61 Four hundred and eighty years after the Israelites came out of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon's rule over Israel, in the month of Ziv, the second month, Solomon started building The Temple of God. 2 The Temple that King Solomon built to God was ninety feet long, thirty feet wide, and forty-five feet high. 3 There was a porch across the thirty-foot width of The Temple that extended out fifteen feet. 4 Within The Temple he made narrow, deep-silled windows. 5 Against the outside walls he built a supporting structure in which there were smaller rooms: 6 The lower floor was seven and a half feet wide, the middle floor nine feet, and the third floor ten and a half feet. He had projecting ledges built into the outside Temple walls to support the buttressing beams. 7 The stone blocks for the building of The Temple were all dressed at the quarry so that the building site itself was reverently quiet - no noise from hammers and chisels and other iron tools. 8 The entrance to the ground floor was at the south end of The Temple; stairs led to the second floor and then to the third. 9 Solomon built and completed The Temple, finishing it off with roof beams and planks of cedar. 10 The supporting structure along the outside walls was attached to The Temple with cedar beams and the rooms in it were seven and a half feet tall.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on 1 Kings 6:1-10
Commentary on 1 Kings 6:1-10
(Read 1 Kings 6:1-10)
The temple is called the house of the Lord, because it was directed and modelled by him, and was to be employed in his service. This gave it the beauty of holiness, that it was the house of the Lord, which was far beyond all other beauties. It was to be the temple of the God of peace, therefore no iron tool must be heard; quietness and silence suit and help religious exercises. God's work should be done with much care and little noise. Clamour and violence often hinder, but never further the work of God. Thus the kingdom of God in the heart of man grows up in silence, Mark 5:27.