(17) Three cubits.--An error of transcription for five. Five cubits was the height of the capital according to 1Kings 7:16; Jeremiah 52:22; 2Chronicles 3:15.

The wreathen work.--Lattice-work (1Kings 7:17).

With wreathen work.--Upon the lattice-work. Thenius says this is the residuum of a sentence preserved in Jeremiah--namely, "And the pomegranates were ninety and six towards the outside; all the pomegranates were a hundred upon the lattice-work round about" (Jeremiah 52:23). Our text is, at any rate, much abridged.

Verse 17. - The height of the one pillar wee eighteen cubits (comp. 1 Kings 7:15 and Jeremiah 52:21, in which latter place an even more elaborate account of the pillars is given), and the chapiter upon it was brass; rather, and there was a chapiter (or capital) upon it of brass - and the height of the chapiter three cubits. The measure given, both in 1 Kings 7:16 and Jeremiah 52:22, is "five cubits," which is generally regarded as correct; but the proportion of 3 to 18, or one-sixth, is far more suitable for a capital than that of 5 to 18, or between a third and a fourth. And the wreathen work - rather, and there was wreathen work, or network - and pomegranates upon the chapiter round about, all of brass (comp. 1 Kings 7:18, 19): and like unto these had the second pillar with wreathen work. The ornamentation of the second pillar was the same as that of the first (see Jeremiah 52:22).

25:8-21 The city and temple were burnt, and, it is probable, the ark in it. By this, God showed how little he cares for the outward pomp of his worship, when the life and power of religion are neglected. The walls of Jerusalem were thrown down, and the people carried captive to Babylon. The vessels of the temple were carried away. When the things signified were sinned away, what should the signs stand there for? It was righteous with God to deprive those of the benefit of his worship, who had preferred false worships before it; those that would have many altars, now shall have none. As the Lord spared not the angels that sinned, as he doomed the whole race of fallen men to the grave, and all unbelievers to hell, and as he spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, we need not wonder at any miseries he may bring upon guilty nations, churches, or persons.And the pillars of brass that were in the house of the Lord,.... The two pillars in the temple, Jachin and Boaz. Benjamin of Tudela says (w), that in the church of St. Stephen in Rome these pillars now are with the name of Solomon engraved on each; and the Jews at Rome told him, when there, (in the twelfth century,) that on the ninth of Ab (the day the temple was destroyed) every year sweat was found upon them like water; the one, I suppose, will equally be believed as the other, since it is here expressly said that the Chaldeans broke them in pieces. From hence, to the end of 2 Kings 25:17 is the same with Jeremiah 52:7, where it is rather more largely and fully expressed; only there is this difference here in 2 Kings 25:17 the height of the chapiter of a pillar is said to be three cubits, there five cubits; for the reconciliation of which; see Gill on Jeremiah 52:22.

(w) Itinerar. p. 13.