets that held the beams fast without damaging the walls. In this way the priests' rooms fitted the house exactly, without harming the building in any way. This is how we shall dwell in glory. Our being there will not weaken the perfection of God's house; it will only add to it.
Commentators differ over how much weight to put on the rising measurements. One writer offers it only as a question — "Is this meant to suggest continual progress in the Father's house above?" (W. W. Fereday). Another presses it further, joining the upward growth to the inward movement of the rooms:
The side rooms are in three storeys. They grow larger as they rise, and they lead one into another from east to west, climbing higher and higher. This strongly suggests enlargement and progress in heavenly glory: higher heights, fuller likeness to God, and closer fellowship with Him. They move on from one room to the next until you reach the innermost room, the nearest to "the Holiest of all," the nearest to the displayed glory of God. Thus shall the saints have increasing capacity to enjoy and serve God in the countless ages of eternity to come.
Solomon's chambers held only so many men. Jesus later spoke of many rooms in His Father's house, and the comparison shows where the temple picture runs short.
In the temple there could only be a limited number of rooms for the priests who were serving there at any one time. But the Lord Jesus says, "In My Father's house are many mansions" (Jn.14:2). So the temple is only a faint picture of the reality. In effect the Lord is saying that there is room for all His redeemed people there. The word for "mansions" is better translated "abodes," permanent dwelling places. All believers will have their place there, for all are priests of God. In glory they will serve in the full capacity of priests, mainly by offering up spiritual sacrifices to God.
(ESV renders John 14:2 "In my Father's house are many rooms.")
- Ledge. The wall stepped back one cubit at each story. Those steps carried the floor beams, so the rooms widened while the wall stayed whole.
- Dwelling. The tent in the wilderness had no side rooms. The temple does: here God not only lives among His people but lets them live with Him.
- Intact. Men lived against the sanctuary, yet not one beam cut into it. The house lost nothing by their being there.
- Ascending. Five, six, seven cubits. Some read the rising, widening rooms as growing capacity for God; one writer raises this only as a question.
- Overflow. Solomon could lodge only a few priests. The Father's house has abodes for all the redeemed, and the temple is only a faint sketch of it.
And the house, when it was being built, was built of stone entirely made ready before it was brought thither; so that there was neither hammer nor axe nor any tool of iron heard in the house while it was being built.
The temple went up without the sound of a single tool: every stone arrived finished, cut for its exact place. Writers ask why God wanted such silence, and what a house built in quiet says about the house He is building now.
The silence matched the character of the God whose house it was. One writer quotes a comment contrasting how the house went up with how it later came down:
It was to be the temple of the God of peace, so no iron tool must be heard in it. Quiet and silence both suit and help acts of worship. God's work should be done with as much care and as little noise as possible. The temple was thrown down with axes and hammers; those who did it roared in the middle of the congregation (Ps. 74:4, 6); but it was built up in silence. Noise and violence often hinder, but never advance the work of God.
The noise was real. It just happened somewhere else. Under Jerusalem, quarries still show where the workers cut the stone:
God settled every measurement in advance. One writer points past the workmen to Him:
No one saw any trace of human tools while the temple was going up. It rose in silence; no one heard an axe or a hammer. It was the work of God; He prepared everything beforehand. The stones that made up the house had the same character as the foundation stones, also precious and prepared beforehand. It is the same with the church (1 Peter 2:4-5), in that its building up is not left to man's responsibility (1 Cor. 3:10-15).
One writer reads the stones as a picture of how Christ builds His church:
Every stone was prepared beforehand and fitted into the place where it belonged. How beautifully it illustrates the fitting together of the house, His Church! He chooses and prepares the material and puts each in its proper place. What a contrast with man's methods in trying to increase "church membership"! ... But all the confusion, the wrong ideas and the evils that go with them cannot frustrate the purpose of the Lord. He is building His Church.
