1 Then Solomon made a start at building the house of the Lord on Mount Moriah in Jerusalem, where the Lord had been seen by his father David, in the place which David had made ready in the grain-floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

2 The building was started in the second month in the fourth year of his rule.

3 And Solomon put the base of the house of God in position; by the older measure it was sixty cubits long and twenty cubits wide.

4 And the covered way in front of the house was twenty cubits long, as wide as the house, and a hundred and twenty cubits high, all plated inside with the best gold.

5 And the greater house was roofed with cypress-wood, plated with the best gold and ornamented with designs of palm-trees and chains.

6 And the house was made beautiful with stones of great value, and the gold was gold of Parvaim.

7 All the house was plated with gold, the supports, the steps, the walls and the doors; and the walls were ornamented with designs of winged ones.

8 And he made the most holy place; it was twenty cubits long, and twenty cubits wide, like the greater house, and was plated all over with the best gold; six hundred talents were used for it.

9 And fifty shekels weight of gold was used for the nails. He had all the higher rooms plated with gold.

10 And in the most holy place he made images of two winged beings, covering them with gold.

11 Their outstretched wings were twenty cubits across; one wing, five cubits long, touching the wall of the house, and the other, of the same size, meeting the wing of the other winged one.

12 And in the same way, the wings of the other, five cubits long, were stretched out, one touching the wall and the other meeting the wing of the first winged one.

13 Their outstretched wings were twenty cubits across; they were placed upright on their feet, facing the inner part of the house.

14 And he made the veil of blue and purple and red, of the best linen, worked with winged ones.

15 And in front of the house he made two pillars, thirty-five cubits high, with crowns on the tops of them, five cubits high.

16 And he made chains, like neck ornaments, and put them on the tops of the pillars, and a hundred apples on the chains.

17 He put up the pillars in front of the Temple, one on the right side and one on the left, naming the one on the right Jachin and that on the left Boaz.

1 Finalmente começou a construção do templo. Localizou-se em Jerusalém, no cimo do monte Moriá, onde o Senhor aparecera a David, seu pai, no sítio onde se localizava a eira de Ornã, o jebuseu. Foi David quem escolheu esse sítio. O início da construção concretizou-se no décimo sétimo dia de Abril , no quarto ano do reinado de Salomão.

3 Os alicerces tinham trinta metros de comprimento e dez de largura. Havia um alpendre ao longo dos dez metros da largura do edifício, na parte da frente. A sua parte interior e o tecto eram cobertos de ouro puro. O telhado estava à altura de sessenta metros.

5 A parte principal do templo era forrada com madeira de cipreste e coberta de ouro puro, com gravações de folhas de palmeiras e de cadeias. Havia pedras preciosas incrustadas nas paredes, para aumentar a beleza; o ouro, aliás, era do melhor, de Parvaim. Todas as paredes, as traves, as portas e as ombreiras das entradas em todo o templo estavam cobertas de ouro, com querubins gravados.

8 Dentro, numa extremidade, havia o local mais sagrado - o lugar santíssimo - com dez metros quadrados. Esta área também era toda coberta de ouro do mais puro, pesando vinte toneladas. Os pregos aí usados, igualmente de ouro, pesavam meio quilo cada. Os quartos superiores estavam também forrados a ouro.

10 Dentro da referida dependência, o lugar santíssimo, Salomão colocou duas esculturas de querubins, recobrindo-as de ouro. Estavam de pé, voltados para a sala, com as asas abertas, tocando-se e tocando as extremidades do compartimento, de ponta a ponta. À entrada deste quarto colocou um véu, de azul, carmezim, púrpura e linho fino, decorado com querubins, também.

15 Em frente do templo havia dois pilares de dezassete metros e meio de altura, com capitéis, de dois metros e meio, ligando-os ao tecto. Mandou fazer cadeias, como as do santuário, e colocou-as no cimo dos pilares; havia cem romãs ligas às cadeias. Os pilares, colocou-os um à direita outro à esquerda, na parte da frente do templo. Deu-lhes nomes: o da direita, Jaquim, o da esquerda, Boaz.