1 Kings 7:26

an handbreadth thick i.e. The metal of which it was made.

with flowers of lilies Rather (as R.V.) -like the flower of lily." This is to indicate that the brim bent outward and not that lily-flowers were all round it.

it contained two thousand baths In 2 Chronicles 4:5 it is said -three thousand baths." Perhaps the smaller quantity was about what was usually kept in supply, the larger what it could contain if it were quite full.

The -bath" was the largest Hebrew liquid measure, but it is not easy to discover what its size was. According to Josephus it held rather more than 8 gallons. Other data make it about half that size. A vessel that could contain 16,000 gallons must have been very enormous to be made in one casting. And the dimensions given, viz. a diameter of 10 cubits by a depth of 5 cubits if the cubit = 18 inches would not hold so much, unless the sides were bowed outward very considerably so as to make the diameter much greater in the inside than at the top. But the description of Josephus makes it to be hemispherical, so that the diameter would be largest at the top. A vessel of this shape however could not be made to rest on the backs of twelve oxen without a good deal of contrivance, while with a cylindrical vessel there is no difficulty. Now a cylinder of the dimensions given in 1 Kings 7:23, taking the cubit = 18 inches, would contain nearly 8260 gallons. It seems therefore that the Hebrew -bath" should be taken as a measure of rather more than 4 gallons. The figures which Josephus gives are so frequently exaggerated, very often doubled, that it need not trouble us if they appear so in this case. The difference between Chronicles and Kings above mentioned may be due to the misreading of a letter in the Hebrew form of notation.