The same writer elsewhere sets a limit to the picture:
However, the temple itself does not exactly prefigure the Church. It is a type of the Father's house above where God dwells. The chambers or dwellings round about remind us of the words of our Lord: "In my Father's house are many rooms." ... But the temple is also prophetic of another temple which will yet stand on the earth when our Lord reigns.
The shaping is done before the stone is set. One writer names the workers God uses, and what He uses besides them:
Each stone stands for the individual believer, once dead in trespasses and sins, but now made alive by the Spirit of the living God. The evangelist is God's quarryman, used by Him to break these stones out of the world they are naturally embedded in. This is often hard work, and takes great skill. Then follows the work of the pastor, leading them into a deeper experience of God's truth. Then these stones must be "polished after the likeness of a palace." This is the work of the teacher, who opens up the mysteries of God and leads souls closer to Christ. The present world is God's workyard. The Lord Jesus uses not only the gifts of the Spirit, but also the trials and temptations that come on Christians. All things are under His skilful hand.
The shaping has an end. One writer applies the silence of the building site to heaven itself:
Perhaps the readiness of the stones is a picture of the saints when we all come "to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ." That is, when we are with Him in glory. There will be no sound of hammer or of axe in heaven; all the shaping and fitting will have been done.
- Peace — The house of the God of peace went up in silence; noise and violence never advance God's work.
- Quarry — The hard cutting was real, only hidden. Workers dressed the stones underground and carried them up finished.
- Prepared — God settled every measurement before a stone arrived, so no one adjusted anything on site.
- Chisel — God shapes believers now, through the gifts He gives and the trials He allows.
- Placed — When the building is complete, the fitting is over; the stones go into glory without a sound.
The entrance to the side-chambers of the middle [floor] was in the right side of the house; and they went up by winding stairs into the middle [floor], and out of the middle into the third.
Solomon's temple had side rooms stacked in three floors, and this verse records how you reached them: one doorway, then stairs winding up. Why note a door and a staircase, and who were those rooms for?
Commentators start with the plain layout.
The doorway for the stairs up to the second and third floors was on the right side (v.8). Scripture mentions no other door for the upstairs, so it seems there must have been a hallway on the three sides, connecting all the rooms.
(The ESV calls this the south side; older translations call it the right side.)
Another writer names who used those upper rooms:
It seems there was only one entrance door from the galleries on each side of the Temple. So you passed from one room into the next, right through to the innermost (1 Kings 6:8; Ezekiel 41:11)... I would suggest that the rooms reached by the stairs were for the priests and Levites. They served in the Temple day and night, shift by shift, so that they could wait on God continually.
The tent Israel carried through the wilderness had no such rooms.
All around the temple, except at the entrance of course, were the side rooms where the priests lived. There was nothing like this in the tabernacle in the wilderness. There God could indeed stoop to live among an earthly people, but only on condition that He hid Himself in thick darkness, and He could not let man come and live with Him. Here, under Solomon's glorious reign, man does come to dwell with God, and that will be true for us when the Lord brings us into the Father's house.
The builders joined these rooms to the temple without cutting into its walls:
The temple walls had ledges where the builders could rest the beams without cutting into the walls. So the priests' rooms fitted the house exactly, and took nothing away from the soundness of the building. This is how we shall live in glory. Our being there will not weaken the perfection of God's house; it will only add to it.
One writer links these rooms to what Jesus said about His Father's house.
The temple pictures the Father's house in heaven. But the temple held only a limited number of rooms, used by the priests who were serving there at any given time. The Lord Jesus says, "In My Father's house are many mansions" (John 14:2). So the picture is only a faint one compared with the reality... The word for "mansions" is better translated "abodes," permanent dwelling places. All believers will have their place there, for all are priests of God.
(The ESV renders that word "rooms"; older translations used "mansions".)
The three floors were not the same size. Each one was wider than the floor below, so the climb was also an enlargement.
The side rooms stand in three floors, growing larger as they rise, leading one into another from east to west, and climbing higher and higher. This strongly suggests enlargement and progress in heavenly glory, greater heights, fuller likeness to God and fellowship with Him... There is also a movement from east to west, from one room into the next, until you reach the innermost room, the one nearest "the Holiest of all," nearest to the visible glory of God. So the saints will have a growing capacity to enjoy and serve God through the countless ages of eternity to come.
