He built means “he caused the workers to build,” as in the earlier cases of this type of expression.

The inner court: Court may be rendered “courtyard” (New Century Version) or “enclosed space.” There seem to have been three separate courts built by Solomon: (1) the inner court, mentioned also in 1 Kgs 7.12, may have completely surrounded the Temple, although according to Good News Translation, it was built “in front of the Temple” (since this courtyard was located higher up on the hill where the Temple was built, it was also called “the upper court” in Jer 36.10); (2) a second court, called “the other court” in 1 Kgs 7.8 and “the middle court” in 2 Kgs 20.4, was located south of the Temple; and (3) a “great court,” mentioned in 1 Kgs 7.12, surrounded both the Temple and the other royal buildings.

Three courses of hewn stone and one course of cedar beams: The wall surrounding the inner court consisted of alternating between three rows of stone and one row of wooden beams made of cedar. The row of wooden beams was probably included to help make the wall stable. A literal translation of this phrase may give the false impression that the wall had only three layers of stone and one layer of cedar beams on top. The meaning, however, seems to be that there were “three courses of dressed stone to one course of cedar beams” (New Revised Standard Version) and that this pattern was repeated at least a few times. If this interpretation is correct, then Good News Translation may be a useful model for other languages.

A literal translation of the Hebrew may also be confusing since it was not the courtyard itself but rather the surrounding wall that was built with layers of stone and cedar beams. In addition to Good News Translation, Bible en français courant provides another helpful model for this verse by beginning it as follows: “Then they enclosed the inner court with a wall made up of….”

For hewn stone, refer to the comments on 1 Kgs 5.17.

Quoted with permission from Omanson, Roger L. and Ellington, John E. A Handbook on 1-2 Kings, Volume 1. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2008. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .