2 Chronicles 3:15 - Exposition

Thirty and five cubits . The height of these pillars is attested in three places to have been 18 cubits ( 1 Kings 7:15 ; 2 Kings 25:17 ; Jeremiah 52:21 ). Some therefore think that the height given in our text describes rather the distance of the one pillar from the other, which would be just 35 cubits, if they stood at the extreme points of the line of the porch front; since the wings on each side (5 cubits for the lowest chamber, and 2.5 cubits for the thickness of the walls) would make up this amount. It is further noticed with this explanation that their height (18 cubits) with the chapiters (5 cubits) added, would bring them to the same height as the porch, and that their ornamentation agrees with that of the porch ( 1 Kings 7:19 ). All this may be the ease. Yet considering other indications of uncertainty about our text, and the fact that the characters yod kheth (18) are easily superseded by lamed he (35), it is perhaps likelier that we have here simply a clerical error. The parallel place tells us that these pillars and the chapiters were cast of brass; that "a line [ 1 Kings 7:15 ; Jeremiah 52:1-34 :41] of twelve cubits [not seven] did compass either of them about;" that the ornamentation of each chapiter was "a net of checker-work, and a wreath of chain-work;" that upon the five cubits of chapiter there was another "four cubits of lily-work," etc. If this last feature apply to the two pillars, and not (as some think) to the porch only, the pillars would reach a height of 27 cubits, and if it be supposed that they stood on some stone or other superstructure, it may still be that our "thirty-five cubits" has its meaning. Meantime the passage in Jeremiah ( Jeremiah 52:1-34 :41) tells us that the pillars were hollow, and that the thickness of the metal was "four fingers."