Another writer gives the measurements, and offers the same reading as a question:
The Temple rooms were built in three floors, and winding stairs led up to the higher ones. The lowest rooms were five cubits wide, the middle six cubits, and the third seven cubits. Is this meant to suggest continual progress in the Father's house above?
Chronicles tells the same story but leaves these rooms almost unmentioned. One writer sees that gap as deliberate.
In 1 Kings the priests' dwellings form part of the house. 2 Chronicles 3:9 mentions them only in passing, and says nothing about how they connect to the temple. In 1 Kings the two most important parts of the Jewish system, the altar and the veil, are missing altogether, while Chronicles mentions them. Without them no one could approach God... So we can conclude that Kings presents the temple as a dwelling-place and Chronicles as a place of approach.
- One door. A single entrance on the south side opened onto the stairs, and every room above lay beyond it.
- One ascent. The winding stairs carried the priests from the lowest floor to the highest. Each room opened into the next, on toward the innermost.
- One enlargement. Each floor was wider than the one below. Writers see in it a growing capacity to enjoy and serve God, though one of them offers this only as a question.
- One dwelling. These rooms were the priests' homes. The wilderness tabernacle had nothing like them. They belonged to the house and took nothing from its perfection.
- One purpose. Only Kings records these rooms, and it shows the temple as God's dwelling-place. That is a faint picture of the Father's house, where every believer has a permanent place.
And he built the house, and finished it; and covered the house with beams and boards of cedar.
Here the temple's outer shell is complete: Solomon roofs the building and lines it with cedar, and the record adds that he finished it. Two details matter — the word "finished," and the choice of cedar for every surface the eye would meet.
The word "finished" is the point. One writer sets it against builders who start without counting the cost.
Though they were long in building, both the temple and the house of Solomon were eventually finished. The work was not in vain, as is sometimes the case with those who have not first counted the cost, but what God builds is always perfectly finished.
No builder can promise a finish without the materials in hand. Another writer applies that to the stones, and to God's foreknowledge of them.
Yes, he would be a foolish builder who began to build and did not know whether he had materials to finish. And what a blessing to remember that God is the great master builder. He foreknew every stone, chosen and precious, that is built and shall be built in the heavenly temple.
The Hebrew word behind "beams" points to the shape of the roof. One writer then compares that roof with the tabernacle — the tent that housed God's presence in the wilderness. (Older translations render the verse "covered the house with beams and boards of cedar.")
These vault-beams, as the Hebrew word informs us (gebim, from gab, an arch), were semi-circular, so forming a dome for the covering. The vault-beams and the ceiling boards were of cedar, both for the Holy and Most Holy house... These domed roofs, covered with cedar and cypress, match the heavenly character of the Temple. They stand in contrast with the acacia wood and flat badger-skin covering of the Tabernacle. The Tabernacle in the Wilderness pictures the Church of God on earth. The Temple pictures the redeemed, called with a heavenly calling and perfected in heavenly glory.
The tabernacle was framed with acacia, a desert wood. One writer reads the change of material as a move from the desert to the Father's house.
The temple inside was panelled with beams and boards of cedar. The tabernacle was built of acacia boards (Ex. 26:15). Acacia is a hard, desert wood and speaks of humanity in temporary circumstances of desert experience. Those boards picture believers as they are seen even now "in Christ," for they were covered with gold. But the cedar of the temple is an unusually enduring wood. It speaks of believers in glory, in the Father's house. They too are clothed with gold, the symbol of divine glory, and they reflect the beauty of Christ for eternity, not only on earth.
The same source explains what it is about cedar that carries this meaning:
Cedar, because it does not decay, is an emblem of the incorruptible resurrection body. A piece of worm-eaten cedar was never seen. The sap of the cedar is death to the worm; so that, instead of the worm destroying the cedar, the cedar destroys the worm.
