While he was sleeping from exhaustion, Heber’s wife Jael took a tent peg, grabbed a hammer, and went silently to Sisera. She hammered the peg into his temple and drove it into the ground, and he died.

When Barak arrived in pursuit of Sisera, Jael went out to greet him and said to him, “Come and I will show you the man you are looking for.” So he went in with her, and there was Sisera lying dead with a tent peg through his temple!

She reached for a tent peg,
her right hand, for a workman’s mallet.
Then she hammered Sisera—
she crushed his head;
she shattered and pierced his temple.

So they gave him 70 pieces of silver from the temple of Baal-berith. Abimelech hired worthless and reckless men with this money, and they followed him.

When all the lords of the Tower of Shechem heard, they entered the inner chamber of the temple of El-berith.

Samson said to the young man who was leading him by the hand, “Lead me where I can feel the pillars supporting the temple, so I can lean against them.”

The temple was full of men and women; all the leaders of the Philistines were there, and about 3,000 men and women were on the roof watching Samson entertain them.

Samson took hold of the two middle pillars supporting the temple and leaned against them, one on his right hand and the other on his left.

Samson said, “Let me die with the Philistines.” He pushed with all his might, and the temple fell on the leaders and all the people in it. And the dead he killed at his death were more than those he had killed in his life.

brought it into the temple of Dagon and placed it next to his statue.

That is why, to this day, the priests of Dagon and everyone who enters the temple of Dagon in Ashdod do not step on Dagon’s threshold.

They cut off Saul’s head, stripped off his armor, and sent messengers throughout the land of the Philistines to spread the good news in the temples of their idols and among the people.

Then they put his armor in the temple of the Ashtoreths and hung his body on the wall of Beth-shan.

I called to the Lord in my distress;
I called to my God.
From His temple He heard my voice,
and my cry for help reached His ears.

Solomon made an alliance with Pharaoh king of Egypt by marrying Pharaoh’s daughter. Solomon brought her to live in the city of David until he finished building his palace, the Lord’s temple, and the wall surrounding Jerusalem.

However, the people were sacrificing on the high places, because until that time a temple for the Lord’s name had not been built.

“You know my father David was not able to build a temple for the name of Yahweh his God. This was because of the warfare all around him until the Lord put his enemies under his feet.

So I plan to build a temple for the name of Yahweh my God, according to what the Lord promised my father David: ‘I will put your son on your throne in your place, and he will build the temple for My name.’

The king commanded them to quarry large, costly stones to lay the foundation of the temple with dressed stones.

So Solomon’s builders and Hiram’s builders, along with the Gebalites, quarried the stone and prepared the timber and stone for the temple’s construction.

Solomon began to build the temple for the Lord in the four hundred eightieth year after the Israelites came out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of his reign over Israel, in the second month, in the month of Ziv.

The temple that King Solomon built for the Lord was 90 feet long, 30 feet wide, and 45 feet high.

The portico in front of the temple sanctuary was 30 feet long extending across the temple’s width, and 15 feet deep in front of the temple.

He also made windows with beveled frames for the temple.

He then built a chambered structure along the temple wall, encircling the walls of the temple, that is, the sanctuary and the inner sanctuary. And he made side chambers all around.

The lowest chamber was 7½ feet wide, the middle was nine feet wide, and the third was 10½ feet wide. He also provided offset ledges for the temple all around the outside so that nothing would be inserted into the temple walls.

The temple’s construction used finished stones cut at the quarry so that no hammer, chisel, or any iron tool was heard in the temple while it was being built.

The door for the lowest side chamber was on the right side of the temple. They went up a stairway to the middle chamber, and from the middle to the third.

When he finished building the temple, he paneled it with boards and planks of cedar.

He built the chambers along the entire temple, joined to the temple with cedar beams; each story was 7½ feet high.

“As for this temple you are building—if you walk in My statutes, observe My ordinances, and keep all My commands by walking in them, I will fulfill My promise to you, which I made to your father David.

When Solomon finished building the temple,

he paneled the interior temple walls with cedar boards; from the temple floor to the surface of the ceiling he overlaid the interior with wood. He also overlaid the floor with cypress boards.

Then he lined 30 feet of the rear of the temple with cedar boards from the floor to the surface of the ceiling, and he built the interior as an inner sanctuary, the most holy place.

The temple, that is, the sanctuary in front of the most holy place, was 60 feet long.

The cedar paneling inside the temple was carved with ornamental gourds and flower blossoms. Everything was cedar; not a stone could be seen.

He prepared the inner sanctuary inside the temple to put the ark of the Lord’s covenant there.

