מלכים א, פרק ו׳, פסוק ב׳

The construction of Solomon’s Temple marks a monumental shift from a temporary desert tent to a magnificent, permanent home for God. Its dimensions are not merely architectural details; they reflect a direct continuation of the Tabernacle built by Moses, carefully scaled to fit its new eternal status. The primary approach among commentators is that the main structure contained both the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies. Its overall length was measured from east to west [מצודת דוד]. Out of this total length, the innermost section on the western side served as the Holy of Holies, housing the Ark of the Covenant, and took up twenty cubits. The remaining forty cubits formed the Holy Place, which held the table, the menorah, and the golden altar [רלב״ג]. Because the building's width was twenty cubits, the Holy of Holies formed a perfect twenty-by-twenty square [רד״ק].

The length and width of the Temple, sixty by twenty cubits, were exactly double the dimensions of Moses’ Tabernacle, which measured thirty by ten [רלב״ג, אברבנאל, מלבי״ם]. However, the height of the Temple was thirty cubits. Unlike the length and width, the height was tripled rather than doubled from the Tabernacle's original ten cubits [מלבי״ם, אברבנאל]. This change in proportion occurred because the Tabernacle was a temporary tent made of curtains with no upper levels, whereas the Temple was a permanent, towering structure designed with upper chambers [אברבנאל].

The reported height of thirty cubits creates a contrast with other Biblical records, prompting several explanations. In the Book of Chronicles, the building's height is recorded as an astonishing one hundred and twenty cubits. Some explain that this massive height refers exclusively to the entrance hall at the front of the building, including the chambers built above it [רד״ק]. Conversely, another view argues that the one hundred and twenty cubits describe the entire building. In this approach, the ground floor of the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies stood thirty cubits high, and three stories of upper chambers were built on top of them, adding ninety cubits to reach the full height [אברבנאל, רד״ק].

A further detail later in the Temple's description mentions a height of only twenty cubits. To bridge the gap between this and the general thirty-cubit height, three distinct understandings are offered. One approach suggests that only the Holy of Holies was a perfect cube of twenty cubits in all directions, maintaining the exact proportions of the original Tabernacle, while the Holy Place in front of it rose to the full thirty cubits [אברבנאל]. A second explanation maintains that the entire structure was indeed thirty cubits high, but the internal wall separating the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies was built up to only twenty cubits. This design left a gap at the top, allowing the fragrant smoke from the incense altar to drift into the inner sanctum [אברבנאל]. A final perspective holds that the entire internal space reached thirty cubits, but only the lower twenty cubits of the walls were paneled with cedar wood and overlaid with gold. The uppermost ten cubits, meanwhile, were adorned with precious stones and gems [רד״ק, רלב״ג, אברבנאל].