Bible Strands
2 Chronicles 4:6
He also made ten basins for washing and placed five on the south side and five on the north. The parts of the burnt offering were rinsed in them, but the priests used the Sea for washing.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The narrator describes the temple courtyard furnishings during Solomon’s reign. He details the placement of ritual washing vessels alongside the bronze Sea.
The words — כִּיּוֹרִים (ki.yo.Rim) translates to lavers or washing basins. מִ/יָּמִין (mi./ya.Min) literally means from the south, indicating directional placement.
The thread — The basins reappear in 1 Kings 7:38 as part of Huram’s bronze work. The washing function echoes the bronze basin commanded in Exodus 30:18 for priestly purification.
Why it lands — The text specifies that ten basins handled rinsing burnt offering parts while priests used the Sea for personal washing. A reader must note the explicit division of labor between sacrificial maintenance and priestly ritual cleansing.
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The Hebrew words
King James Version
He made also ten lavers, and put five on the right hand, and five on the left, to wash in them: such things as they offered for the burnt offering they washed in them; but the sea was for the priests to wash in.
Cross-references
- 1 Kings 7:38 He also made ten bronze basins, each holding forty baths and measuring four cubits across, one basin for each of the ten stands.
- Exodus 30:18 “You are to make a bronze basin with a bronze stand for washing. Set it between the Tent of Meeting and the altar, and put water in it,
- 1 Kings 7:40 Additionally, Huram made the pots, shovels, and sprinkling bowls. So Huram finished all the work that he had undertaken for King Solomon in the house of the LORD:
- Psalms 51:2 Wash me clean of my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.
- Ezekiel 40:38 There was a chamber with a doorway by the portico in each of the inner gateways. There the burnt offering was to be washed.
- Exodus 29:4 Then present Aaron and his sons at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting and wash them with water.
- Leviticus 1:9 The entrails and legs must be washed with water, and the priest shall burn all of it on the altar as a burnt offering, a food offering, a pleasing aroma to the LORD.
- Leviticus 1:13 The entrails and legs must be washed with water, and the priest shall present all of it and burn it on the altar; it is a burnt offering, a food offering, a pleasing aroma to the LORD.
- 2 Chronicles 4:2 He also made the Sea of cast metal. It was circular in shape, measuring ten cubits from rim to rim, five cubits in height, and thirty cubits in circumference.
- 1 Corinthians 6:11 And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.