Next, Solomon overlaid the interior of the temple with pure gold, and he hung gold chains across the front of the inner sanctuary and overlaid it with gold.

So he added the gold overlay to the entire temple until everything was completely finished, including the entire altar that belongs to the inner sanctuary.

Then he put the cherubim inside the inner temple. Since their wings were spread out, the first one’s wing touched one wall while the second cherub’s wing touched the other wall, and in the middle of the temple their wings were touching wing to wing.

He carved all the surrounding temple walls with carved engravings—cherubim, palm trees and flower blossoms—in both the inner and outer sanctuaries.

He overlaid the temple floor with gold in both the inner and outer sanctuaries.

The foundation of the Lord’s temple was laid in Solomon’s fourth year in the month of Ziv.

In his eleventh year in the eighth month, in the month of Bul, the temple was completed in every detail and according to every specification. So he built it in seven years.

Around the great courtyard, as well as the inner courtyard of the Lord’s temple and the portico of the temple, were three rows of dressed stone and a row of trimmed cedar beams.

He set five water carts on the right side of the temple and five on the left side. He put the reservoir near the right side of the temple toward the southeast.

Then Hiram made the basins, the shovels, and the sprinkling basins.

So Hiram finished all the work that he was doing for King Solomon on the Lord’s temple:

and the pots, shovels, and sprinkling basins. All the utensils that Hiram made for King Solomon at the Lord’s temple were made of burnished bronze.

Solomon also made all the equipment in the Lord’s temple: the gold altar; the gold table that the bread of the Presence was placed on;

the pure gold ceremonial bowls, wick trimmers, sprinkling basins, ladles, and firepans; and the gold hinges for the doors of the inner temple (that is, the most holy place) and for the doors of the temple sanctuary.

So all the work King Solomon did in the Lord’s temple was completed. Then Solomon brought in the consecrated things of his father David—the silver, the gold, and the utensils—and put them in the treasuries of the Lord’s temple.

The priests brought the ark of the Lord’s covenant to its place, into the inner sanctuary of the temple, to the most holy place beneath the wings of the cherubim.

When the priests came out of the holy place, the cloud filled the Lord’s temple,

and because of the cloud, the priests were not able to continue ministering, for the glory of the Lord filled the temple.

I have indeed built an exalted temple for You,
a place for Your dwelling forever.

“Since the day I brought My people Israel out of Egypt,
I have not chosen a city to build a temple in
among any of the tribes of Israel,
so that My name would be there.
But I have chosen David to rule My people Israel.”

It was in the desire of my father David
to build a temple for the name of Yahweh, the God of Israel.

But the Lord said to my father David,
“Since it was your desire to build a temple for My name,
you have done well to have this desire.

The Lord has fulfilled what He promised.
I have taken the place of my father David,
and I sit on the throne of Israel, as the Lord promised.
I have built the temple for the name of Yahweh, the God of Israel.

But will God indeed live on earth?
Even heaven, the highest heaven, cannot contain You,
much less this temple I have built.

so that Your eyes may watch over this temple night and day,
toward the place where You said:
My name will be there,
and so that You may hear the prayer
that Your servant prays toward this place.

When a man sins against his neighbor
and is forced to take an oath,
and he comes to take an oath
before Your altar in this temple,

When Your people Israel are defeated before an enemy,
because they have sinned against You,
and they return to You and praise Your name,
and they pray and plead with You
for mercy in this temple,

whatever prayer or petition
anyone from Your people Israel might have—
each man knowing his own afflictions
and spreading out his hands toward this temple—

for they will hear of Your great name,
mighty hand, and outstretched arm,
and will come and pray toward this temple—

may You hear in heaven, Your dwelling place,
and do according to all the foreigner asks You for.
Then all the people on earth will know Your name,
to fear You as Your people Israel do
and know that this temple I have built
is called by Your name.

When Your people go out to fight against their enemies,
wherever You send them,
and they pray to Yahweh
in the direction of the city You have chosen
and the temple I have built for Your name,

and when they return to You with their whole mind and heart
in the land of their enemies who took them captive,
and when they pray to You in the direction of their land
that You gave their ancestors,
the city You have chosen,
and the temple I have built for Your name,

Solomon offered a sacrifice of fellowship offerings to the Lord: 22,000 cattle and 120,000 sheep. In this manner the king and all the Israelites dedicated the Lord’s temple.

On the same day, the king consecrated the middle of the courtyard that was in front of the Lord’s temple because that was where he offered the burnt offering, the grain offering, and the fat of the fellowship offerings since the bronze altar before the Lord was too small to accommodate the burnt offerings, the grain offerings, and the fat of the fellowship offerings.

