Sefer Yechezkel, chapter 40. "In the twenty fifth year of our exile, at the beginning of the year, on the tenth of the month, in the fourteenth year after the city was struck down, on this very day the hand of Hashem was upon me and He brought me there."
We now enter a section that is known in Sefer Yechezkel as the building of the Third Temple. We will now see a description of how an angel leads Yechezkel. Yechezkel, as you recall, is by the river Kevar, and an angel leads him and brings him to the Temple, and there in the Temple he shows him the measurements of the Third Temple.
The matters here are very obscure, and therefore there are quite a few opinions on the whole subject in order to understand the measurements: the length, the width, when he is speaking of the length, when he is speaking of the thickness, and all sorts of other questions that this subject raises. So we will hold to one line and, with Hashem's help, we will learn as is our way with the Malbim.
Now the Malbim bases his words also by raising difficulties on the other commentaries and showing that their explanations are seemingly forced in understanding the verses. But even so, the matters are complex in themselves, so we have no interest in making them more complex. We will not deal with the other commentaries and why not to explain like them. We will immediately explain what the Malbim says in his explanation of the verses.
Whoever wishes to see additional commentaries and additional opinions on how to explain the verses can study them: there is Rashi here, there is the Radak and other commentators. But as I said, we will learn along the line and in the way of the Malbim, without contradicting the other commentaries, and whoever wishes to understand the differences should also study the other commentaries.
The Tosafot Yom Tov says that whoever merits to engage in the building of the Third Temple will surely merit to see it built. We are now learning chapter 40 and the following chapters that deal with the building of the Third Temple. These are complex chapters, and we need to remember that if we strive with Hashem's help to understand them and exert ourselves in them, which is not simple, if we merit this, we will merit with Hashem's help to see the building of the Third Temple. And therefore, according to the effort is the reward, with Hashem's help.
And we will begin. "In the twenty fifth year of our exile." Twenty five years of our exile refers to the exile of Yehoyachin. The exile of Yehoyachin was eleven years before the destruction. So the Malbim says, it turns out that when this prophecy was revealed to him, it was fourteen years after the city was struck down.
And if we make the calculation of fourteen years after the city was struck down, it comes out exactly to be a Yovel year. Why? Because the Yovel, says the Malbim, was in the seventeenth year, in the seventeenth year of Yoshiyahu, when they found the Sefer Torah lying open in the courtyard, as we learned this subject at length, and that was thirty six years before the destruction. It follows then that when we count up to twenty five years of our exile, we arrive exactly at the Yovel year.
And why must we say that this was a Yovel year? Not only because of the time, which fits perfectly, but it is also required from the plain meaning of the verses. "In the twenty fifth year of our exile, at the beginning of the year, on the tenth of the month." With us, Rosh Hashanah usually falls on the first of the month, it does not fall on the tenth of the month. So how do you speak of the beginning of the year on the tenth of the month? The tenth of the month is Yom Kippur, it is not Rosh Hashanah. Why does he call the beginning of the year the tenth of the month?
Rather, necessarily, here we are speaking of the Yovel year, and then on Yom Kippur they blow the shofar and the slaves go free, so it is like a beginning of the year. As it were, this is the time that is the beginning of the year from which the Yovel year begins. And therefore he calls it the beginning of the year. The beginning of the year for Yovel is on Yom Kippur, "and you shall proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants," the slaves go out and are freed and go to liberty. This is therefore considered the beginning of the year for Yovel.
And then, "after the city was struck down, on this very day the hand of Hashem was upon me and He brought me there." "The hand of Hashem," the Malbim explains, means that when the Holy One, blessed be He, wishes to show the prophet mighty and exalted visions, it is written that the hand of Hashem is upon him. As it were, the hand of Hashem upon him is an expression that there was a great power here. "The hand of Hashem was upon him" means Hashem showed him mighty and exalted things, and therefore this is the expression here too. "And He brought me there," Hashem brought me to the city that was struck down, to Yerushalayim.
