King James Version · The united kingdom
2 Chronicles 3
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Then began to build the at in mount Moriah, where appeared unto his , in the place that had prepared in the threshingfloor of the . And he began to build in the second day of the second month, in the fourth year of his reign. Now these are the things wherein was instructed for the building of the house of . The length by after the first measure was threescore , and the breadth twenty . And the porch that was in the front of the house, the length of it was according to the breadth of the house, twenty , and the height was an hundred and twenty: and he overlaid it within with pure gold. And the greater house he cieled with fir tree, which he overlaid with fine gold, and set thereon palm trees and chains. And he garnished the house with precious stones for beauty: and the gold was gold of Parvaim. He overlaid also the house, the beams, the posts, and the walls thereof, and the doors thereof, with gold; and graved cherubims on the walls. And he made the most house, the length whereof was according to the breadth of the house, twenty , and the breadth thereof twenty : and he overlaid it with fine gold, amounting to six hundred . And the weight of the nails was fifty of gold. And he overlaid the upper chambers with gold. And in the most house he made two cherubims of work, and overlaid them with gold. 11And the of the cherubims were twenty long: one of the one was five , reaching to the wall of the house: and the other was likewise five , reaching to the of the other . 12And one of the other was five , reaching to the wall of the house: and the other was five also, joining to the of the other . The of these cherubims spread themselves forth twenty : and they stood on their feet, and their faces were inward. And he made the vail of blue, and purple, and crimson, and fine linen, and wrought cherubims thereon. Also he made before the house two pillars of thirty and five high, and the chapiter that was on the top of each of them was five . And he made chains, as in the oracle, and put them on the heads of the pillars; and made an hundred pomegranates, and put them on the chains. And he reared up the pillars before , one on , and the other on the left; and called the name of that on , and the name of that on the left .
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · The united kingdom, 1050 BC to 931 BC ›
Saul, David, and Solomon. A rare window when both Egypt and Mesopotamia are weak, which is how a small kingdom in the corridor between them could briefly become a regional power.
- The power vacuum
- This is the whole political explanation for the united kingdom. Egypt is fragmented, Assyria is recovering but still local, the Hittites are gone, and nobody is in a position to object to a strong state in the corridor. It lasts about a century, and Israel's golden age fits exactly inside it.
- Phoenicia
- Tyre under Hiram is the commercial power of the coast, and supplies the cedar, the craftsmen, and the shipping for Solomon's building programme. The alliance is trade, not charity: Israel had grain and a land route, Tyre had timber and ships.
- Egypt
- Weak enough that a pharaoh gives a daughter in marriage to an Israelite king, which is the opposite of Egyptian practice in stronger centuries. Late in the era it recovers under a new house, and Shishak will invade within five years of Solomon's death.
- Further afield
- Greece is still in its dark age but beginning to recover, and will adopt the Phoenician alphabet within a century or two. Carthage is founded by settlers from Tyre by tradition in 814 BC. In the Americas the Olmec centre shifts to La Venta.