1 Kings 6:20

the oracle in the fore-part The two words thus rendered would, if they stood alone, be rendered -before the oracle." In this verse, however, this cannot be the meaning. But in standing before such a room as is here described, it is in front of you, and you see the interior. In this way -before the oracle" may be taken to indicate what is seen when you stand there. Hence we may arrive at the sense in the R.V. - within the oracle was a space&c." It is difficult to assign any meaning to the A.V., and it may be that some error has crept into the text.

Some have preferred to render literally thus, -And before the oracle twenty cubits was it in length, and twenty cubits in breadth, and twenty cubits in the height thereof, and he overlaid it with pure gold he overlaid also the altar with cedar." But the accents of the Hebrew do not favour such a parenthetic clause, and the last sentence is very awkward.

The LXX. (Vat.) omits at the beginning of the verse -before the oracle," then takes the next sentences as a specification of the size of the oracle, and makes an addition to the last clause thus, -and he made an altar before the oracle and overlaid it with gold," making no mention of the cedar at all. Most probably this represents the correct text.

and so covered the altarwhich was of cedar We cannot, in the face of the preceding clause, translate otherwise than and he covered an altar with cedar. The construction in the two cases is identical. But then arises a difficulty. The altar in question was the altar of incense in the holy place. This stood in front of the vail which separated the most holy place (see Exodus 40:5; Exodus 40:26), and in Ezekiel 41:22 it is called -the altar of wood" (cf. Exodus 30:1-6). From the description in the verse before us there must have been some substance underneath the wood. The LXX. (Alex.) solves the difficulty by reading -and he made" for -and he covered," i.e. ויעשׂ for ויצף, καὶ ἐποίησε θυσιαστήριον κέδρου.