"In visions of God He brought me to the land of Israel and set me upon a very high mountain, and upon it something like the structure of a city to the south." "In visions of God He brought me," says the Malbim, you see from here that he was not actually there but only saw it in a vision. That is to say, there is a situation where he actually arrives at the place, and there is a situation where he does not: he is sitting here but sees a vision as if he were there.
The Malbim says there is also an additional meaning here, that there he saw the visions of the Merkavah, as we learned in chapter 43. So the vision of the Merkavah that Yechezkel saw was also there. And there he also saw the vision of the Temple, which is in fact aligned opposite the supernal Merkavah, for the Temple below corresponds to the Temple above, and therefore there too there was a revelation regarding the Merkavah.
And then, "and set me upon a very high mountain." What is a very high mountain? For it is written about the Temple, "the mountain of the House of Hashem shall be established at the top of the mountains." It will be at the top of the mountains, so it is a very high mountain. "And upon it something like the structure of a city to the south." "And upon it something like the structure of a city to the south," that is, here he is already speaking of Yerushalayim. Only it is not clear why he speaks of it from the south. After all, the Temple is in the center of Yerushalayim, so why do you speak from the south? The Malbim explains in chapter 45 and in chapter 48 that in the future Yerushalayim will be to the south.
The Temple will be where Yerushalayim is now, and Yerushalayim itself will be further south, forty five mil away. And therefore he says, I see something like the structure of a city. As it were, he cannot identify things clearly because it is a great distance, forty five mil. But it is like the structure of a city in the south, the city is very far and it is in the south. And it is not adjacent to the place of the Temple, because as the Malbim brings there at length in chapter 45 and in chapter 48, Yerushalayim will be built further south, more distant.
"And He brought me there, and behold a man whose appearance was like the appearance of copper, with a cord of linen in his hand and a measuring reed, and he was standing at the gate."
The Malbim explains: seemingly you say "and set me upon a very high mountain," that is, he already arrived there. Now you say "and He brought me there," so he came again? What is this additional expression of bringing that is written here? The Malbim explains that at first He brought him close to the mountain, as it is written "and set me upon a very high mountain"; it is not written that He set me on a high mountain, but rather "to," meaning toward. He brought me next to a very high mountain. This is what "to" means, says the Malbim, an expression that he was still not there but was close to there. Because from there Hashem wants him to see the city standing at a distance. And now He brought me there, where is "there"? It is the holy place at the top of the mountain, where the Temple is to be built.
And there I see a man. "Whose appearance was like the appearance of copper." A man means an angel of God. And I see him like the appearance of copper. This refers to the form of his figure. "With a cord of linen in his hand." And I see that he has a cord of linen. What is a cord of linen? When they wanted to measure a tract of land over a distance, they would measure it with a rope, with a drawn cord. This is called a cord of linen. Usually they would take linen, because whoever knows, linen does not stretch.
Whoever takes, for example, plumbers' linen and tries to stretch it will see that it does not stretch. It is impossible to stretch it. At most you can tear it, but you cannot stretch it. And to measure you must take, if you take wool for example, a cord of wool, you cannot measure with it. Since wool by its nature stretches, how can you measure with it? Therefore they would make a rope, the rope itself made of linen, since linen does not stretch, and with it they would measure large distances.
So I see that there is a cord of linen in his hand, and this is to measure spaces, as I said, large distances. On the other hand, I also see "and a measuring reed." The measuring reed is a kind of ruler, and this ruler is intended for measuring smaller places. It is more precise and it is smaller, and with it they would measure. And I see him, we will soon see how long the measuring reed was. And I see "and he was standing at the gate." I see that there is also a gate, and this gate is in fact the gate of the Temple Mount, yes, the eastern one, the eastern gate of the Temple Mount.
That is to say, if we come from the direction of Har HaZeitim, then it refers to the gate that is more on that side. And then he shows him that in fact the future building of the Temple will not be by human beings, but he shows him that it will be by the supernal ones in a miraculous building. So says the Malbim.
