Today, I am reading and commenting on  1 Kings 7.

The first thing we are told in today’s passage is that Solomon spent thirteen years building his palace, one year less than twice as long as he took to have the Temple built.  Every time I read that it causes me to wonder if Solomon put more time and effort into his own interests as he did in to praising and serving God.  However, I realized today that it took Solomon thirteen years o build at least two buildings, and perhaps a third, whereas the Temple was a single building.  So, “Solomon’s Palace” was the Hall of Justice, where Solomon presided over his court making judgements in cases brought before him and, probably, holding audiences for visiting dignitaries, and the palace where he lived.  In addition, the writer may have included the time it took to build a palace for Pharoah’s daughter, whom Solomon had wed.  It would naturally take longer to build these two or three buildings than it took to build the one building of the Temple.

I planned to make the main focus of today’s entry about the flourishes in the decorations of the Temple furnishings, but I am not sure it will be of much note.  When I read this passage looking for what to read, I took note of the fact that the bronze sea (kind of a very large basin for water) that Huram made for Solomon’s Temple rested on twelve bronze bulls.  This reminded me of the golden calf which Aaron made for the Israelites to worship while Moses was on Mount Sinai, and the two calves which Jeroboam made for the Israelites to worship after he rebelled against Rehoboam.  I am confident that the calf which Aaron made and those made by Jeroboam were both related to the same aspect of Hebrew mythology, but I suspect that the bulls which the sea rested upon had a completely unrelated symbology.  In an effort to see why the supports for the sea were shaped to resemble bulls, I looked at the other flourishes on the furnishings made for the Temple.  So, there were bronze pomegranates decorating the network of chains around the tops of the pillars.  The capitals on the tops of the pillars were shaped like lilies.  There were movable stands with side panels decorated with bulls, lion, and cherubim.  In addition, the supports for these stands had lions, cherubim, and palm trees engraved upon them.  All of this leads me to believe that the bulls were included as a symbol of strength, as were the lions, while the other things were beautiful embellishments intended to increase the sense of wonder and joy experienced by those who worshiped in the Temple.

pomegranates, lilies, bulls, lion, cherubim, floral work

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.