The cedar did not stop at the ceiling. One writer follows it down to the floor.
The innermost sanctuary, as well as the holy place, was covered with cedar wood. In the Word cedar represents majesty and height, durability and firmness. No part of the walls within was left uncovered. Nowhere did the stone appear. But the cedar wood itself, and even the planks of cypress of which the floor was made, were entirely covered with gold. In the Word gold always represents divine righteousness and glory... Man cannot dwell with God except according to divine righteousness.
The stones had no say in any of it — and that is the lesson one writer presses home:
You observe all was done to these stones. Not one bit did they do. They were hewn, they were drawn out, they were built into the temple, they were covered with cedar. The pure gold was put upon them. It is so with the poor sinner. Salvation from beginning to end is all of God.
The house Solomon completed was not an end in itself.
The days of Solomon were unique in the history of Israel and of the world; and the house that he built to the name of Jehovah was also unique. It was all a bright foreshadowing of days of glory and blessing yet to be brought in by the Lord Jesus.
- Finished. What God builds is always perfectly finished. He never starts a house without the material to finish it.
- Foreknown. God knew every stone of the heavenly temple, chosen and precious, before a single one was laid.
- Cedar. The desert acacia of the tabernacle gives way to cedar. Cedar's sap kills the worm instead of feeding it — a picture of what cannot decay.
- Covered. Cedar over every wall, gold over the cedar, no bare stone in sight. No one dwells with God except on the ground of divine righteousness.
- All of God. The stones were hewn, moved, built in, covered with cedar and gilded — they did nothing. Salvation is all of God, from first to last.
And he built the floors against all the house, five cubits high; and they held to the house by the timbers of cedar.
A ring of rooms stood against the outside wall of Solomon's temple, in three storeys, each five cubits high and tied to the house by cedar beams. The detail looks like plain building work, yet it answers a question the tabernacle never raised: can anyone live where God lives?
The temple wall itself carried the chambers, and no beam cut into it:
The side chambers were in three stories, and each story grew one cubit wider: 5, 6, and 7 cubits. So the wall of the house stepped back at each story. That step left a ledge one cubit wide. The floor beams did not go into the wall; they rested on that ledge.
The height in this verse belongs to each storey of rooms:
The doorway for the stairs up to the second and third floors was on the right side (v.8). The text names no other door to the upper floors, so it seems there must have been a hallway on the three sides, connecting all the rooms. Each of the rooms was 5 cubits high (v.10), though their length is not given.
The way the beams rested carries meaning:
Nothing could separate the priests' homes from the house. They formed one whole with it and spoiled no part of it. The temple walls had ledges where the beams could be fastened without damaging the walls. So the priests' rooms fitted the house perfectly and took nothing from the soundness of the building. This is how we will dwell in glory. Our being there will not weaken the perfection of God's house; it will only add to it. "Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God" (Rev. 21:3).
The wilderness tent could never have held such rooms:
All around the temple, except at its entrance, naturally, were the side chambers, dwellings of the priests. The tabernacle in the wilderness had nothing like this. There God could indeed stoop to live among a people in the flesh, but only on one condition: that He hid Himself in thick darkness. He could not let man come and live with Him. Under Solomon's glorious reign man does come to live with God, and it will be so for us when the Lord brings us into the Father's house. All of us who are children of God belong to this family of priests, whose home will be around its Head. And already the Father's house is open to our faith, so we may dwell there while still in this world.
A further contrast is noted in the flooring:
One more thing set the temple apart: chambers surrounded it, so the priests who served God could live around Him. Christ may be pointing to this when He says, "In my Father's house are many rooms." The tabernacle had no floor, and the priests walked on bare earth. In the temple a floor lifted them off the ground.
Second Chronicles describes the same temple, and what each book leaves out tells us something:
First Kings 6:5-10 mentions the chambers all around the house; 2 Chronicles leaves them out. Second Chronicles speaks of the veil (2 Chron. 3:14) and the bronze altar (2 Chron. 4:1), but the writer of 1 Kings mentions neither. This, with other small details, makes it plain that 1 Kings describes God's home and His close fellowship with His people. Second Chronicles however depicts the place where one can come near to God to worship Him.