In fact this is a matter of discussion, not a simple discussion, on the question of how the Third Temple will be built. Will the Third Temple descend already built in fire, as Rashi says, which is well known here, and there are others who say so, and on this basis our prayers are also founded: "show us its building, gladden us in its restoration, and may You build it speedily and increase its glory," the Holy One, blessed be He, will build it, it will descend built in fire. And on the other hand, there are other opinions that say no, that we will build the Temple, that Am Yisrael will build the Temple.
In fact there are also attempts to reconcile the opinions and say that we will build the Temple but the completion, or the reverse, that is, the Temple will descend built in fire but the completion will be done by us, and therefore it will be considered as if we built it. This too they bring in the name of the Vilna Gaon, "gladden us in its restoration," since its restoration, the completion, we will do. And there are other explanations and other resolutions to reconcile this. Some say it will depend on our merits, whether we have merits or whether we do not have merits. However it may be, in any case, from here, says the Malbim, we see that Hashem wanted to show him that the building will be done, as it were, with supernal powers.
And therefore He shows him, as it were, an angel with the measuring instruments in his hand, and he is now like the architect, the builder, the surveyor, in order to see how to build the Temple. "And the man spoke to me: Son of man, see with your eyes and hear with your ears and set your heart to all that I show you."
"For in order to show you have you been brought here. Tell all that you see to the House of Israel." He says to him, son of man, see with your eyes and hear with your ears and set your heart.
As it were, all that I now show you, all the forms and all the figures that you will now see and all the measurements, I want you to see; I want you to hear with your ears the things that I will explain to you; and I want you to set your heart, because beyond what you see on the surface, there are also secrets in these things, there is also an inner dimension in these things. Set your heart to understand the deeper meaning and the secrets hidden in the measurements and the forms that I show you.
"For in order to show you have you been brought here." For the whole reason that I brought you here is to show you this vision, since the main purpose for which I brought you here is so that you will tell it to Bnei Yisrael, in order to comfort them, in order to strengthen weak hands, those who are in distress in exile and say, Hashem destroyed our House, so what hope is left for us? As we saw that they would come to the prophet and say to him, a woman whose husband divorced her, does she have any claim against him or does the husband have some grievances against her? So too, as it were, Hashem exiled us from the land and there is thus a severance here.
So what more is expected of us? And therefore Hashem sends the prophet so that he will tell the House of Israel how he already sees with his mind's eye the Third Temple and receives it in prophecy from Hashem, so that through this they will understand that the future redemption will surely come, and through this they will not despair and will not break. So therefore he says, I want you to "tell all that you see to the House of Israel."
We explained that "set your heart" refers to the deeper meaning and the hidden secrets. We need to know that both in the First Temple and in the Second Temple and in the Third Temple, everything was "by the hand of Hashem upon me He gave me understanding." The Temple was not built according to an interior designer: here it will be nicer if we put this like this, and there we will put that like that, and here if we shrink the niche a bit then it will be more practical, and so on. Your own house you build according to an interior designer. But the Temple, everything was "by the hand of Hashem upon me He gave me understanding." Since the Temple below is aligned opposite the Temple above, it must be made with the proper intentions and the precise measurements, exactly according to the will of God.
For if not, then there is no alignment. If not, you did not make things as they are in fact at their root, so how will the Shechinah dwell here below? The Shechinah dwells here below since it is aligned opposite the Temple above. And therefore he says to him, contemplate also the secrets of these things. And indeed in the holy books there is a lengthy discussion explaining how the Mishkan and how the Temple allude to lofty and exalted matters, and how they allude to the matters of the small world, which is this world, as opposed to the supernal world, which is the great world, and how all this is also connected to man, since man too is a small world and he too corresponds to all this.
And the matters, as I said, are discussed at length, and in any case this is what he says to him: I want you also to contemplate the secret of these things and not only their externals, because there is not here merely some architectural plan that you come and see, this is built like this and this is its length and this is built like that, no. I want you also to delve into the inner depth of things to understand their secrets. "And behold a wall on the outside of the House all around."
"And in the man's hand was a measuring reed of six cubits by the cubit and a handbreadth. And he measured the width of the structure, one reed, and the height, one reed."
