if we should not suppose the rooms in these stories to be very broad, since the further three rows of pillars, which Weiss assumes in addition, according to 1Ki 7:3, as the actual supporters of the upper building, have no foundation in the text. The words “four rows of cedar pillars” do not absolutely require the assumption that there were four rows side by side or one behind the other on every side of the building; for the assertion that טוּר does not denote a row in the sense of a straight line, but generally signifies a row surrounding and enclosing a space, is refuted by Exo 28:17, where we read of the four טוּרים of precious stones upon the breastplate of the high priest. - Is it not likely that the truth lies midway between these two views, and that the following is the view most in accordance with the actual fact, namely, that there were four rows of pillars running along the full length of the building, but that they were distributed on the two sides, so that there were only two rows on each side? In this case a person entering from the front would see four rows of pillars running the whole length of the building. In any case the rows of pillars would of necessity be broken in front by the entrance itself.
The utter uncertainty as to the number and position of the four rows of pillars is sufficient in itself to render it quite impossible to draw any plan of the building that could in the slightest degree answer to the reality. Moreover, there is no allusion at all in the description given in the text to either entrance or exit, or to staircases and other things, and the other buildings are still more scantily described, so that nothing certain can be determined with regard to their relative position or their probable connection with one another. For this reason, after studying the matter again and again, I have been obliged to relinquish the intention to illustrate the description in the text by drawings.)
Verses 3-4
1Ki 7:3-4 “And roofing in (of) cedar was above the over the side-rooms upon the pillars, five and forty; fifteen the row.” ספן is to be understood of the roofing, as in 1Ki 6:15 (compare ספּן, 1Ki 6:15). The numbers “forty-five and fifteen the row” cannot refer to העמּוּדים, but must refer, as Thenius assumes, to הצּלעת as the main idea, which is more precisely defined by העמּוּדים על. If we took it as referring to the pillars, as I myself have formerly done, we should have to assume that there were only galleries or pillar-halls above the lower rows of pillars, which is at variance with הצּלעת. There were forty-five side-rooms, therefore, built upon the lower rows of pillars, in ranges of fifteen each. This could only be done by the ranges of rooms being built, not side by side, but one over the other, in other words, by the forty-five side-rooms forming three stories, as in the side buildings of the temple, so that each story had a “row” of fifteen side-rooms round it. This view receives support from 1Ki 7:4 : “and beam-layers (שׁקפים, beams, as in 1Ki 6:4) were three rows, and outlook against outlook three times;” i.e., the rows of side-rooms were built one over the other by means of layers of beams, so that the rooms had windows opposite to one another three times; that is to say, the windows looking out upon the court were so arranged in the three stories that those on the one side were vis à vis to those on the opposite side of the building. The expression in 1Ki 7:5, אל־מחזה מחזה מוּל, “window over against window,” compels us to take אל־מחזה in the sense of “opposite to the window” (אל, versus), and not, as Thenius proposes, “outlook against outlook,” according to which אל is supposed to indicate that the windows were only separated from one another by slender piers. מחזה, which only occurs here, is different from חלּון, the ordinary window, and probably denotes a large opening affording a wide outlook.
Verse 5
1Ki 7:5 “And all the doorways and mouldings were square of beams” (שׁקף is an accusative of free subordination, denoting the material or the mode of execution; cf. Ewald, §284, a., β). “Square with a
