1 Kings 7:1-12

I. THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE PALACE COMPLEX 7:1-12

TRANSLATION

(1) Now his own house, Solomon was thirteen years in the process of building; and he finished all his house. (2) And he built the house of the forest of Lebanon; a hundred cubits was its length and fifty cubits was its width and thirty cubits was its height, upon four rows of cedar pillars, and cedar beams upon the pillars. (3) And it was covered with cedar above the chambers which were upon the forty-five pillars, fifteen to a row. (4) And there were beam-layers in three rows and outlook[189] was opposite outlook three times. (5) And all the doors and posts[190] were squared with windows, and light was opposite light in three ranks. (6) And he made a porch of pillars; fifty cubits was its length and thirty cubits was its width, and the porch was before them, and the pillars and the threshold were before them. (7) Then he made a porch for the throne on which he would render judgment, the porch of judgment, and it was covered with cedar from one side of the floor to the others. (8) And his house where he would dwell had another court within the porch, of the same construction. And he made a house for the daughter of Pharaoh whom Solomon had married, like onto this porch. (9) All of these were of costly stones, according to the measure of hewn stones sawed with saws, within and without, from foundation to coping, and from the outside unto the great court. (10) And the foundation was of precious stones, great stones, stones of ten cubits and stones of eight cubits. (11) And the superstructure was of precious stones according to the measure of hewn stones, and cedars. (12) And as for the great court, there were round about it three rows of hewn stones, and a row of cedar beams as in the inner court of the house of the LORD, and the porch of the house.

[189] The Hebrew word, which occurs only here, is different from the ordinary word for window, and probably denotes a larger opening.
[190] Many scholars follow the translation of the Septuagint and render the word windows as in the previous verse. However, this translation necessitates an emendation of the Hebrew text.

COMMENTS

The first twelve verses of chapter seven constitute a break in the long account of the Temple. Before passing on to the description of the contents of the Temple buildings, the historian pauses to mention other royal buildings erected by Solomon. The translators of the Septuagint version of the Old Testament shifted this section to the end of this chapter. There is, however, logic in the order of the Hebrew Bible. The description of the building of the Temple culminates with the building of the inner court (1 Kings 6:36); after the brief chronological note in 1 Kings 6:37-38 the description proceeds to the outer court (1 Kings 7:9) and the buildings contained therein.

Though Solomon was engaged for 7 1/2 years in the construction of the Temple, it took thirteen years for him to build his house; i.e., the palace complex. This longer period spent on his own house does not argue selfishness or worldliness on the part of Solomon. On the contrary, it speaks well for his piety that he built the Temple first. Three factors account for the longer construction of the king's house. First, much time was saved on the Temple construction due to the fact that David and Solomon had gathered materials before the actual building operation began. Second, the buildings which made up the palace complex were much larger and thus this undertaking was a more extensive one. Third, a special force of laborers was employed in the erection of the Temple while the number of workers was no doubt greatly diminished in this latter project. The thirteen years date from the completion of the Temple so that in the construction of both the Temple and the palace complex Solomon was engaged for twenty years (1 Kings 9:10). By Solomon's house is not meant his private residence alone, but a complex of buildings more or less connected, the individual components of which are described in 1 Kings 7:2-12.

1. The house of the forest of Lebanon (1 Kings 7:2-5). In describing the outer court, the author begins from the outer entrance and thus deals first with the house of the forest of Lebanon, the building farthest removed from the Temple. This building received its name from the fact that it was built of cedar wood and from the fact that it contained a virtual forest of cedar pillars. Owing to the brevity of the account and the obscurity of the text, attempts to mentally and pictorially reconstruct this building are largely pure conjecture.

With its dimensions of a hundred fifty by seventy-five feet, the house of the forest of Lebanon covered over four times the area of the Temple building. It does not follow that this entire area of 11,250 square feet was all under roof, for it seems that the house was built around an open courtyard. The height of the building was the same as that of the Temple, viz., forty-five feet. The structure was supported by four rows of cedar pillars which probably ran around all four sides, and by great support beams (1 Kings 7:2) which stretched from these pillars to a stone wall (1 Kings 7:9). How these pillars were arranged or what the number of pillars might have been remains a matter of conjecture.

