And day after day Mordecai used to walk back and forth in front of the court of the harem in order to learn how Esther was doing ¹  and what might happen to her.

I desperately want to be ¹  in the courts of the Lord’s temple. ²  My heart and my entire being ³  shout for joy to the living God.

Certainly ¹  spending just one day in your temple courts is better than spending a thousand elsewhere. ²  I would rather stand at the entrance ³  to the temple of my God than live ⁴  in the tents of the wicked.

Then Jeremiah left Topheth where the Lord had sent him to give that prophecy. He went to the Lord’s temple and stood ¹  in its courtyard and called out to all the people.

Now at that time, ¹  the armies of the king of Babylon were besieging Jerusalem. ²  The prophet Jeremiah was confined in the courtyard of the guardhouse ³  attached to the royal palace of Judah.

The officials put the scroll in the room of Elishama, the royal secretary, for safekeeping. ¹  Then they went to the court and reported everything ²  to the king. ³ 

So Jeremiah remained confined ¹  in the courtyard of the guardhouse until the day Jerusalem ²  was captured.The following events occurred when Jerusalem ³  was captured. ⁴ 

He said to them, “Defile the temple and fill the courtyards with corpses. Go!” So they went out and struck people down throughout the city.

Then the glory of the Lord arose from the cherub and moved to the threshold of the temple. The temple was filled with the cloud while the court was filled with the brightness of the Lord’s glory.

Then he measured the width from before the lower gate to the front of the exterior of the inner court as 175 feet ¹  on the east and on the north.

Opposite the gate on the north and the east was a gate of the inner court; he measured the distance from gate to gate at 175 feet. ¹ 

The inner court had a gate toward the south; he measured it from gate to gate toward the south as 175 feet. ¹ 

He measured the court as a square 175 feet long and 175 feet wide; ¹  the altar was in front of the temple.

Then he measured the length of the building facing the courtyard at the rear of the temple, with its galleries on either side as 175 feet. ¹  The interior of the outer sanctuary and the porch of the court, ² 

Then he led me out to the outer court, toward the north, and brought me to the chamber which was opposite the courtyard and opposite the building on the north.

For they were in three stories and had no pillars like the pillars of the courts; therefore the upper chambers ¹  were set back from the ground more than the lower and upper ones.

As for the outer wall by the side of the chambers, toward the outer court facing the chambers, it was 87½ feet ¹  long.

For the chambers on the outer court were 87½ feet ¹  long, while those facing the temple were 175 feet ²  long.

On the day he enters the sanctuary, into the inner court to serve in the sanctuary, he must offer his sin offering, declares the sovereign Lord.

The priest will take some of the blood of the sin offering and place it on the doorpost of the temple, on the four corners of the ledge of the altar, and on the doorpost of the gate of the inner court.