And then I see a wall. The wall here, says the Malbim, is the wall of the Temple Mount. The wall of the Temple Mount is the wall we have today called the Kotel. The Kotel, as is known, is the wall of the Temple Mount on the outside, yes? So I see the wall of the Temple Mount, and this wall was five hundred reeds on each side, as we will see at the end of chapter 42.
And this wall is on the outside of the House, since within the wall of the Temple Mount is the Temple. And I now see the man with the measuring reed in his hand. The measuring reed, as we said, is a rod of a certain length with which they measured. The measuring reed in his hand, the measuring reed that was in the man's hand, what was its measure? It held six cubits. And each cubit holds five handbreadths plus a handbreadth. Meaning, Chazal say that the building cubit was different from an ordinary cubit.
An ordinary cubit, usually the measure of a cubit is from the elbow to the tip of the fingers. That is generally what is said, this is the measure of a cubit for an average person. Usually when speaking of a cubit it is a cubit of five handbreadths. But when speaking of the Temple, one speaks of a cubit of six handbreadths. Chazal distinguish between the cubit of vessels and the cubit of building. In any case, here he says, therefore know that we are speaking of six cubits by the cubit and a handbreadth. This is six cubits by the cubit of six handbreadths, not by the ordinary cubit of five handbreadths, but by the cubit of six handbreadths, this is six by the cubit and a handbreadth.
So there are six cubits of a cubit and a handbreadth, and through this I see it, a rod, this was the length of the rod. The length of the rod was six cubits of a cubit and a handbreadth. More or less, if we speak according to Rav Chaim Naeh, more or less the rod was about three meters. Since if we speak of a handbreadth, which is about 8 cm according to Rav Chaim Naeh, then six handbreadths, we are speaking of 48 cm, about half a meter approximately.
And if we say that it held six cubits, six such cubits of half a meter, we are speaking of something like three meters. This was the length of the reed with which he measured. And what is written here, "and he measured the width of the structure, one reed," and he measured with it all around. The Malbim says, we see from here that the wall was low on all sides.
That is, there are commentators who wanted to explain, Rashi and the Radak, that since he comes from the east, only on the eastern side the wall was lower, because when they would make the ashes of the Parah on Har HaZeitim, it is written that they would see, it was possible to see all the way into the Holy of Holies. So it was necessary for the wall there to be lower. And the wall of the rest of the Temple Mount all around was higher. The Malbim, however, does not agree with this. The Malbim says the wording is precise: "all around." "All around" means that around the entire Temple, the whole wall of the Temple Mount was of this height.
What is the height? He says, he measured the width of the structure, one reed, and the height, one reed. "The width of the structure" means the thickness of the wall was six cubits, something approximately three meters, and so too the height of the wall, the height was also about three meters all around, around all the sides. Note, do not try to learn from this about the Second Temple or the First Temple, since the measurements were different. And Chazal already point out the differences between the Temples and the measurements. Here we are speaking of the Third Temple, and it is built with different measurements, as we see here according to what the angel shows the prophet Yechezkel.
"And he came to the gate whose face is toward the east and went up its steps, and he measured the threshold of the gate, one reed in width, and the one threshold, one reed in width." Here the Malbim finds difficulty in the words of Rashi and the Radak, and as I said, we will not deal with the Malbim's difficulties but go directly to the explanation with which the Malbim explains the verses.
"And he came to the gate whose face is toward the east." He arrives from there at another gate, and this gate is the gate of the Ezrat Nashim, which was before the Ezrat Yisrael. It is called a gate; this place is called the outer courtyard. The Ezrat Nashim is called the outer courtyard, as opposed to the Ezrat Yisrael which was more inner and is called the inner courtyard.
We saw that this wall surrounds from the four directions. "Whose face is toward the east" means whoever comes on the eastern side. The eastern side means kedmah, kedmah means east. And then "and he went up its steps." What is the meaning of "and he went up its steps"? They would go up steps in order to reach the Temple. The mountain is sloped, and since they wanted to reach it, they dug steps at the gate, and through this there were steps to reach there.
