As mentioned in the discussion on the previous verse, this verse seems out of place in the Masoretic Text. New American Bible, therefore, places this material after verse 35.
Its opening: The pronoun Its refers to the basin. Revised English Bible makes this explicit by saying “The opening for the basin.” The word for opening is literally “mouth” in Hebrew. And certain languages may find this the best translation of the term in this context.
Within a crown: Apparently the basin was set within a crown, or circular collar (Good News Translation “circular frame”), that sat on the bronze supports.
Which projected upward one cubit … a cubit and a half deep: One cubit (about 50 centimeters or 18 inches) above the top of the square-shaped frame and panels was a circular frame with legs (called “supports” in verse 30b) extending down to the top of the cart. The exact description in this verse is not clear. Good News Translation understands this to mean that the circular frame projected both above the top of the cart and down into the cart. But the sense may well be that the circular frame to hold the basin was a cubit above the cart and that the circular frame was either a cubit and a half deep or “a cubit and a half wide” (New Revised Standard Version; New Living Translation says “2¼ feet across”). The equivalent of a cubit and a half is “seventy-five centimeters” (Bible en français courant) or “twenty-seven inches” (Contemporary English Version).
As a pedestal is made renders two Hebrew words, which are literally “after the structure of a stand.” This expression, as translated in Revised Standard Version, contains at least two problems. First, it is passive, so those languages requiring an active statement may have to say something like “as they [indefinite] make a pedestal.” Second, the meaning of these two Hebrew words is not certain. Revised English Bible says “with a level edge,” but De Vries has “of similar design.” The exact meaning is not clear, but Revised Standard Version (also New Revised Standard Version) probably expresses the correct meaning. New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh gives a clearer translation for this part of the verse with “… this funnel was round, in the fashion of a stand, a cubit and a half in diameter.”
At its opening there were carvings; and its panels were square, not round: This seems to say the circular frame had carvings within square panels around the circular frame. The meaning is not clear. If the panels refer to the panels mentioned in verse 28, then Revised English Bible has a good model here: “the opening was round with a level edge, and it had decorations in relief. The panels of the trolleys were square, not round.”
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 .