It would seem that the house of the forest of Lebanon had three tiers of side chambers modeled after those of the Temple. These side chambers, roofed over with cedar, rested on the pillars mentioned in 1 Kings 7:2. There were forty-five chambers arranged fifteen in a row on each tier or story[191] (1 Kings 7:3). The rows of side-rooms were built one over the other by means of layers of beams. Things were so arranged that the windows looking out upon the court from one side corresponded exactly to those on the opposite side of the building (1 Kings 7:4). The doorsboth those through which the different rooms were connected with one another and those through which the building and its stories were reachedwere square (1 Kings 7:5). The upper stories were no doubt reached by a winding staircase located on the front side of the building. Keil conjectures that the cedar pillars in the building were twelve feet tall, and the side chambers on top of them thirty-three feet tall. Allowing for the thickness of supporting beams, this would still leave nine feet for the internal height of each story. To judge from 1 Kings 10:17 and Isaiah 22:8 this building served as a treasury and armory. Possibly it was also the residence of the royal bodyguard.

[191] Hammond (PC, p. 125) suggests that the chambers were only built on three sides of the rectangular building and that on each tier they were divided six to each long side and three to the rear.

2. The porch of pillars (1 Kings 7:6). The porch of pillars was no doubt a covered colonnade; i.e., it had a roof but no sides. The pillars were its only walls. From the fact that this porch was seventy-five feet long, the same width as the house of the forest of Lebanon, some commentators have concluded that it served as the entrance to that building. The porch was forty-five feet in width or depth. A small porch of pillars and steps stood in front of the colonnade. The size of this building and the fact that it had itself a porch favor the view that the porch of pillars was an independent structure.[192] No doubt it stood between the house of the forest of Lebanon and the hall of justice and may have connected the two buildings. What, if any, special function the porch of pillars served is not stated. It may have been that here litigants awaited the call to present their case in the hall of justice.

[192] As opposed to the view that the porch of pillars was simply the vestibule to the house of the forest of Lebanon or the hall of justice.

3. The hall of justice (1 Kings 7:7). While the function of the third building in the palace complex is explicitly stated, the description is even more vague than in the preceding cases. This building served the dual purpose of an audience room and a court of justice. It was open only in front, and was shut in by solid walls on the other three sides. The interior was covered with cedar from one side of the floor to the other (lit., from floor to floor). Keil thinks that the building was two stories and that the walls from the ground floor to the floor of the second story were covered with cedar. Others think the expression means that the walls and ceiling from one side of the floor to the opposite side were covered with cedar.

4. The palace (1 Kings 7:8 a). After the description of the public quarters of the palace, the private residence of the king is mentioned. The author of Kings regarded this phase of Solomon's building activity as comparatively unimportant, and so gives only brief and vague notice to it. Three details only are known of the palace: (1) it was located within a courtyard; (2) this courtyard was within the porch of justice; i.e., the audience room and hall of justice served as the principal entrance into the king's residence; and (3) the royal residence was built on the same order as the porch of justice.

5. The palace of Pharaoh's daughter (1 Kings 7:8 b). The house of Pharaoh's daughter was probably distinct from the dwelling- place of the king and located behind the latter. This would seem to have been the private residence of the queen, not the harem where all the wives and concubines were collected.

All of the stones which were used in the construction of the palace complex were of the finest quality, shaped to certain specified dimensions with iron saws. In contrast with the practice of the Phoenician stone-masons who left the outer surface rough, these stones were dressed on all sides. The entire wall was constructed of such stones from the foundation to the coping, the projecting stones on which the beams rested at the top. The pavement of the courtyard in which these buildings were locatedthe outer courtwas of sawed stones (1 Kings 7:9). The foundation stones were much larger than those reared upon them, some being twelve feet long and others as much as fifteen feet long (1 Kings 7:10). The stones of the superstructure were no doubt smaller than those of the foundation, but more carefully smoothed and faced (1 Kings 7:11).

The palace complex, like the Temple, had two courtyards. The smaller court mentioned in 1 Kings 7:8 seems to have been enclosed among the buildings. The great court probably surrounded the whole complex. This court was enclosed by a wall consisting of three rows of hewn stones and a coping of cedar (1 Kings 7:12). It thus resembled the wall of the Temple courtyard (5:36) and also, it would seem, the wall of the court within the porch[193] (cf. 1 Kings 7:8).

[193] It is almost impossible to decide whether porch of the house refers to the porch of judgment (1 Kings 7:7) or to the porch of the Temple. Hammond (PC, p. 127) is probably right in taking this to be a reference to the court within the porch mentioned in 1 Kings 7:8.