Ezekiel 43:17

The ledge shall also be square, fourteen cubits long and fourteen cubits wide, with a rim of half a cubit and a gutter of a cubit all around it. The steps of the altar shall face east.”

Berean Standard Bible

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Study note

Setting — The Lord GOD addresses Ezekiel during a visionary tour of the restored temple, specifying the altar’s construction details immediately after describing the hearth’s dimensions.

The words — The Hebrew עֲזָרָה ('a.za.Rah) refers to the square ledge surrounding the altar, while אֹרֶךְ ('O.rekh) and רֹחַב (Ro.chav) literally denote its measured length and breadth.

The thread — This measurement pattern aligns with Exodus 25:25’s command to add a rim around sacred furniture and Exodus 20:26’s restriction against altar steps, while Ezekiel 40:6 and 43:16-18 maintain a consistent sequence of exact dimensions for temple architecture and ritual preparation.

Why it lands — The text requires precise obedience to divine architectural standards, establishing that sacred space and ritual access must conform to God’s measured boundaries rather than human adaptation.

Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.

The Hebrew words

King James Version

And the settle shall be fourteen cubits long and fourteen broad in the four squares thereof; and the border about it shall be half a cubit; and the bottom thereof shall be a cubit about; and his stairs shall look toward the east.

Cross-references

Exodus 20:26 And you must not go up to My altar on steps, lest your nakedness be exposed on it.’
Ezekiel 40:6 Then he came to the gate facing east and climbed its steps. He measured the threshold of the gate to be one rod deep.
Exodus 25:25 And make a rim around it a handbreadth wide and put a gold molding on the rim.
Exodus 30:3 Overlay with pure gold the top and all the sides and horns, and make a molding of gold around it.
1 Kings 6:8 The entrance to the bottom floor was on the south side of the temple. A stairway led up to the middle level, and from there to the third floor.
1 Kings 18:32 And with the stones, Elijah built an altar in the name of the LORD. Then he dug a trench around the altar large enough to hold two seahs of seed.
Nehemiah 9:4 And the Levites—Jeshua, Bani, Kadmiel, Shebaniah, Bunni, Sherebiah, Bani, and Chenani—stood on the raised platform and cried out in a loud voice to the LORD their God.
Ezekiel 8:16 So He brought me to the inner court of the house of the LORD, and there at the entrance to the temple of the LORD, between the portico and the altar, were about twenty-five men with their backs to the temple of the LORD and their faces toward the east; and they were bowing to the east in worship of the sun.