How many steps were there? How many stairs were there? The Malbim says, it is not mentioned to us. What will you say, we should learn from the building of the Second Temple? He says it is impossible to learn from there, since it was different, as we mentioned, from the building of the Third Temple. And you see that also in the steps of the Ezrat Yisrael it was different. So necessarily, says the Malbim, that what he did not mention to us here about the number of steps that there were, is because he already explained to us on the north and south side that there were seven steps, seven ascents. So therefore he relied on that, and here too he says there were seven ascents. Seven steps to reach there.
"And he measured the threshold of the gate." This wall, says the Malbim, its thickness was 13 cubits. It had two thresholds. Thresholds, the meaning is from the word saf, threshold. One on the outer side and one on the inner side. The meaning is, the wall itself is thick, so when you come from one side you are, as it were, entering a room. You have a threshold. And when you also come from the other side of the wall, you are, as it were, entering a room, there is another threshold.
With us, when there is a door, the door itself is narrow, the wall is narrow, there is one threshold. But there, since it is such a wide place, the wall is so thick, so from whichever side you enter there was a threshold, says the Malbim, there were two thresholds, yes, these are two thresholds. And each holds six cubits, and one cubit was in the middle between threshold and threshold. Each threshold held six cubits, the second threshold six cubits, and one more cubit in the middle.
That is to say, we have in fact six cubits and another six cubits, we reached 12 cubits, and it is not 12 because he said the thickness is 13, because in the middle there was one more cubit. Between them. Between the six of the one who enters, as it were, through the door from here, and the six of the one who enters through the door opposite, there was in the middle a threshold of six cubits on this side and six cubits on that side and in the middle one more cubit. What is this cubit in the middle? He will explain shortly.
The Malbim says, he measured one threshold, which is in fact the outer one, and this is the width, and afterwards the one threshold, which is the inner one, this is one more reed in width, says the Malbim, and this was equal on both sides. The middle threshold, says the Malbim, was the place that was made to hold the door there, and this was called a doorpost. The doorpost, the doorposts are in fact the sides of the entrance, and they are the ones that hold the doors. He says here the doorpost was in the middle, its width one cubit.
So we understood that there was one threshold from here of six cubits, one threshold for the one who comes from the other side of six cubits, all this beneath the wall, and the door was in the middle of the wall and it holds one cubit. And we will see shortly that there was a lintel, which is in fact the covering, yes, in a picture drawn round, which was a covering above the entrance, which is the lintel of the entrance, as we will see later.
"And the cell, one reed in length and one reed in width, and between the cells five cubits, and the threshold of the gate beside the porch of the gate from the House, one reed."
In order to understand the precise descriptions here in the whole matter, one needs some drawing or some diagram. We will try to explain orally even without a drawing, but in any case, whoever wishes, in the future we will put the drawing and diagram on the website, so that whoever wishes to hear the lesson on the website and also to see the drawing can follow the matters there. It is important to know which drawing we take, since as I explained there are quite a few explanations in the interpretation of Yechezkel's prophecy, so whoever takes some drawing, and several books have come out.
But whoever takes some drawing that does not match what the Malbim explains and tries to combine it with the words of the Malbim, will see that it does not fit, and he will not understand why he does not understand. Therefore we need to see these things with a drawing that matches what the Malbim says, because only according to that will we truly have an understanding of the verses according to the Malbim's approach. The Malbim says that when he enters he sees on the two sides of the gate on the outside buildings that belong to the gate, and they are called cells.
These buildings were not the full height of the wall; they were structures such that whoever entered through the gate would see on the right side three structures and on the left side three structures, which did not look like divided structures, but from the outside it looked like one long structure, but in fact inside they were divided. The manner of their division inside was that, as you will see with the rod, the measuring reed, he measures it in length and width. That is to say, we are speaking of three cells on the right and three cells on the left of the one who enters, and all this is from the wall on the outside.
