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He made a bronze altar, 30 feet[a] long, 30 feet[b] wide, and 15 feet[c] high. He also made the big bronze basin called “The Sea.”[d] It measured 15 feet[e] from rim to rim, was circular in shape, and stood 7½[f] high. Its circumference was 45 feet.[g] Images of bulls were under it all the way around, ten every 18 inches[h] all the way around. The bulls were in two rows and had been cast with “The Sea.”[i] “The Sea” stood on top of twelve bulls. Three faced northward, three westward, three southward, and three eastward. “The Sea” was placed on top of them, and they all faced outward.[j] It was four fingers thick, and its rim was like that of a cup shaped like a lily blossom. It could hold 18,000 gallons.[k]

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Footnotes

  1. 2 Chronicles 4:1 tn Heb “20 cubits.” Assuming a cubit of 18 inches (45 cm), the length would have been 30 feet (9 m).
  2. 2 Chronicles 4:1 tn Heb “20 cubits.”
  3. 2 Chronicles 4:1 tn Heb “10 cubits.” Assuming a cubit of 18 inches (45 cm), the height would have been 15 feet (4.5 m).
  4. 2 Chronicles 4:2 tn Heb “He made the sea, cast.”sn The large bronze basin known as “The Sea” was mounted on twelve bronze bulls and contained water for the priests to bathe themselves (see v. 6; cf. Exod 30:17-21).
  5. 2 Chronicles 4:2 tn Heb “10 cubits.” Assuming a cubit of 18 inches (45 cm), the diameter would have been 15 feet (4.5 m).
  6. 2 Chronicles 4:2 tn Heb “5 cubits.” Assuming a cubit of 18 inches (45 cm), the height would have been 7.5 feet (2.25 m).
  7. 2 Chronicles 4:2 tn Heb “and a measuring line went around it 30 cubits all around.”
  8. 2 Chronicles 4:3 tn Heb “ten every cubit.”
  9. 2 Chronicles 4:3 tn Heb “rows being cast with its casting.”
  10. 2 Chronicles 4:4 tn Heb “all their hindquarters were toward the inside.”
  11. 2 Chronicles 4:5 tn Heb “3,000 baths” (note that the capacity is given in 1 Kings 7:26 as “2,000 baths”). A bath was a liquid measure roughly equivalent to six gallons (about 22 liters), so 3,000 baths was a quantity of about 18,000 gallons (66,000 liters).

He made a bronze altar ·thirty feet [L twenty cubits] long, ·thirty feet [L twenty cubits] wide, and ·fifteen feet [L ten cubits] tall. Then he made from ·bronze [cast metal] a large round ·bowl [basin], which was called the Sea [C symbol of chaos subdued; 1 Kin. 7:23]. It was ·forty-five feet [L thirty cubits] ·around [in circumference], ·fifteen feet [L ten cubits] ·across [from rim to rim], and ·seven and one-half feet [L five cubits] ·deep [high]. There were ·carvings [figures; images] of ·bulls [oxen] under the rim of the bowl—ten ·bulls [oxen] every ·eighteen inches [L cubit]. They were in two rows and were ·made [cast] in one piece with the bowl.

The bowl rested on the backs of twelve bronze ·bulls [oxen] ·that faced outward from the center of the bowl [L all their hindquarters were toward the inside]. Three ·bulls [oxen] faced north, three faced west, three faced south, and three faced east. The sides of the bowl were ·four inches [four fingers; L a handbreadth] thick, and it held ·about seventeen thousand five hundred gallons [L three thousand baths]. The rim of the bowl was like the rim of a cup ·or like [and resembled] a lily blossom.

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