Commentators differ on how these rooms relate to what Jesus promised. Some see them as a true but limited picture:
The temple pictures the Father's house in heaven. In the temple, however, only a limited number of rooms served the priests on duty at any one time. But the Lord Jesus says, "In my Father's house are many rooms" (Jn.14:2). So the temple is only a faint picture of the reality. The Lord is in effect saying there is room for all His redeemed people there. The word for "rooms" is better translated "abodes," permanent dwelling places.
Others read the Lord's words as a contrast with the temple chambers, not a copy of them:
In the earthly house there were small chambers for the priests and Levites (1 Chron. 28:11-13) as they came up to serve in their turns. The word translated "rooms" points back to these, but by way of contrast. The chambers of the temple were only for temporary use; the rooms Christ promises are dwellings for eternity. The first are earthly; the latter heavenly.
- Resting, not cutting. The beams rested on ledges where the wall stepped back. The house carried the chambers, and no beam cut into it.
- Joined, not damaging. The rooms formed one whole with the temple. Those who live in God's house add to its perfection instead of taking from it.
- Dwelling, not only visiting. In the tabernacle God lived among His people, hidden in thick darkness. In the temple priests lived all around Him, lifted off the bare earth by a floor.
- Recorded on purpose. Kings keeps the chambers and drops the veil and bronze altar. Its picture is God's home and His closeness to His people.
- Small now, eternal then. The temple rooms were small and used in turn. The Father's house holds permanent dwellings for all His people.
And the word of Jehovah came to Solomon saying,
The house was going up when God broke in with a message for the king. What He said turned a construction report into a test, because the promise attached to the house came with an "if."
God spoke while the work was unfinished. He came with a promise of His own presence, tied to obedience.
What a delight it clearly was to God to dwell among His people! … And as He told Moses, so He told Solomon, of His dwelling among His people. While the house was going up, God cheered the king with a promise. If he obeyed, the Lord would dwell among the children of Israel and would not forsake them.
The message itself is short, and everything in it hangs on one small word.
Early in the building work, the Lord spoke again to Solomon. "Concerning this house that you are building, if you will walk in my statutes and obey my rules and keep all my commandments and walk in them, then I will establish my word with you, which I spoke to David your father. And I will dwell among the children of Israel and will not forsake my people Israel." Here again is the fatal "if." Everything at that moment depended upon the faithfulness of king and people.
Why attach a condition to a promise of His presence at all?
Then in 1 Kings 6:13, He says, "And I will dwell among the children of Israel." The verse before it shows the moral condition which God looks for among His people: "if you will walk in my statutes …" God could not dwell among a lawless, disobedient people.
God spoke to one man, yet the whole nation's place with Him hung on that man.
Yet responsibility fell on Solomon in the building of the house. Like so many others, he failed, and so brought ruin upon his kingdom. "If you will walk in my statutes … I will dwell among the children of Israel and will not forsake my people Israel." The only condition God set for not forsaking His people was the king's faithfulness. All His blessing depended on Solomon meeting this condition.
Yet Solomon's failure did not put God's purpose at risk.
God keeps His purpose of grace certain. He keeps His judgments just as certain if the king fails to answer the demands of His holiness. Grace and responsibility are two currents. They flow side by side and never mix.
Solomon finished the house. The question is whether God stayed in it.
The account first gives the measurements of the house. Then, after he had built it and built the chambers, the word of the Lord came to Solomon. It told him that God's dwelling among the children of Israel depended upon Solomon's faithfulness. Soon the failure came, and Ezekiel later saw the glory of the Lord leave the temple and leave Jerusalem.
Did the failure cancel what God had promised?
All was soon lost, never to be restored until the day of the Lord Jesus. But "the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable" (Rom. 11:29), and He will yet fulfill all His promises of grace to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Human nature is so weak and unstable that each one of us must humbly say, "Saved by grace alone; this is all my plea."
