The Temple

The tabernacle, Solomon’s temple, the house Zerubbabel rebuilt and the temple Herod enlarged, drawn as plans whose every court, chamber and furnishing opens on a tap — with the ark of the covenant given a drawing of its own. Shade a plan by what each part was made of and the value climbs inward from bare ground to bronze to gold; shade it by who was permitted to stand there and the same drawing becomes a diagram of distance. Measurements are the text’s own, in cubits, and every part says whether it is described in Scripture, reported by Josephus, remembered in the Mishnah or reconstructed — and where the accounts disagree, the plan names the disagreement instead of settling it.