Ezekiel 41:14

Also the breadth of the face of the house, and of the separate place toward the east, an hundred cubits.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

41:1-26 After the prophet had observed the courts, he was brought to the temple. If we attend to instructions in the plainer parts of religion, and profit by them, we shall be led further into an acquaintance with the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Toward the east - The separate place was measured on its eastern side, for the western was not approachable for the purpose of measurement.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

12-15. Sum of the measures of the temple, and of the buildings behind and on the side of it.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Of the face; the whole front of the house eastward, the prospect of it being to the east.

Of the separate place: this explains the other, say some, the house is the separate place; or else, as others, that other building on the west end of the temple, which was of equal dimensions with the temple.

An hundred cubits; measuring from the north point along by the eastern front to the south point, or corner of the building or wall. The admeasuring the particulars I forbear; but since this side runs equal with the length of the whole from east to west, we need not doubt it is a hundred cubits.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Also the breadth of the face of the house, and the separate place toward the east,.... The whole front of the temple, the holy and most holy place, which looked to the east: and was measured from north to south,

an hundred cubits: which some reckon thus; the breadth of the temple twenty cubits; the thickness of the outward walls, twelve cubits; the side chambers, eight cubits; the walls of these chambers, five cubits on each side: the breadth of the void space, five cubits on each side; and twenty cubits round about the house; so that the length and breadth of this structure was the same, and made a perfect foursquare, as the city of the New Jerusalem is said to be, Revelation 21:16.

Geneva Study Bible

Also the breadth of the face of the house, and of the separate place toward the east, an hundred cubits.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

14. Two measurements of 100 cubits from N. to S.

The front of the house buildings, the “separate place” on each side of them being included, gives 100 cubits, namely, 20 (breadth of house) + 6 + 6 (side walls) + 4 + 4 (side-chambers) + 5 + 5 (walls of side-chambers) + 5 + 5 (remainder of raised basement) + 20 + 20 (separate place) = 100, Fig. 3, lm.

Ezekiel 41:14

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The Separate Place, and the External Dimensions of the Temple

Ezekiel 41:12. And the building at the front of the separate place was seventy cubits broad on the side turned toward the west, and the wall of the building five cubits broad round about, and its length ninety cubits. Ezekiel 41:13. And he measured the (temple) house: the length a hundred cubits; and the separate place, and its building, and its walls: the length a hundred cubits. Ezekiel 41:14. And the breadth of the face of the (temple) house, and of the separate place toward the east, a hundred cubits. - The explanation of these verses depends upon the meaning of the word גּזרה. According to its derivation from גּזר, to cut, to separate, גּזרה means that which is cut off, or separated. Thus ארץ גּזרה is the land cut off, the desert, which is not connected by roads with the inhabited country. In the passage before us, גּזרה signifies a place on the western side of the temple, i.e., behind the temple, which was separated from the sanctuary (Plate I J), and on which a building stood, but concerning the purpose of which nothing more definite is stated than we are able to gather, partly from the name and situation of the place in question, and partly from such passages as 1 Chronicles 26:18 and 2 Kings 23:11, according to which, even in Solomon's temple, there was a similar space at the back of the temple house with buildings upon it, which had a separate way out, the gate שׁלּכת, namely, that "this space,with its buildings, was to be used for the reception of all refuse, sweepings, all kinds of rubbish, - in brief, of everything that was separated or rejected when the holy service was performed in the temple, - and that this was the reason why it received the name of the separate place" (Kliefoth). The building upon this space was situated אל־פּני־הגּזרה, in the front of the gizrah (that is to say, as one approached it from the temple); and that פּאת דּרך־היּם, on the side of the way to the sea, i.e., on the western side, sc. of the temple, and had a breadth of seventy cubits (from north to south), with a wall round about, which was five cubits broad (thick), and a length of ninety cubits. As the thickness of the wall is specially mentioned in connection with the breadth, we must add it both to the breadth and to the length of the building as given here; so that, when looked at from the outside, the building was eighty cubits broad and a hundred cubits long. In Ezekiel 41:13 this length is expressly attributed to the separate place, and (i.e., along with) its building, and the walls thereof. But the length of the temple house has also been previously stated as a hundred cubits. In Ezekiel 41:14 the breadth of both is also stated to have been a hundred cubits - namely, the breadth of the outer front, or front face of the temple, was a hundred cubits; and the breadth of the separate place לקּדים toward the east, i.e., the breadth which it showed to the person measuring on the eastern side, was the same. If, them, the building on the separate place was only eighty cubits broad, according to Ezekiel 41:12, including the walls, whilst the separate place itself was a hundred cubits broad, there remains a space of twenty cubits in breadth not covered by the building; that is to say, as we need not hesitate to put the building in the centre, open spaces of ten cubits each on the northern and southern sides were left as approaches to the building on both sides (K), whereas the entire length of the separate place (from east to west) was covered by the building. - All these measurements are in perfect harmony. As the inner court formed a square of a hundred cubits in length (Ezekiel 40:47), the temple house, which joined it on the west, extended with its appurtenances to a similar length; and the separate place behind the temple also covered a space of equal size. These three squares, therefore, had a length from east to west of three hundred cubits. If we add to this the length of the buildings of the east gates of the inner and outer courts, namely fifty cubits for each (Ezekiel 40:15, Ezekiel 40:21, Ezekiel 40:25, Ezekiel 40:29, Ezekiel 40:33, Ezekiel 40:36), and the length of the outer court from gate to gate a hundred cubits (Ezekiel 40:19, Ezekiel 40:23, Ezekiel 40:27), we obtain for the whole of the temple building the length of five hundred cubits. If, again, we add to the breadth of the inner court or temple house, which was one hundred cubits, the breadths of the outer court, with the outer and inner gate-buildings, viz., two hundred cubits on both the north and south sides, we obtain a total breadth of 100 + 200 + 200 equals 500 (say five hundred) cubits; so that the whole building covered a space of five hundred cubits square, in harmony with the calculation already made (at Ezekiel 40:24-27) of the size of the surrounding wall.