John Wesley

Now therefore, order that cedars of Lebanon be cut down for me. My servants will be with your servants, and I will pay your servants whatever wages you set, for…

“They - That is, thy servants. And this assistance which these Gentiles gave to the building of Solomon's temple, was a type of the calling of the Gentiles, and that they should be instrumental in building and constituting Christ's spiritual temple.”

and year after year Solomon would provide Hiram with 20,000 cors of wheat as food for his household, as well as 20,000 baths of pure olive oil.

“Measures - Hebrew. twenty cors pure oil; but in 2Chr ii, 10, it is twenty thousand baths of oil. To which there is added twenty thousand measures of barley, and twenty thousand baths of wine.”

Then King Solomon conscripted a labor force of 30,000 men from all Israel.

“If it seem strange, that so many thousands should be employed about so small a building as the temple was; it must be considered, 1. that the temple, all its parts being considered, was far larger than men imagine; 2.”

not including his 3,300 foremen who supervised the workers.

“Three thousand &c. - Whereof three thousand were set over the fifteen hundred thousand, expressed ver.”

And the king commanded them to quarry large, costly stones to lay the foundation of the temple with dressed stones.

“Great and costly - Marble and porphyry, or other stones of great size and value. The foundation - Where they could not afterward be seen: and therefore that this was done, is mentioned only as a point of magnificence, except it was intended for a…”

So Solomon’s and Hiram’s builders, along with the Gebalites, quarried the stone and prepared the timber and stone for the construction of the temple.

“Stone-squarers - Hebrew. the Giblites, the inhabitants of Gebel, a place near Zidon, famous for artificers and architects, Josh. xiii, 5. These are here mentioned apart, distinct from the rest of Hiram's builders, as the most eminent of them.”

In the four hundred and eightieth year after the Israelites had come out of the land of Egypt, in the month of Ziv, the second month of the fourth year…

“So long it was before that holy house was built, which in less than four hundred and thirty years was burnt by Nebuchadnezzar.”

The house that King Solomon built for the LORD was sixty cubits long, twenty cubits wide, and thirty cubits high.

“Which are the proportions answering to the three great concords in music, commonly called, a twelfth, an eighth, and a fifth. Which therefore must needs be a graceful proportion to the eye, as that in music is graceful to the ear.”

The portico at the front of the main hall of the temple was twenty cubits long, extending across the width of the temple and projecting out ten cubits in front…

“Or, if we take in the whole height mentioned, 2 Chron. iii, 4, which is one hundred and twenty; there is in this no disproportion: being to its length as six to one; and to its breadth as twelve to one; especially when this height…”

Against the walls of the temple and the inner sanctuary, Solomon built a chambered structure around the temple, in which he constructed the side rooms.

“Round about - On all the sides except the east, where the porch was; and except some very small passages for the light.”

The bottom floor was five cubits wide, the middle floor six cubits, and the third floor seven cubits.

“Broad - On the inside, and besides the galleries mentioned above. Narrowed rests - Or, narrowings: as in our buildings the walls of an house are thicker, or broader at the bottom, and narrower towards the top: only these narrowings were in the outside of…”

The temple was constructed using finished stones cut at the quarry, so that no hammer or chisel or any other iron tool was heard in the temple while it was…

“Made ready - Hewed, and squared, and fitted exactly according to the direction of the architect. Neither hammer, &c.”

The entrance to the bottom floor was on the south side of the temple. A stairway led up to the middle level, and from there to the third floor.

“The door - That is, by which they entered to go up to the middle chamber or chambers; such as were in the middle story.”

He built chambers all along the temple, each five cubits high and attached to the temple with beams of cedar.

“The inner roof was arched, ver. 9, that it might be the more beautiful, but the outward roof was flat.”

“As for this temple you are building, if you walk in My statutes, carry out My ordinances, and keep all My commandments by walking in them, I will fulfill through…

“If - God expresses the condition upon which his promise and favour is suspended; and by assuring him thereof in case of obedience, he plainly intimates the contrary upon his disobedience.”

He lined the interior walls with cedar paneling from the floor of the temple to the ceiling, and he covered the floor with cypress boards.

“Floor - This is spoken only concerning the floor, because there was nothing but planks of fir; whereas there was both cedar and fir in the sides of the house, the fir being either put above, or upon the cedar; or intermixed with, or put…”

He partitioned off the twenty cubits at the rear of the temple with cedar boards from floor to ceiling to form within the temple an inner sanctuary, the Most Holy…

“House - That is, the most holy place, which contained in length twenty cubits, which may be said to be on the sides Of the house, because this part took off twenty cubits in length from each side of the house, and was also twenty…”

The inner sanctuary was twenty cubits long, twenty cubits wide, and twenty cubits high. He overlaid the inside with pure gold, and he also overlaid the altar of cedar.

“Forepart - Which was in the inner part of the house, called in Hebrew, the forepart; not because a man first enters there, but because when a man is entering, or newly entered into the house, it is still before him.”

So Solomon overlaid the inside of the temple with pure gold, and he extended gold chains across the front of the inner sanctuary, which was overlaid with gold.

“Before the oracle - In the outward part of the wall, or partition, which was erected between the oracle and the holy place; which is properly said to be before the oracle, there the veil was hung; and there the chains or bars, or whatsoever…”

So he overlaid with gold the whole interior of the temple, until everything was completely finished. He also overlaid with gold the entire altar that belonged to the inner sanctuary.

“Whole house - Not only the oracle, but all the holy place. The altar - the altar of incense, which was set in the holy place close by the doors of the oracle.”

In the inner sanctuary he made two cherubim, each ten cubits high, out of olive wood.

“Cherubim - Besides those two made by Moses, Exod. xxv, 18, which were of gold, and far less than these. The Heathens set up images of their gods, and worshipped them.”

Solomon built the inner courtyard with three rows of dressed stone and one row of trimmed cedar beams.

“Cedar beams - Which is understood, of so many galleries, one on each side of the temple, whereof the three first were of stone, and the fourth of cedar, all supported with rows of pillars: upon which there were many chambers for the uses of…”

In his eleventh year and eighth month, the month of Bul, the temple was finished in every detail and according to every specification.

“We are wonderfully made by the Divine Providence, but more wonderfully made anew by the Divine grace. And as Solomon's temple was built on a rock, so are we built on Christ.”

He was the son of a widow from the tribe of Naphtali, and his father was a man of Tyre, a craftsman in bronze.

“In brass - And Of gold, and stone, and purple, and blue, 2 Chron. ii, 14. But only his skill in brass is here mentioned, because he speaks only of the brasen things which he made.”

He also made two capitals of cast bronze to set on top of the pillars, each capital five cubits high.

“Or, more strictly, either for the pommels, as they are called, 2 Chron. iv, 12, or for the cornice or crown, and so it was but three cubits, to which the pomegranates being added make it four cubits, as it is below, ver.”