Study Desk

For seven months the house of Israel will be burying them, in order to cleanse the land.

"As for you, son of man, thus says the Lord God : Speak to the birds of every sort and to all beasts of the field: ‘Assemble and come, gather from all around to the sacrificial feast that I am preparing for you, a great sacrificial feast on the mountains of Israel, and you shall eat flesh and drink blood.

And you shall eat fat till you are filled, and drink blood till you are drunk, at the sacrificial feast that I am preparing for you.

And the nations shall know that the house of Israel went into captivity for their iniquity, because they dealt so treacherously with me that I hid my face from them and gave them into the hand of their adversaries, and they all fell by the sword.

"Therefore thus says the Lord God : Now I will restore the fortunes of Jacob and have mercy on the whole house of Israel, and I will be jealous for my holy name.

And the man said to me, "Son of man, look with your eyes, and hear with your ears, and set your heart upon all that I shall show you, for you were brought here in order that I might show it to you. Declare all that you see to the house of Israel."

As for the gate that faced toward the north, belonging to the outer court, he measured its length and its breadth.

And there were four tables of hewn stone for the burnt offering, a cubit and a half long, and a cubit and a half broad, and one cubit high, on which the instruments were to be laid with which the burnt offerings and the sacrifices were slaughtered.

And he said to me, "This chamber that faces south is for the priests who have charge of the temple,

and the chamber that faces north is for the priests who have charge of the altar. These are the sons of Zadok, who alone among the sons of Levi may come near to the Lord to minister to him."

And the side chambers were in three stories, one over another, thirty in each story. There were offsets all around the wall of the temple to serve as supports for the side chambers, so that they should not be supported by the wall of the temple.

The double doors had two leaves apiece, two swinging leaves for each door.

Now the upper chambers were narrower, for the galleries took more away from them than from the lower and middle chambers of the building.

For they were in three stories, and they had no pillars like the pillars of the courts. Thus the upper chambers were set back from the ground more than the lower and the middle ones.

For the chambers on the outer court were fifty cubits long, while those opposite the nave were a hundred cubits long.

Then he said to me, "The north chambers and the south chambers opposite the yard are the holy chambers, where the priests who approach the Lord shall eat the most holy offerings. There they shall put the most holy offerings—the grain offering, the sin offering, and the guilt offering—for the place is holy.

When the priests enter the Holy Place, they shall not go out of it into the outer court without laying there the garments in which they minister, for these are holy. They shall put on other garments before they go near to that which is for the people."

"As for you, son of man, describe to the house of Israel the temple, that they may be ashamed of their iniquities; and they shall measure the plan.

And he said to me, "Son of man, thus says the Lord God : These are the ordinances for the altar: On the day when it is erected for offering burnt offerings upon it and for throwing blood against it,

you shall give to the Levitical priests of the family of Zadok, who draw near to me to minister to me, declares the Lord God , a bull from the herd for a sin offering.