Compare this with God's dwelling among His people now.
While the temple was still going up, God spoke to Solomon. He told him seriously that God's dwelling in the temple would depend on Solomon's obedience to God's statutes, his carrying out God's judgments and keeping His commandments. How different this is from the Church of God, now established as "a dwelling place for God by the Spirit" (Eph. 2:21-22). God's presence in the Church does not depend on our obedience. It rests on the permanent value of the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus — a divine work, with no condition of man's work involved at all.
- Timing. God spoke early in the building work, while the house was still going up.
- Condition. The promise came wrapped in an "if": walk in My statutes, keep My commandments. Everything at that moment depended on the faithfulness of king and people.
- Reason. The condition was not arbitrary. God could not dwell among a lawless, disobedient people.
- Outcome. Solomon failed, and Ezekiel later watched the glory leave the temple. Yet God's promises of grace still stand.
- Contrast. God's presence with His people today rests on the sacrifice of Christ, not on our obedience.
As to this house which thou art building, if thou wilt walk in my statutes, and practise mine ordinances, and keep all my commandments to walk in them, then will I perform my word as to thee which I spoke unto David thy father;
While the walls of the temple were still going up, God broke into the building project with a message for the king. It was not about cedar, gold or measurements. It was about how Solomon would walk. On that one point hung God's dwelling among His people.
God set His terms before the work was finished. The message tied His presence in the house to the king's obedience — a link that no longer holds for believers today.
While the temple was still being built, God spoke to Solomon. He told him plainly that God's dwelling in the temple would depend on Solomon's obedience to God's statutes, on his carrying out God's judgments, and on his keeping His commandments (vs. 11-13). How different this is from the Church of God, which is now established as "a dwelling place for God by the Spirit" (Eph. 2:21-22). God's presence in the Church does not depend on our obedience. It rests on the lasting value of the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus — a divine work, with no condition of man's work involved at all.
Throne, nation and temple all rested on one small word: "if." It explains why the glory of Solomon's reign did not last.
Here again is the fatal "if." At that moment everything depended on the faithfulness of king and people. All was soon lost, never to be restored until the day of the Lord Jesus. But "the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable" (Rom. 11:29), and He will still fulfill all His promises of grace to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Human nature is so evil and so unstable that each one of us must humbly say, "Saved by grace alone; this is all my plea."
Another writer points out how much God attached to that single condition.
The only condition God set for not forsaking His people was the king's faithfulness. All His blessing was dependent on this condition being met.
The temple carried on what the tabernacle had begun. One commentator shows how the kind of redemption behind it shaped the kind of dwelling that followed.
The temple was the same thing in substance. It was only suited to Israel's settled state in the land, unlike the tabernacle, which travelled with the Israelites up and down the wilderness. But in either case, this was only an outward redemption. So His dwelling was of an outward kind, and it depended on their faithfulness to Him. They were witnesses of the one true God, placed under the responsibility of His law. The result was ruin, as it must always be for the first man.
God asked Solomon to walk, to do, and to keep. Construction work was not on the list.
Obedience is the test of loyalty and of all true worship. Without it, everything that sacrifice and the fat of rams stand for is worse than nothing. "But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word," said the LORD. He said it while they were busy "building a house to Him" — a service He had never asked of them — and while they were in rebellion against His authority and disobedient to His plain commands (Isa. 66). Much of this spirit of Saul is seen in the professing church today. The Christian reader needs to be warned and kept on guard against it.
God's patience with Israel lasted a long time. It did not last forever.
Solomon himself did not fulfill the conditions God set down. Neither did his family, and neither did his subjects. So in the end God withdrew from the temple. Ezekiel records the glory departing in stages (Ezek. 8:4; 9:3; 10:18; 11:23). God did bear long with Israel's disobedience, but in the end, as the Lord Jesus said, "See, your house is left to you desolate" (Mt. 23:38). This was solemnly settled when the Lord Jesus, the Son over God's house, was rejected and crucified. What could the temple be without its Lord?
