2 Chronicles 4

2 Chronicles 4 belongs to the account of Solomon's temple construction in 2 Chronicles 2–5 and summarizes the making of the furnishings inside and outside the temple. It continues the account of the temple building and its two pillars in 2 Chronicles 3 and leads into the installation of the ark of the covenant in 2 Chronicles 5.

Outline

• Verse 1 Solomon makes a bronze altar twenty cubits long, twenty cubits wide, and ten cubits high. A cubit is the length from the elbow to the fingertip, generally reckoned at about 45 cm (roughly 18 inches).
• Verses 2–5 The large cast basin called the "Sea" is introduced. It measures ten cubits in diameter, five cubits in height, and thirty cubits in circumference. Below its brim run two rows of figures of oxen, and twelve oxen facing north, west, south, and east support the Sea. Its brim is shaped like a lily blossom, and it holds three thousand baths.
• Verse 6 Ten lavers (large basins holding water for washing) are set up, five on the right and five on the left. The articles used for the burnt offering are washed in the lavers, while the Sea is used by the priests for washing.
• Verses 7–8 Ten golden lampstands and ten tables are placed in the nave (the holy place), five on each side, and one hundred golden basins are made.
• Verses 9–10 The court of the priests, the great court, and the doors of the court are made, and the doors are overlaid with bronze. The Sea is placed on the right side of the temple, toward the southeast.
• Verses 11–18 The bronze articles made by Huram are summarized: the two pillars and their capitals, the networks, four hundred pomegranates, the stands and lavers, the Sea and the twelve oxen, and the pots, shovels, and fleshhooks, among others. These were cast in the clay ground of the Jordan plain between Succoth and Zeredathah, and so much bronze was used that its weight could not be determined.
• Verses 19–22 The golden furnishings inside the sanctuary are listed: the golden altar, the tables for the showbread, the lampstands and lamps of pure gold, the flowers, tongs, snuffers, basins, spoons, and censers. The doors of the Most Holy Place and the doors of the nave are overlaid with gold.

Key Verses

• 2 Chronicles 4:2 "Also he made a molten sea of ten cubits from brim to brim." This verse introduces the bronze Sea, the largest furnishing placed in the temple court.
• 2 Chronicles 4:6 "But the sea was for the priests to wash in." Here Chronicles specifies the purpose of the Sea, which Kings does not mention.
• 2 Chronicles 4:22 "The inner doors thereof for the most holy place, and the doors of the house of the temple, were of gold." This verse marks the completion of the furnishings and the transition to the dedication of the temple in chapter 5.

People and Places

• Solomon: The son of David and king of Israel, who leads the building of the temple.
• Huram: The craftsman from Tyre who made the bronze articles for Solomon. In 1 Kings 7 he is called "Hiram." The phrase "Huram his father" in verse 16 is understood by some as part of his name and by others as an honorific meaning "master craftsman" or "teacher."
• Temple in Jerusalem: The place where all the furnishings in this chapter were set.
• Succoth and Zeredathah: Places in the Jordan plain where the bronze articles were cast.

Points for Reflection

• The chapter differs in places from 1 Kings 7, which covers the same material. The capacity of the Sea is given as two thousand baths in 1 Kings 7:26 but three thousand baths in this chapter. The decoration below the brim is described in 1 Kings as "knops" (gourd-shaped ornaments) but in this chapter as "figures of oxen." The dimensions of the bronze altar appear only in Chronicles. These differences have been explained in various ways, with some attributing them to variations in manuscript transmission and others to different standards of measurement.
• The figures of ten cubits in diameter and thirty cubits in circumference are frequently discussed in connection with the value of pi. Some hold that the numbers are rounded, while others suggest that, because the brim was a handbreadth thick, the inner and outer measurements were taken separately.
• The tabernacle had a single lampstand and a single table for the showbread, but in this chapter each increases to ten. The phrase "according to their form" in verse 7 is often read as meaning that the furnishings followed the regulations for the tabernacle in Exodus.
• Hebrews 9 describes the furnishings and sacrifices of the tabernacle as a shadow pointing to the work of Christ. In the Christian preaching tradition, the altar of burnt offering, the bronze Sea, and the lavers are sometimes interpreted as symbols of atonement and purification, and some interpreters connect the bronze Sea with the "sea of glass" in Revelation 4. Such symbolic interpretations, however, are later readings rather than what the text itself directly states.