THE TEN LAVERS: THEIR USE, AND THAT OF THE SEA
(2 Chronicles 4:6). (Comp. 1 Kings 7:27-39.)
(6) The chronicler now returns to his abbreviating style, and omits altogether the description of the ten bases, or stands, upon which the lavers were placed, and which are described in full and curious detail in 1 Kings 7:27-39. The unusual difficulty of the passage may have determined the omission, but it seems more likely that the sacred writer thought the bases of less importance than the objects described in 2 Chronicles 4:7-9, the account of which he has interpolated between the first and second half of 1 Kings 7:39.
He made also ten lavers. — And he made ten pans. The word kîyôr is used in 1 Samuel 2:14 as a pan for cooking, and in Zechariah 12:6 as a pan holding fire. Its meaning here and in the parallel place is a pan for washing. (Comp. Exodus 30:18; Exodus 30:28.) The LXX. renders λουτῆρας, “baths;” the Syriac, laqnê, “flagons” (lagenae, λάγηνοι).
To wash in them. — This statement, and, indeed, the rest of the verse is peculiar to the chronicler. On the other hand, 1 Kings 7:38 specifies the size and capacity of the lavers here omitted.
Such things as they offered for the burnt offering they washed in them. — This gives the meaning. Literally, the work (comp. Exodus 29:36, “to do” being equivalent to “to offer”) of the burnt offering they used to rinse (strictly, thrust, plunge) in them.
But the sea was for the priests to wash in. — The Hebrew words have been transposed apparently. The same infinitive (lĕrohçâh) occurs in Exodus 30:18; Exodus 40:30, in a similar context. Instead of all this, the Syriac and Arabic versions read: “put them five on the right hand and five on the left, that the priests might wash in them their hands and their feet,” which appears to be derived from Exodus 30:19; Exodus 40:31.