When Solomon finished building the temple of the Lord, the royal palace, and all that Solomon desired to do,

The Lord said to him:

I have heard your prayer and petition you have made before Me. I have consecrated this temple you have built, to put My name there forever; My eyes and My heart will be there at all times.

I will cut off Israel from the land I gave them, and I will reject the temple I have sanctified for My name. Israel will become an object of scorn and ridicule among all the peoples.

Though this temple is now exalted, everyone who passes by will be appalled and will mock. They will say: Why did the Lord do this to this land and this temple?

At the end of 20 years during which Solomon had built the two houses, the Lord’s temple and the royal palace—

This is the account of the forced labor that King Solomon had imposed to build the Lord’s temple, his own palace, the supporting terraces, the wall of Jerusalem, and Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer.

Three times a year Solomon offered burnt offerings and fellowship offerings on the altar he had built for the Lord, and he burned incense with them in the Lord’s presence. So he completed the temple.

the food at his table, his servants’ residence, his attendants’ service and their attire, his cupbearers, and the burnt offerings he offered at the Lord’s temple, it took her breath away.

The king made the almug wood into steps for the Lord’s temple and the king’s palace and into lyres and harps for the singers. Never before had such almug wood come, and the like has not been seen again even to this very day.

If these people regularly go to offer sacrifices in the Lord’s temple in Jerusalem, the heart of these people will return to their lord, Rehoboam king of Judah. They will murder me and go back to the king of Judah.”

He seized the treasuries of the Lord’s temple and the treasuries of the royal palace. He took everything. He took all the gold shields that Solomon had made.

Whenever the king entered the Lord’s temple, the royal escorts would carry the shields, then they would take them back to the royal escorts’ armory.

He brought his father’s consecrated gifts and his own consecrated gifts into the Lord’s temple: silver, gold, and utensils.

So Asa withdrew all the silver and gold that remained in the treasuries of the Lord’s temple and the treasuries of the royal palace and put it into the hands of his servants. Then King Asa sent them to Ben-hadad son of Tabrimmon son of Hezion king of Aram who lived in Damascus, saying,

He set up an altar for Baal in the temple of Baal that he had built in Samaria.

However, in a particular matter may the Lord pardon your servant: When my master, the king of Aram, goes into the temple of Rimmon to worship and I, as his right-hand man, bow in the temple of Rimmon—when I bow in the temple of Rimmon, may the Lord pardon your servant in this matter.”

Then Jehu sent messengers throughout all Israel, and all the servants of Baal came; there was not a man left who did not come. They entered the temple of Baal, and it was filled from one end to the other.

Then Jehu and Jehonadab son of Rechab entered the temple of Baal, and Jehu said to the servants of Baal, “Look carefully to see that there are no servants of the Lord here among you—only servants of Baal.”

When he finished offering the burnt offering, Jehu said to the guards and officers, “Go in and kill them. Don’t let anyone out.” So they struck them down with the sword. Then the guards and officers threw the bodies out and went into the inner room of the temple of Baal.

They brought out the pillars of the temple of Baal and burned them

and tore down the pillar of Baal. Then they tore down the temple of Baal and made it a latrine—which it is to this day.

Joash was in hiding with Jehosheba in the Lord’s temple six years while Athaliah ruled over the land.

Then in the seventh year, Jehoiada sent messengers and brought in the commanders of hundreds, the Carites, and the guards. He had them come to him in the Lord’s temple, where he made a covenant with them and put them under oath. He showed them the king’s son

“Your two divisions that go off duty on the Sabbath are to provide protection for the Lord’s temple.

The priest gave to the commanders of hundreds King David’s spears and shields that were in the Lord’s temple.

Then the guards stood with their weapons in hand surrounding the king—from the right side of the temple to the left side, by the altar and by the temple.

When Athaliah heard the noise from the guard and the crowd, she went out to the people at the Lord’s temple.

Then Jehoiada the priest ordered the commanders of hundreds in charge of the army, “Take her out between the ranks, and put to death by the sword anyone who follows her,” for the priest had said, “She is not to be put to death in the Lord’s temple.”

So all the people of the land went to the temple of Baal and tore it down. They broke its altars and images into pieces, and they killed Mattan, the priest of Baal, at the altars.

Then Jehoiada the priest appointed guards for the Lord’s temple.

He took the commanders of hundreds, the Carites, the guards, and all the people of the land, and they brought the king from the Lord’s temple. They entered the king’s palace by way of the guards’ gate. Then Joash sat on the throne of the kings.