fi Ezk 416.
y IlHul (Sj'.i) is probably the eame b« the Accadlan ei;al, ' threat lioiiae,' as Scbrrwler, Haupt, and most Assyrinlopiste hold. Il niav mean properly a hall (AJSL, July IDDl, p. 244 (T.). See the Ojcf. Ilrb. Lrx. on the word. Though used in other eensee, ite cotniiioneat mcnninff Is that of the Iloly Place (E'li:), which is the later term. In this article h^kal has alwav's tliia mean- ing.
d Di^W {yyi) la the term employed in Kings (or what In the paunllcl part* of Ohron. la often called 'Holy of Holies' (^'jf
698
Tl.MPLE
TEMPLE
was an oblong rectangle 40 cubits from west to east, and 20 cubits from north to south. The deblr was a cube measuring 20 cubits in all three direc- tions. Since the whole house was 30 cubits high — the house (n'jri) including /u!mI and dcbir — there must have been 10 cubits of siiace-room on the top of the dcOir, this being used probably for storing purposes, though Ewald says it was inaccessible and empty.
Stieglitz and Griineisen view the d^ir as externally lower than the Mkdl by 10 cubits, but 1 K C- says the whole house had a height oJ SO cubit*. Kurtz and Merx held that the hikdl had an inside height of 20 cubits only, and that on the top of the whole house there was an upper room, 60 cubits in length, for keeping the relics of the tabernacle.* They say further that the Chronicler means this upper space by his ri'^lin (LXX to iTi/!i«»). But bow could such an upper chamber be reached, and why do we never read about it or about the means of getting at it? The chambers about the house/S reached, taking the three storeys together, to 16 cubits. Above these were the windows ; > but there would be scant room for the windows between the roofs of the chambers and the ceiling
word is said in Kings about the height of the porch, but in 2 Ch 3* it is said to be 120 cubits. But such a structure would have been called a S'jjp (tower) and not a ch^x (porch). The propor- tions, 20, 10, 120, are impossible on both aesthetic and statical grounds. There is certainly a corrup- tion of the text, or we have another example — a gross one here — of the love of exaggeration to which the Chronicler is prone when describing the sanctu- ary and its worship. It is most natural to think of the porch as having tlie same height as the house ; and it is not stated in 1 K 6, because that would be inferred by the reader.
Walls. — There is no information given as to the thickness of the walls, but it must have been sub- stantial, because they had rebatements of a cubit, or at least of half a cubit, at each successive storey of chambers.o It could be diminished therefore by 2 cubits, or at least by one, without any material change in the appearance. Ezekiel gives
Cubits
FIO. 3. — SECTION OF THB TEMPLE, NOETH TO SOUTH.
Of the house if the latter were but 20 cubits above the floor. The Chronicler does not say where his n'vS;' were placed, and it is most probable that by them we are to understand the cy^s, or the chambers ranged along the three sides of the house.
The. parrh. — In front of the house and continuous with it^ — the two, indeed, forming one building — "as the porch, S which was not considered a part of the house. Its length,€ east to west, was 10 cubits ; its breadth, north to south, being the same as the breadth f of the house, viz. 20 cubits. Not a
fi'S'"?!'")- Jerome connected the word with the Hebrew "12'! {diiher) 'to speak,' and followed the LXX j;iir,u«riirrr/>i»> in rendering it oracttlum {oraeuti sedei), it is really derived from
the root I'm used in Arab., j J (V) 'to be behind." So d^r l.jTi = what is behind ; that is, what lies to the west, the east being called CliJ, or what lies to the front. Just as the south is the right-hand side CyO') and the north the left-handed (SrfC^). DMr is the older term, and in the LXX of 1 Kings and in 2 Ch S" 420 68- 8 it is 8imj)ly transliterated 3«^i,> and J«(3v>. DtSbir occurs also in Ps 2S-, prob. also 2 K 102* (for Ty).
« 2 Ch 8». fi See below.
y 1 K 6«. ) dSk CtUam).
I In the or, length and breadth, when used of a sorfoce of
the thickness of the walls of his temple as 0 cubits. /3
In 1 K 618 the cedar-covered walls are said to have figures carved on them of knops and open flowers ; but this verse isnot in the LXX, and it breaks in upon the account of the h^kdl in v.n and of the d^Mr in v.l9, besides repeating what has been said in v.ls. Probably this carving was the work of a later kin^, a later editor, by mistake, ascribing it to Solomon. Tet in v.3fi the doors of both hPkdt and d^r are said to have been adorned with figures of cherubim, palm trees, and open flowers ; and the verse is above suspicion.