- Condition. God's dwelling in Solomon's temple hung on one word — if. Walk, do, keep, and He would stay.
- Carrier. The if rested on a single man. The king's faithfulness alone decided whether God would abandon a whole nation.
- Collapse. The condition was never met, by Solomon or by anyone after him, and the glory left the house stage by stage.
- Contrast. Building for God never replaces obeying God. God looks at the humble and contrite heart, not the finished stonework.
- Cross. What man could not secure by keeping conditions, Christ secured by His sacrifice. God's presence in His people today rests on His finished work, not on ours.
and I will dwell among the children of Israel, and will not forsake my people Israel.
The temple is only half-built when God interrupts the work with a word for Solomon. He promises to live among Israel, but ties that promise to an "if" — so does His presence rest on how people behave, or on something steadier?
The timing of this message matters. It comes in the middle of the building report, not at the dedication.
After the size of the house was described, and after he had built it and built the side rooms, the word of the Lord came to Solomon. It told him that His dwelling among the children of Israel depended on Solomon's faithfulness. Soon the failure came in, and Ezekiel later saw the glory of the Lord leave the temple and Jerusalem.
God makes the promise to the whole nation, but He sets the terms for the king alone.
This very responsibility fell on Solomon (vv. 11-13) while the house was going up. Like so many others, he failed, and so brought ruin on his kingdom: "If you will walk in My statutes … I will dwell among the children of Israel, and will not forsake My people Israel." The only condition God set for not forsaking His people was the king's faithfulness. All His blessing depended on meeting this condition.
The verse before the promise describes the kind of life God looks for in the people He lives among.
Then in 1 Kings 6:13, He says, "And I will dwell among the children of Israel." The verse before shows the moral condition God looks for among His people: "If you will walk in My statutes, and execute My judgments, and keep all My commandments to walk in them." God could not dwell among a lawless, disobedient people.
The condition on its own sounds like a warning. But God had said the same thing to Moses, and here He says it to cheer a king in the middle of his work.
What a delight it clearly was to God to dwell among His people! … And as He told Moses, so He told Solomon, of His dwelling among His people. While the house was going up, God cheered the king with a promise. If he was obedient, the Lord would dwell among the children of Israel and not forsake them. It is true that His presence would continue only if the king obeyed. Yet God truly did delight to dwell among His people, and to tell them so.
The temple did not change the kind of dwelling God had among Israel.
The temple was the same thing in substance. It was simply suited to Israel now settled in the land, unlike the tabernacle, which moved with the Israelites up and down the wilderness. But in either case the redemption was only an outward one. So His dwelling was outward too, and it depended on their faithfulness to Him as witnesses of the one true God, placed under the responsibility of His law. The result was, as it must always be for the first man, ruin.
Set that beside the way God dwells with believers now.
While the temple was still going up, God spoke to Solomon. He told him seriously that God's dwelling in the temple would depend on Solomon's obedience to God's statutes, his executing God's judgments and keeping His commandments (vv. 11-13). How different this is from the Church of God, which is now established as "a dwelling place for God by the Spirit" (Eph. 2:21-22). God's presence in the Church does not depend on our obedience. It rests on the lasting value of the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus, a divine work, with no condition of man's work involved at all.
Solomon did not keep the terms. Yet that is not where the writers leave the story.
Here again is the fatal "if." Everything at the moment depended upon the faithfulness of king and people. All was soon lost, never to be restored until the day of the Lord Jesus. But "the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable" (Rom. 11:29), and He will yet fulfil all His promises of grace to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Such is the evil and instability of poor flesh, that each one of us must humbly say, "Saved by grace alone; this is all my plea."
(Fereday cites the older wording, "without repentance.")
- Timing — God gave this promise while the temple was still being built, not at its dedication.
- Condition — His dwelling among Israel rested on one man's obedience. Every blessing the nation had hung on that single "if."
- Character — The condition was not arbitrary. God could not dwell among a lawless, disobedient people.
- Delight — Behind the condition stood real pleasure. God told His people, from Moses to Solomon, how glad He was to dwell among them.
