The Instructions for Building Solomon's Temple

 

The First Temple, built by Solomon, as it was believed to have appeared.

            While there are many factors that can contribute to a place becoming sacred, one factor that defines a place as sacred even before the time it is built is the plans for the site. In the case of David and Solomon, “the dimensions plans of a temple had to be revealed… so that the dimensions of the furnishings of the god’s home in the world above could be accurately reproduced on earth”(Armstrong, page 45). This temple was to be God’s home on earth, and he wanted it built in a manner that made it an earthly replica of his heavenly palace. A temple of this esteem could not be designed by a human, but it had to be physically constructed by a human so God passed on the “divine instructions” and “minute details” of where, how, and with what his temple should be built to Solomon. God entrusted Solomon to build a house for his name because he said that Solomon was a “man of peace,” unlike his father (1 Chronicles 22:9). Ultimately, Solomon did exactly as God instructed him, and although the temple no longer stands, it remains a widely recognized site of sacred and divine power by many people around the world, with particular historical and religious importance to the Jews. The first temple was both a symbol of God's residence on earth and a sacred place for people to go to feel connected to their God.

            Although the First Temple no longer stands and there is no direct evidence for its existence, the story of its creation and holiness is still extremely important. 1 Chronicles 28 discusses David telling Solomon that he had been chosen by the Lord to build the Temple according to the plans of Yahweh. The Chronicles were written in 450-430 BCE, meaning that even though these books are placed early when viewing the Old Testament in chronological order, these books were some of the last of the Old Testament books to be written. Despite this, there are obvious ties and callbacks to books of the Bible that were written much earlier, such as the same phrase, “Do not be afraid, and do not be frightened, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go” being used in both 1 Chronicles 28:20 as David is talking to Solomon and in Joshua 1:9 when God was speaking to Joshua (Braun, page 587). There are also strong similarities between the ways in which Solomon was commanded to build the Temple according to the instructions given to him by God and how Joshua was commanded to lead the Israelites to the Promised Land in Deuteronomy 31. Both the book of Joshua and the book of Deuteronomy were written between 1435 and 1385 BCE, meaning that these books are decades older than the Chronicles, but God’s commands were still being expressed in the same ways (Braun, page 588). Ultimately, it is obvious that the author of the Chronicles wanted to express the importance of the divine instructions that Solomon received by outlining them in the same way that one of the most important commands and best demonstrations of faith had been expressed decades earlier.

Citations -

Armstrong, Karen. Jerusalem: One City, Three Faiths. Ballantine Books, 1997.

Braun, Roddy. 1976. “Solomon, the Chosen Temple Builder: The Significance of 1 Chronicles 22, 28, and 29 for the Theology of Chronicles.” Journal of Biblical Literature 95(4):581.

Image: https://www.bibleodyssey.org/articles/first-temple/