8:16 Then he brought me to the inner court of the Lord’s house. Right there 3 at the entrance to the Lord’s temple, between the porch and the altar, 4 were about twenty-five 5 men with their backs to the Lord’s temple, 6 facing east – they were worshiping the sun 7 toward the east!
47:1 Then he brought me back to the entrance of the temple. I noticed 8 that water was flowing from under the threshold of the temple toward the east (for the temple faced east). The water was flowing down from under the right side of the temple, from south of the altar.
48:1 “These are the names of the tribes: From the northern end beside the road of Hethlon to Lebo-hamath, as far as Hazar-enan (which is on the border of Damascus, toward the north beside Hamath), extending from the east side to the west, Dan will have one portion.
1 tn Or “a griddle,” that is, some sort of plate for cooking.
2 tn That is, a symbolic object lesson.
3 tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something.
4 sn The priests prayed to God between the porch and the altar on fast days (Joel 2:17). This is the location where Zechariah was murdered (Matt 23:35).
5 tc The LXX reads “twenty” instead of twenty-five, perhaps because of the association of the number twenty with the Mesopotamian sun god Shamash.
tn Or “exactly twenty-five.”
6 sn The temple faced east.
7 tn Or “the sun god.”
sn The worship of astral entities may have begun during the reign of Manasseh (2 Kgs 21:5).
8 tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something and has been translated here as a verb.
9 tn Heb “ten thousand cubits” (i.e., 5.25 kilometers); the phrase occurs again later in this verse.