- Contrast — Solomon failed, and the glory left. God's presence with believers today rests on the lasting worth of Christ's sacrifice, not on their obedience. And His promises to Israel still stand.
And Solomon built the house and finished it.
This one short sentence closes the account of the building work. It comes straight after God's warning to Solomon in the verses just before. Two questions press on it: whose house was this really, and what does it mean that a man "finished" a dwelling for God?
One writer compares the temple with the tabernacle — the tent of worship from Moses' day — and rejects the idea that Solomon copied the great temples of the nations around him:
Look carefully at the way the temple was built. Beyond the striking likeness between its dimensions and those of the tabernacle, you see that it was built on no model other than that one. We stress this because men who disbelieve God's revelation without a second thought will go to great lengths to work out whether the temples of Tyre, Assyria, Egypt or Babylon served more or less as models for Solomon's. In fact it served as its own model. Is this not worthy of the True Architect of the temple? He revealed all its details to David, just as He had earlier revealed the tabernacle's details to Moses.
The word "finished" carries weight. A work a man starts may stall. This one did not, and both houses carry a meaning beyond themselves:
Both the temple and the house of Solomon took a long time to build, but in the end both were finished. The work was not wasted, as it sometimes is for those who did not first count the cost. What God builds is always perfectly finished. The temple pictures the Father's house in glory, while Solomon's house is a picture of the Church in her condition and circumstances on earth, where God's order is to be maintained among His saints.
The pace of the work shows what mattered most to the king. Compare it with the time he spent on his own house:
It had taken Solomon seven years to build the house of the Lord. We see in this his promptness at this work. It took Herod forty-six years to build his temple. At the start of his career the service of the Lord came before everything else in the king's heart. His own house, certainly less important than the temple, cost him thirteen years of labour.
While the work went on, God attached a condition to His own presence there. The whole nation's standing hung on one man's obedience:
Responsibility fell on Solomon himself in connection with the building of the house. Like so many others, he failed, and so brought ruin on his kingdom. "If you will walk in my statutes … I will dwell among the children of Israel and will not forsake my people Israel." The only condition God set for not forsaking His people was the king's faithfulness. All His blessing depended on Solomon meeting that condition.
One writer contrasts that arrangement with the way God dwells with His people now:
While the temple was still going up, God spoke to Solomon. He told him seriously that God's dwelling in the temple would depend on Solomon's obedience: keeping God's statutes, carrying out God's judgments and keeping His commandments. How different this is from the Church of God, which is now established as "a dwelling place for God by the Spirit" (Ephesians 2:21-22). God's presence in the Church does not depend on our obedience. It rests on the lasting value of the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus — a divine work, with no condition of man's work involved at all.
Finishing the building was not the end. The condition God set was never met:
Neither Solomon himself, nor his family, nor his subjects met the conditions God set down. So in the end God withdrew from the temple. Ezekiel records the glory departing in stages. God did bear long with Israel's disobedience. But in the end, as the Lord Jesus said, "See, your house is left to you desolate." That was settled in a solemn way when the Lord Jesus, the Son over God's house, was rejected and crucified. What could the temple be without its Lord?
Solomon's finished house points past itself to another builder:
As the one loved by the Lord, Solomon was chosen to sit on his father's throne and to build the house of the Lord. He was also a figure of Him who is Son over God's house. Even now we see God's beloved Son sitting on His throne, waiting for the time when He will sit on His own throne. He too is the One who will build the temple of the Lord.
- Pattern — Solomon copied no foreign temple. The design came from God through David, just as the tabernacle's came to Moses.
- Priority — the Lord's house took seven years, his own thirteen. At this point in his life, the Lord's service came first.
- Promise — while the work went on, God tied His dwelling among Israel to the king's obedience. Every blessing rested on one man.
- Failure — Solomon and his people never met the condition, and the glory departed. A finished building is nothing without its Lord.
- Permanence — the Son over God's house builds a temple that rests on the lasting value of His own sacrifice, not on our obedience.