The House and Its Chambers
1 He brought me to the nave and measured the posts, six cubits wide on the one side and six cubits wide on the other side, which was the width of the tent. 2 The width of the entrance was ten cubits, and the sides of the entrance were five cubits on the one side, and five cubits on the other side. He measured its length, forty cubits, and the width, twenty cubits. 3 Then he went inward and measured each post of the entrance, two cubits; and the entrance, six cubits; and the width of the entrance, seven cubits. 4 He measured its length, twenty cubits, and the width, twenty cubits, before the nave. He said to me, “This is the most holy place.” 5 Then he measured the wall of the house, six cubits; and the width of every side room, four cubits, all around the house on every side. 6 The side rooms were in three stories, one over another, and thirty in each story. They entered into the wall which belonged to the house for the side rooms all around, that they might be supported and not penetrate the wall of the house. 7 The side rooms were wider on the higher levels, because the walls were narrower at the higher levels. Therefore the width of the house increased upward; and so one went up from the lowest level to the highest through the middle level. 8 I saw also that the house had a raised base all around. The foundations of the side rooms were a full reed of six great cubits. 9 The thickness of the outer wall of the side rooms was five cubits. That which was left was the place of the side rooms that belonged to the house. 10 Between the rooms was a width of twenty cubits around the house on every side. 11 The doors of the side rooms were toward an open area that was left, one door toward the north, and another door toward the south. The width of the open area was five cubits all around. 12 The building that was before the separate place at the side toward the west was seventy cubits wide; and the wall of the building was five cubits thick all around, and its length ninety cubits. 13 So he measured the temple, one hundred cubits long; and the separate place, and the building, with its walls, one hundred cubits long; 14 also the width of the face of the temple, and of the separate place toward the east, one hundred cubits. 15 He measured the length of the building before the separate place which was at its back, and its galleries on the one side and on the other side, one hundred cubits from the inner temple, and the porches of the court, 16 the thresholds, and the closed windows, and the galleries around on their three stories, opposite the threshold, with wood ceilings all around, and from the ground up to the windows, (now the windows were covered), 17 to the space above the door, even to the inner house, and outside, and by all the wall all around inside and outside, by measure. 18 It was made with cherubim and palm trees. A palm tree was between cherub and cherub, and every cherub had two faces, 19 so that there was the face of a man toward the palm tree on the one side, and the face of a young lion toward the palm tree on the other side. It was made like this through all the house all around. 20 Cherubim and palm trees were made from the ground to above the door. The wall of the temple was like this. 21 The door posts of the nave were squared. As for the face of the nave, its appearance was as the appearance of the temple. 22 The altar was of wood, three cubits high, and its length two cubits. Its corners, its base, and its walls were of wood. He said to me, “This is the table that is before Yahweh.” 23 The temple and the sanctuary had two doors. 24 The doors had two leaves each, two turning leaves: two for the one door, and two leaves for the other. 25 There were made on them, on the doors of the nave, cherubim and palm trees, like those made on the walls. There was a threshold of wood on the face of the porch outside. 26 There were closed windows and palm trees on the one side and on the other side, on the sides of the porch. This is how the side rooms of the temple and the thresholds were arranged. Ezekiel 42 1 Then he brought me out into the outer court, the way toward the north. Then he brought me into the room that was opposite the separate place, and which was opposite the building toward the north. 2 Facing the length of one hundred cubits was the north door, and the width was fifty cubits. 3 Opposite the twenty cubits which belonged to the inner court, and opposite the pavement which belonged to the outer court, was gallery against gallery in the three stories. 4 Before the rooms was a walk of ten cubits’ width inward, a way of one cubit; and their doors were toward the north. 5 Now the upper rooms were shorter; for the galleries took away from these more than from the lower and the middle in the building. 6 For they were in three stories, and they didn’t have pillars as the pillars of the courts. Therefore the uppermost was set back more than the lowest and the middle from the ground. 7 The wall that was outside by the side of the rooms, toward the outer court before the rooms, was fifty cubits long. 8 For the length of the rooms that were in the outer court was fifty cubits. Behold, those facing the temple were one hundred cubits. 9 From under these rooms was the entry on the east side, as one goes into them from the outer court. 10 In the thickness of the wall of the court toward the east, before the separate place, and before the building, there were rooms. 11 The way before them was like the appearance of the rooms which were toward the north. Their length and width were the same. All their exits had the same arrangement and doors. 12 Like the doors of the rooms that were toward the south was a door at the head of the way, even the way directly before the wall toward the east, as one enters into them. 13 Then he said to me, “The north rooms and the south rooms, which are opposite the separate place, are the holy rooms, where the priests who are near to Yahweh shall eat the most holy things. There they shall lay the most holy things, with the meal offering, the sin offering, and the trespass offering; for the place is holy. 14 When the priests enter in, then they shall not go out of the holy place into the outer court until they lay their garments in which they minister there; for they are holy. Then they shall put on other garments, and shall approach that which is for the people.” 15 Now when he had finished measuring the inner house, he brought me out by the way of the gate which faces toward the east, and measured it all around. 16 He measured on the east side with the measuring reed five hundred reeds, with the measuring reed all around. 17 He measured on the north side five hundred reeds with the measuring reed all around. 18 He measured on the south side five hundred reeds with the measuring reed. 19 He turned about to the west side, and measured five hundred reeds with the measuring reed. 20 He measured it on the four sides. It had a wall around it, the length five hundred cubits, and the width five hundred cubits, to make a separation between that which was holy and that which was common.
The guide measures the innermost room and steps outside it, and the last measurement of the section is a wall dividing holy from common.
The survey now enters the house itself, and the sequence is the one any priest would recognize. First the nave, forty cubits by twenty. Then the guide went inward alone and measured a further room, twenty by twenty, and told Ezekiel what it was: This is the most holy place. The prophet does not enter it. The man with the reed goes in and comes out with a number, and the room is described from the doorway.
What is on the walls is worth noting against chapter 8. There the hidden chamber had been painted around on the wall with creeping things and abominable animals Ezekiel 8:10. Here the whole house is carved with cherubim and palm trees alternating, each cherub with two faces — a man's face toward a palm tree on one side, a young lion's toward a palm tree on the other. The same technique, the same surfaces, and an entirely different subject.
The chambers that follow are storage and vesting rooms in blocks of three stories, and their purpose is given plainly. The priests eat the most holy things there and lay the offerings there. And one rule attached to them explains a great deal about the whole vision: when the priests leave the holy place they must leave their ministering garments behind and put on other garments, before they approach that which is for the people. Holiness is treated here as something that transfers by contact and must not be carried out casually into ordinary space.
Then the guide brings him out by the east gate and measures the perimeter, five hundred by five hundred, and the section ends with a sentence that states what all the numbers have been for. There was a wall around it to make a separation between that which was holy and that which was common. The priests of chapter 22 had failed at exactly this — they made no distinction between the holy and the common Ezekiel 22:26. What they would not teach, the architecture now enforces.
settled What this mark means