Solomon’s Temple

2 Chronicles 5: 1 – 14

Solomon’s Temple

5 So all the work that Solomon had done for the house of the LORD was finished; and Solomon brought in the things which his father David had dedicated: the silver and the gold and all the furnishings. And he put them in the treasuries of the house of God. 2 Now Solomon assembled the elders of Israel and all the heads of the tribes, the chief fathers of the children of Israel, in Jerusalem, that they might bring the ark of the covenant of the LORD up from the City of David, which is Zion. 3 Therefore all the men of Israel assembled with the king at the feast, which was in the seventh month. 4 So all the elders of Israel came, and the Levites took up the ark. 5 Then they brought up the ark, the tabernacle of meeting, and all the holy furnishings that were in the tabernacle. The priests and the Levites brought them up. 6 Also King Solomon, and all the congregation of Israel who were assembled with him before the ark, were sacrificing sheep and oxen that could not be counted or numbered for multitude. 7 Then the priests brought in the ark of the covenant of the LORD to its place, into the inner sanctuary of the temple, to the Most Holy Place, under the wings of the cherubim. 8 For the cherubim spread their wings over the place of the ark, and the cherubim overshadowed the ark and its poles. 9 The poles extended so that the ends of the poles of the ark could be seen from the holy place, in front of the inner sanctuary; but they could not be seen from outside. And they are there to this day. 10 Nothing was in the ark except the two tablets which Moses put there at Horeb, when the LORD made a covenant with the children of Israel, when they had come out of Egypt. 11 And it came to pass when the priests came out of the Most Holy Place (for all the priests who were present had sanctified themselves, without keeping to their divisions), 12 and the Levites who were the singers, all those of Asaph and Heman and Jeduthun, with their sons and their brethren, stood at the east end of the altar, clothed in white linen, having cymbals, stringed instruments and harps, and with them one hundred and twenty priests sounding with trumpets— 13 indeed it came to pass, when the trumpeters and singers were as one, to make one sound to be heard in praising and thanking the LORD, and when they lifted up their voice with the trumpets and cymbals and instruments of music, and praised the LORD, saying: “For He is good, for His mercy endures forever,” that the house, the house of the LORD, was filled with a cloud, 14 so that the priests could not continue ministering because of the cloud; for the glory of the LORD filled the house of God.

The First Temple of Israel is known as Solomon’s Temple which is a correct title. It was supposed to be The House of the Lord. However, with all the wrong things that went into this building I think it is appropriate to call it after Solomon and not add our Lord involvement in its design and construction. Remember He was never asked His opinion on any of this. All in all, it in my opinion the whole building and its items demeaned our Holy God.

The Bible tells us that Solomon employed 30,000 people to build the temple in 3 shifts of 10,000 at a time. There were a staggering 80,000 people quarrying stone to build the temple. Yet another 70,000 people were employed just to transport the stone from the quarry to the building site. Solomon employed another 3,300 supervisors to oversee the work. That's a total of 183,300 people working for 7 years - yes 7 years to build the magnificent temple of Solomon.

So, it took 183,000 men 7 years to build a temple. Now I know that there were not any of the heavy construction equipment available in this time in history. But exactly what were 80,000 people doing in the quarry for 7 years? Perhaps they had really bad union problems. Perhaps Solomon’s project managers and the supervisors (all 3,300 of them) were just utterly incompetent or desiring job security. I live just outside Philadelphia and our main access highway I-95 the Pennsylvania Highway Department has been fixing this road every year since I was a kid. It is amazing that they put in nice smooth black top and after the first small salting for icy roads the highway reverts to pot hole alley.

Now to go on to the shift workers cutting wood in Lebanon: -10,000 men working for 313 days a year (Sabbath off). Let’s suppose one man cuts down and prepares only one tree a day. that's 3,130,000 trees a year for 7 years.