We will see shortly that something like this was also on the inside. But all this was from the wall on the outside. And whoever entered would see on the right side three cells adjacent to one another, each cell in its interior, in the inner part, its volume being six cubits length and six cubits width. What separated cell from cell was a wall, and this wall was five cubits in width. These were the walls separating cell from cell. Three cells on the right, three cells on the left, two walls separating cell from cell, each of them five cubits in width, almost the thickness of the cell, note.
Now, the outer walls of the cells, of the right triple and of the left triple, the outer wall, meaning whoever enters sees the wall for example on the right side, the outermost on the right, it was six cubits. Likewise the outermost on the left, which is already adjacent to the gate, it too was six cubits. The same for whoever now goes and looks at the cells on the left. The cells on the left were also three cells, each cell six cubits by six cubits in its inner part, the separating walls five cubits, six cubits was the outer wall adjacent to the gate, and another six cubits the outer wall belonging to the outside. So it was both on the right and on the left.
So let us read the verse again. "And the cell, one reed in length and one reed in width," this is the inner part of each and every cell. "And between the cells five cubits," this is the wall separating cell from cell. "And the threshold of the gate beside the porch of the gate from the House, one reed." The meaning is that we are now speaking of the gate itself, the threshold of the gate, as we explained before, that the threshold of the gate itself, this was the part we are speaking about through which they would enter, so we saw that this part, if you measure it, you get it in a width, in a length of six cubits.
And another six cubits on the other side and another cubit in the middle, we reached together 13, this is what he mentions now, "and the threshold of the gate beside the porch of the gate from the House," that when we measure from the inside, from there we arrive at one reed. "And he measured the porch of the gate from the House, one reed." Now he makes a second measurement of the porch of the gate. The meaning is the length of the wall of the porch from west to east.
The second measurement is like the first measurement. In the first measurement we only measured when a person enters, so we said there are six cubits, which is the threshold for the one who enters. And for the one who exits we said also on the other side there are six cubits. And these six cubits are those over which the gate is, yes, over which the gate covers. Together we got 12 cubits. So one measurement he measured the threshold for the one who enters, the second measurement he measures the threshold for the one who exits. Six cubits from here, six cubits from here, and we said that in the middle was the cubit of the door.
"And he measured the porch of the gate, eight cubits, and its posts two cubits, and the porch of the gate from the House." The third measurement he measures the porch of the gate, but note, now he measures from north to south. That is, first we measured the one who enters, from the place where he enters and inward, we measured, it was a length of six cubits. Now we measure when the person enters from right to left, which means in fact from north to south, what was in fact the width? First we spoke of the length, now he measures for the one who enters how much was the width.
"And he measured the porch of the gate, eight cubits, and its posts two cubits, and the porch of the gate from the House." What is the meaning? So first let us explain what "its posts" are. "Its posts" are in fact the... when a person enters a place that has a gate there, he sees a kind of arch like this above and pillars that descend below. These are called the ailim, the posts. Now, he will explain to us that in fact the width of the gate was 10 cubits.
But when we look and subtract from the width the pillars, which were a kind of arch rising up to the top, and these pillars were made round, and their size was a cubit on the right and a cubit on the left, this narrowed the entrance, so that the entrance now instead of 10 cubits will be eight cubits. And this is what he tells us here, that you should note that now the size has narrowed. "And he measured the porch of the gate," the meaning is when you enter, the porch of the gate is the inner part of the gate, as we said, this porch, its width is eight cubits.
"And its posts two cubits," on the right side a post on the right and a post, a pillar, on the left, "and the porch of the gate from the House," the porch of the gate, meaning the open part of the gate, was from the House, from the House meaning that it was further inward. It turns out then that in total there were 10 cubits, when the pillars are two cubits on the right and left and they narrowed the entrance, and so too it was...
Let us just be more precise, that in fact here what we are speaking about is not the one who comes from east to west, but rather, as we saw before, he comes from the west. That is to say, whoever now arrives from the western side means he comes from the inside outward, so he would see these two pillars on the right and left, and then it turns out that the entrance narrows from 10 cubits to eight. That is, these pillars were more in the inner part of the wall and not in the outer part.