Discovery BoxEzekiel 45:1-6 
Context45:1 “‘When you allot the land as an inheritance, you will offer an allotment 1 to the Lord, a holy portion from the land; the length will be eight and a quarter miles 2 and the width three and one-third miles. 3 This entire area will be holy. 4 45:2 Of this area a square 875 feet 5 by 875 feet will be designated for the sanctuary, with 87½ feet 6 set aside for its open space round about. 45:3 From this measured area you will measure a length of eight and a quarter miles 7 and a width of three and one-third miles; 8 in it will be the sanctuary, the most holy place. 45:4 It will be a holy portion of the land; it will be for the priests, the ministers of the sanctuary who approach the Lord to minister to him. It will be a place for their houses and a holy place for the sanctuary. 9 45:5 An area eight and a quarter miles 10 in length and three and one-third miles 11 in width will be for the Levites, who minister at the temple, as the place for the cities 12 in which they will live.
45:6 “‘Alongside the portion set apart as the holy allotment, you will allot for the city an area one and two-thirds miles 13 wide and eight and a quarter miles 14 long; it will be for the whole house of Israel.
1 tn Heb “a contribution.”
2 tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers). The measuring units here are the Hebrew “long” cubit, consisting of a cubit (about 18 inches or 45 cm) and a handbreadth (about 3 inches or 7.5 cm), for a total of 21 inches (52.5 cm). Because modern readers are not familiar with the cubit as a unit of measurement, and due to the additional complication of the “long” cubit as opposed to the regular cubit, all measurements have been converted to American standard miles (one mile = 5,280 feet), with the Hebrew measurements and the metric equivalents given in the notes.
3 tc The LXX reads “twenty thousand cubits.”
tn Heb “ten thousand cubits” (i.e., 5.25 kilometers).
4 tn Heb “holy it is in all its territory round about.”
5 tn Heb “five hundred cubits” (i.e., 262.5 meters); the phrase occurs twice in this verse.
6 tn Heb “fifty cubits” (i.e., 26.25 meters).
7 tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).
8 tn Heb “ten thousand cubits” (i.e., 5.25 kilometers).
9 tc The LXX apparently understood “open land” instead of “sanctuary.”
10 tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).
11 tn Heb “ten thousand cubits” (i.e., 5.25 kilometers).
12 tc The translation follows the LXX here. The MT reads “twenty.” See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 2:246.
13 tn Heb “five thousand cubits” (i.e., 2.625 kilometers).
14 tn Heb “twenty-five thousand cubits” (i.e., 13.125 kilometers).
