Ezekiel 41:15

Summary Account of the Measurement, the Character, and the Significant Ornaments of the Projecting Portions of the Temple Building. - Eze 41:15. And thus he measured the length of the building in the front of the separate place which was at the back thereof, and its galleries on this side and that side, a hundred cubits, and the inner sanctuary, and the porches of the court; Eze 41:16. The thresholds, and the closed windows, and the galleries round about all three - opposite to the thresholds was wainscoting wood round about, and the ground up to the windows; but the windows were covered - Eze 41:17. (The space) above the doors, both to the inner temple and outside, and on all the wall round about, within and without, had its measures. Eze 41:18. And cherubs and palms were made, a palm between every two cherubs; and the cherub had two faces; Eze 41:19. A man's face toward the palm on this side, and a lion's face toward the palm on that side: thus was it made round about the whole house. Eze 41:20. From the floor to above the doors were the cherubs and palms made, and that on the wall of the sanctuary. Eze 41:21. The sanctuary had square door-posts, and the front of the holy of holies had the same form. Eze 41:22. The altar was of wood, three cubits high, and its length two cubits; and it had its corner-pieces and its stand, and its walls were of wood: and he said to me, This is the table which stands before Jehovah. Eze 41:23. And the holy place and the holy of holies had two doors. Eze 41:24. And the doors had two wings, two turning leaves; the one door two, and the other two leaves. Eze 41:25. And there were made upon them, upon the doors of the sanctuary, cherubs and palms, as they were made upon the walls; and a moulding of wood was on the front of the porch outside…

An account was given of the porch of the house in the close of the foregoing chapter; this brings us to the temple itself, the description of which here given creates much difficulty to the critical expositors and occasions differences among them. Those must consult them who are nice in their enquiries into the meaning of the particulars of this delineation; it shall suffice us to observe, I. The dimensions of the house, the posts of it (Eze 41:1), the door (Eze 41:2), the wall and the side-chambers (Eze 41:5, Eze 41:6), the foundations and wall of the chambers, their doors (Eze 41:8-11), and the house itself (Eze 41:13). II. The dimensions of the oracle, or most holy place (Eze 41:3, Eze 41:4). III. An account of another building over against the separate place (Eze 41:12-15). IV. The manner of the building of the house (Eze 41:7, Eze 41:16, Eze 41:17). V. The ornaments of the house (Eze 41:18-20). VI. The altar of incense and the table (Eze 41:22). VII. The doors between the temple and the oracle (Eze 41:23-26). There is so much difference both in the terms and in the rules of architecture between one age and another, one place and another, that it ought not to be any stumbling-block to us that there is so much in these descriptions dark and hard to be understood, about the meaning of which the learned are not agreed. To one not skilled in mathematics the mathematical description of a modern structure would be scarcely intelligible; and yet to a common carpenter or mason among the Jews at that time we may suppose that all this, in the literal sense of it, was easy enough.

41:15-20 The Temple building was all paneled with wood and decorated with palm trees and cherubim. The cherubim were like those described in Ezekiel’s earlier visions of judgment (see 1:5-12; 10:2-14). But where those real-life cherubim had four faces, the carved two-dimensional models are depicted with only two faces—that of a lion, the highest of the wild animals, and a human, the pinnacle of the created order. Cherubim also adorned Solomon’s Temple (1 Kgs 6:32); they were traditional symbols of judgment that complemented the palm trees, traditional symbols of blessing.