Schematic of Ezekiel’s Temple drawn by Dutch architect Bartelmeüs Reinders, Sr. (1893–1979) released into public domain by artist.

Ezekiel 41: 1-15a

¹ Then he brought me to the nave, and measured the pilasters; on each side six cubits was the width of the pilasters. ² The width of the entrance was ten cubits; and the sidewalls of the entrance were five cubits on either side. He measured the length of the nave, forty cubits, and its width, twenty cubits. ³ Then he went into the inner room and measured the pilasters of the entrance, two cubits; and the width of the entrance, six cubits; and the sidewalls of the entrance, seven cubits. ⁴ He measured the depth of the room, twenty cubits, and its width, twenty cubits, beyond the nave. And he said to me, This is the most holy place.

⁵ Then he measured the wall of the temple, six cubits thick; and the width of the side chambers, four cubits, all around the temple. ⁶ The side chambers were in three stories, one over another, thirty in each story. There were offsets all around the wall of the temple to serve as supports for the side chambers, so that they should not be supported by the wall of the temple. ⁷ The passageway of the side chambers widened from story to story; for the structure was supplied with a stairway all around the temple. For this reason the structure became wider from story to story. One ascended from the bottom story to the uppermost story by way of the middle one. ⁸ I saw also that the temple had a raised platform all around; the foundations of the side chambers measured a full reed of six long cubits. ⁹ The thickness of the outer wall of the side chambers was five cubits; and the free space between the side chambers of the temple¹⁰ and the chambers of the court was a width of twenty cubits all around the temple on every side. ¹¹ The side chambers opened onto the area left free, one door toward the north, and another door toward the south; and the width of the part that was left free was five cubits all around.

¹² The building that was facing the temple yard on the west side was seventy cubits wide; and the wall of the building was five cubits thick all around, and its depth ninety cubits.

¹³ Then he measured the temple, one hundred cubits deep; and the yard and the building with its walls, one hundred cubits deep; ¹⁴ also the width of the east front of the temple and the yard, one hundred cubits.

¹⁵ Then he measured the depth of the building facing the yard at the west, together with its galleries on either side, one hundred cubits.

Ezekiel is brought into the center of this new temple complex, which is similar in description to the temple of Solomon in 1 Kings 6, although the dimensions here are larger (assuming I am reading the layout correctly) than what 1 Kings indicates. The description of the temple, especially in verse five and beyond, is full of rarely used architectural expressions and translation is uncertain. The description, even if all the words are translated correctly, is difficult to fully comprehend and once again is lacking the details to fully realize this structure. This may be intentional to prevent someone from attempting to replicate this vision, but enough pieces are clear to give an overall idea of this central section of the temple.

The ’nave’ or ‘great hall’ which stands before the most holy place was a space that only the priests would enter to place the showbread on the table before the holiest place daily. This twenty by forty cubit[1] rectangular space is larger than the space in Solomon’s temple if the measurements are for the internal space of the room. For both the ‘nave’ and the most holy place the thickness of the walls is massive, equivalent to the wall surrounding the entire structure, six cubits (roughly ten feet) thick. Along this wall which spans three stories are a total of ninety chambers, presumably for storage. This structure, which is similar to Solomon’s temple, is difficult to visualize because it is unclear whether there is some type of stairway to access these side chambers. The most holy space is half the size of the nave as a twenty cubit square. On the outside was another large building, larger than the nave and most holy space combined: seventy cubits by ninety cubits.[2] The purpose of this final structure is not indicated here.

The primary concern throughout this structural description is the setting aside of spaces that separate the mundane from the holy. As we proceed from the outer doors of the structure to the most holy space the doorways decrease in size to restrict admittance and to demarcate the increasing sacredness of the intended space. With the smaller doors also comes the physical ascent to this holy space. Although there will be some description of the furnishings and decorations below, this is significantly different from the descriptions of the lavish resources committed to the construction of the tabernacle and Solomon’s temple.

Ezekiel 41: 15b- 26

The nave of the temple and the inner room and the outer vestibule ¹⁶ were paneled, and, all around, all three had windows with recessed frames. Facing the threshold the temple was paneled with wood all around, from the floor up to the windows (now the windows were covered), ¹⁷ to the space above the door, even to the inner room, and on the outside. And on all the walls all around in the inner room and the nave there was a pattern. ¹⁸ It was formed of cherubim and palm trees, a palm tree between cherub and cherub. Each cherub had two faces: ¹⁹ a human face turned toward the palm tree on the one side, and the face of a young lion turned toward the palm tree on the other side. They were carved on the whole temple all around; ²⁰ from the floor to the area above the door, cherubim and palm trees were carved on the wall.

²¹ The doorposts of the nave were square. In front of the holy place was something resembling ²² an altar of wood, three cubits high, two cubits long, and two cubits wide; its corners, its base, and its walls were of wood. He said to me, “This is the table that stands before the LORD.” ²³ The nave and the holy place had each a double door. ²⁴ The doors had two leaves apiece, two swinging leaves for each door. ²⁵ On the doors of the nave were carved cherubim and palm trees, such as were carved on the walls; and there was a canopy of wood in front of the vestibule outside. ²⁶ And there were recessed windows and palm trees on either side, on the sidewalls of the vestibule.

The temple is decorated with cherubim and palm trees, although each cherub has only two faces instead of the four in the initial visions.[3] This decorative paneling covers the entire space from floor to above the door. The table seems to serve as the table for showbread (Exodus 25: 23-30) but Ezekiel needs to have it explained because it is double the size of the previous table. It is not a table for burnt offerings since a wooden altar would burn with the offering. The final detail is the doors which are similar to the doors in Solomon’s temple (1 Kings 6: 33-36). In comparison with both the tabernacle and the temple there is surprisingly little focus on ornamentation or the usage of gold and other precious resources. Perhaps Ezekiel, like the narrative of 1 Kings, is critical of the ostentatious nature of Solomon’s expenditure of wealth on both the temple and his own household but it is also likely that the primary purpose of this nature is not to focus on furnishings but the dimensions to set aside a sacred space.

[1] Thirty-four feet by sixty eight feet.

[2] One hundred twenty feet by one hundred fifty feet.

[3] Ezekiel 1 and 10.