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the Mishnic Tractate Middoth, in the Appendix to Sketches of Jewish Social Life in the
Days of Christ. Our present limits prevent more than the briefest outline.
(^116) See Speaker's Comment. 2., p. 521 - not, as in our Authorized Version, "certain
additions made of thin work" (1 Kings 7:29).
(^117) This was "the covert for the Sabbath" (2 Kings 16:18). The Rabbis hold it to have
been the exclusive privilege of the kings to sit down within the Priests' Court.
(^118) This appears from 1 Chronicles 26:13-16.
(^119) It is with exceeding reluctance that I forbear entering on the symbolical import of
the Temple, of its materials, structure, and arrangements. But such discussions would
evidently be outside the plan and limits of this Bible History.
(^120) Comparing the Temple of Solomon with that of Herod, the latter was, of course,
much superior, not only as regards size, but architectural beauty. To understand the
difference, plans of the two should be placed side by side.
We add a few remarks which may interest the reader. From being so largely
constructed of cedar-wood, the Temple is also figuratively called "Lebanon"
(Zechariah 11:1). Among the Jewish legends connected with the Temple, one of the
strangest is that about a certain worm Shamir, which, according to Aboth 5:6, was
among the ten things created on the eve of the world's first Sabbath, just before sunset
(see also Sifre on Deut. p. 147, a). In Gitt. 86, a and b, we are informed by what
artifices Solomon obtained possession of this worm from Ashmedai, the prince of the
demons. This worm possessed the power, by his touch, to cut the thickest stones, and
was therefore used by Solomon for this purpose (comp. also generally Gitt. 68 a, and
Sotah 48 b). According to Joma 53b, 54b, the Ark was placed upon what is called the
"foundation stone of the world." So early as in the Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on Exodus
28:30, we read that the ineffable Name of God was engraved upon this stone, and that
God at the first sealed up with it the mouth of the great deep. This may serve as a
specimen of these legends. Perhaps we should add that, according to later Rabbis, the
roof of the Temple was not quite flat, but slightly sloping, yet probably not higher in
any part than the parapet around.
(^121) The Temple was completed in the eighth month; its dedication took place in the
seventh of the next year. Ewald suggests that it was dedicated before it was quite
finished, But this idea can scarcely be maintained.
(^)