1Then Solomon began building the Temple of the Lord in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where the Lord appeared to his father David. This was the place that David had provided—the former threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite.

2Solomon began construction on the second day of the second month in his fourth year as king.

3The size of the foundation Solomon laid for the Temple of God was sixty cubits long and twenty cubits wide (according to the old cubit measurement).

4The front porch that ran across the width of the Temple was twenty cubits long and twenty ⁵cubits high. He covered the inside of the porch with pure gold.

5He paneled the main room with cypress overlaid with fine gold, with images of palm trees and chains.

6He decorated the Temple with beautiful gems, and with gold he imported from Parvaim.

7He covered the beams, thresholds, walls, and doors of the Temple with gold, and he carved cherubim on the walls.

8He made the room of the Most Holy Place to correspond with the width of the Temple—twenty cubits long and twenty cubits wide. He covered the interior with six hundred talents of fine gold.

9The weight of the nails was one shekel for every fifty shekels of gold. ⁶

10He made for the Most Holy Place two wooden cherubim covered with gold.

11The wingspan of the cherubim together was twenty cubits. One wing of the first cherub was five cubits long and touched one Temple wall, while its other wing, also five cubits long, touched the second cherub.

12In similar fashion, one wing of the second cherub was five cubits long and touched one Temple wall, while its other wing, also five cubits long, touched the first cherub.

13So the wingspan of these cherubim together was twenty cubits. They stood on their feet, facing the main room.

14He made the veil ⁷of blue, purple, and crimson embroidery on fine linen, with images of cherubim on it.

15He made two columns for the front of the Temple, thirty-five cubits high, each having a capital five cubits high.

16He made chains like in the Most Holy Place and he placed them on top of the columns. He also made one hundred ornamental pomegranates and attached them to each chain. ⁸

17He set up the columns in front of the Temple, one on the south, and one on the north. The column on the south he named Jachin, and the column on the north he named Boaz.