6. Solomon also built the Porch of Columns. It was 50 cubits long and 30 cubits wide. Along the front of the porch, there was a covering supported by columns.
7. He also built a throne room where he judged people. He called this the Judgment Hall. The room was covered with cedar from floor to ceiling.
8. Behind the Judgment Hall was a courtyard. The palace where Solomon lived was built around that courtyard and looked like the Judgment Hall. He also built the same kind of palace for his wife, the daughter of the king of Egypt.
9. All these buildings were made with expensive blocks of stone. The stones were cut to the right size with a saw and then smoothed on front and back. These expensive stones went from the foundation all the way up to the top layer of the wall. Even the wall around the yard was made with expensive blocks of stone.
10. The foundations were made with large, expensive stones. Some of the stones were 10 cubits long and the others were 8 cubits long.
11. On top of these stones there were other expensive stones and cedar beams.
12. There were walls around the palace yard and around the yard and porch of the Lord’S Temple. The walls were built with three rows of stone and one row of cedar timbers.
13. King Solomon sent for a man named Huram who lived in Tyre and brought him to Jerusalem.
14. Huram’s mother was an Israelite from the tribe of Naphtali. His dead father was from Tyre. Huram made things from bronze. He was a very skilled and experienced builder. So King Solomon asked him to come, and Huram accepted. King Solomon put him in charge of all the bronze work, and Huram did all the work he was given to do.
15. Huram made two bronze columns for the porch. Each column was 18 cubits tall and 12 cubits around. The columns were hollow and their metal walls were 3 inches thick.
16. He also made two bronze capitals that were 5 cubits tall. He put these capitals on top of the columns.
17. He made two nets of chain to cover the capitals on top of the two columns.
18. Then he made two rows of bronze pomegranates. He put the bronze pomegranates on the nets of each column to cover the capitals at the top of the columns.
19. The capitals on top of the columns were shaped like flowers.
20. The capitals were on top of the columns, above the bowl-shaped net. There were 200 pomegranates in rows all around the capitals.
21. Huram put these two bronze columns at the porch of the Temple. One column was put on the south side of the entrance and one was put on the north side of it. The column on the south was named Jakin. The column on the north was named Boaz.
22. They put the flower-shaped capitals on top of the columns, and the work on the two columns was finished.
23. Then Huram melted bronze and poured it into a huge mold to make a tank, which was called “The Sea.” The tank was about 30 cubits around. It was 10 cubits across and 5 cubits deep.
24. There was a rim around the outer edge of the tank. Under this rim there were two rows of bronze gourds all around the tank. The bronze gourds were made in one piece as part of the tank.
25. The tank rested on the backs of 12 bronze bulls. All 12 of the bulls were looking out, away from the tank. Three were looking north, three east, three south, and three west.