Breadth of the House

3 And the porch before the temple of the house, twenty cubits was the length thereof, according to the breadth of the house; and ten cubits was the breadth thereof before the house.

1 Kings 6:2-3

Here we finally see the true dimension of the house that Solomon built for the Lord. It was quite of good quality to be sure. The thing was though, that this house might have been the same dimensions whether inside or outside. We’ll run both scenarios just to check since the text doesn’t say. Both though inside and outside are pretty fascinating. Consider what all Solomon had put in the house from huge cherubims which took up the length of the walls, to the furnishing of the Lord’s house itself. Then too, there’s all the architecture which wasn’t included at first in the earthly tent that Moses had seen. There was chambers and floors and a couple whole trees for the doors. After that, we’ll need to see the depth of the material used itself. Hold up for a minute, let’s check. Right now, the inside or outside measurements won’t matter much until you get to all other stuff. Let’s see, the length was threescore cubits I think. Supposing the cubits is an accepted eighteen inches in length, we’ll need to multiply 18 by threescore. Before we do that though, how much is score? We know from history, that’s about twenty.

20

18

____

 (0 times any number such as eight always zero makes)

 (2 times 8 makes sixteen)

(Add the zero in the right place and the 16 in front)

160

(Now we move forward into place the second)

(One times zero still makes nothing there)

(One times two is going to be two)

(Put a zero on the right side to hold the place)

(Add a zero in front and the two ahead of that)

200

(Now add 160 and 200 to make 360)

______

360

Oh wait, I forgot we had threescore cubits. That means we’ll need to multiply twenty by approximately three. From there, you’ll then multiply the sum of that by eighteen. Let’s short it out since I’ve just showed you both styles.

20

  3

___

60

Then the 60 will get multiplied by 18.

 60

 18

___

    0

48 

___

480 

    0 

  0

6

600

(480 plus 600 due to the sum of the one and the eight multiplied by the number above)

____

1080

Oh wait, I forgot the breadth can also refer to the width or how wide something is at the narrowest point. That would be, oh let’s see, twenty cubits which is something we’ve already done. The other number that’s equally important is the 30 cubits in height to the top. Really quick, let’s convert. 

30

18

 ___

240

300

____

540

All these come together to form the house, set like this. You’ll fine though that the height, length, and width can be multiplied together to get the space found inside. Since we’re going to be dealing with really huge numbers, let’s just try sticking with the scores and the cubits to see what comes next. From there, converting it into something we both understand should be pretty easy I guess. Otherwise, the numbers all get really big and kinda hard to understand. It’s better to do this than to get into the imaginary numbers that we can’t really understand anyway. I mean, really, who wants 1,000,000 which is one million inches of anything anyway. The foot is somewhat better, but it’s not a standard form of measurement accepted in each place. I’ll include the following just in case you meet someone from each place. The metric system, as we’ve said before is home to the world’s measurement in simplest forms. Then, there’s just what Scripture said. 

Kilometer 1 0.621 miles

Meter 1 0.305 foot

Cubit 1 18 inches

Score 1 20 units

Foot 1 12 inches

Now, we’ll multiply 60, 20, and 30 cubits by each other, one at a time, in turn.

  60

  20

____

  00

120

____

120

120 cubits makes the base of the square. We’ll say this is the floor plan for the rest of the house. It would be considered cubits squared or the square footage due to the base of the floor. Then, there’s the 30 cubits representing height. Since we’re adding depth to the space, this will be considered the volume. Measures of volume are also considered between metric for some areas and imperial that covers the rest.