What do we learn from "Tzela El Tzela"?
Rashi: There was a cell next to [another] cell, and a cell on a cell.
Radak: This is like Tzela Al Tzela. They were built one on top of another, like it says in Melachim [about Bayis Rishon].
Malbim: The cells were double ? a cell inside a cell. One was on the side of the Bayis, and one towards the outside. It is as if each cell was divided into two. This was 33 times, for there were five in the north, five in the south and one in the west (11 in all), and there were another 11 on top, and 11 on top of those. All 33 were divided 1 .
Here, Malbim says that there were 64 in all. Below (12), he implies that the [bottom] cell in the west was not divided. To reach 64, we must say that exactly one of the other 32 cells was not divided. This requires investigation. (PF)
What do we learn from "Shalosh u'Sheloshim Pe'amim"?
Rashi: In Bayis Sheni there were 38 cells ? 15 in the north and 15 in the south ? five on five, and another five on top of them. There were eight in the west. I say that [here,] in the north and south, each was 12 Amos long ? all five were 60. There were five walls of five Amos each ? this is another 25. The empty space was five ? this accounts for the 90 Amos of the wall's length (verse 12). In the west there was one on top of one, and a third on top of it. The length on top was 20 ? the width of Kodesh ha'Kodoshim. There were 11 cells at each level (bottom, middle and top). Targum Yonasan says so.
Radak: The height was that of 33 feet 1 ; a foot is two Tefachim.
This refers to the average size of a human foot. (PF)
What is the meaning of "u'Va'os ba'Kir Asher la'Bayis [la'Tzela'os]"?
Rashi: The beams of the upper cells, their ends were on the sides of walls of the outer cells. They made holes in the wall on its inner side.
Vilna Gaon: The walls that divided between the cells were attached to the wall of the cells. They were not attached to the wall of Kodesh ha'Kodoshim 1 ; there was a gap of five Amos between them.
Malbim: They rested on the wall [between cells on the north and south sides, i.e.] between Kir ha'Bayis and the other wall of the Tzela'os.
This includes the Heichal. (PF)
What do we learn from "Lihyos Achuzim"?
Rashi: They were fixed strongly.
Vilna Gaon: The walls that divided between the cells were attached to their wall (of the cells).
Why does it say "v'Lo Yihyu Achuzim b'Kir ha'Bayis"?
Rashi: Their ends on the side of Kir ha'Heichal, they made holes in the recessions that Kir ha'Heichal protruded into the cells, like it says "Ki Migra'os Nasan la'Bayis Saviv Chutzah" (Melachim I, 6:6). The bottom cells' interior was five Amos; those on top of them was six Amos. The wall of the Heichal recessed an Amah above. The top cells were seven. (The floor beams of the middle and top cells rested on the Migra'os, where the wall recessed; they were like wide steps.) Also here was similar. They did not make holes in Kir ha'Heichal 1 , like is normally done for low beams fixed in a tall wall.
Vilna Gaon: Refer to 41:6:3:2.
Rather, they made holes in recessions of the wall. (PF)
QUESTIONS ON RASHI
Rashi writes that they did not make holes in Kir ha'Heichal. The verse implies that they did! He says that the upper cells were bigger, like in Bayis Rishon. Why did the verse not tell the size of the upper cells?
Malbim: In Bayis Rishon they needed Migra'os (recessions of walls), lest they need to make holes in Kiros ha'Bayis. This will not be so in Bayis Shelishi. The beams of the cells, will not be placed along their width, rather, along their length, on the walls between cells. Each cell was 12 long, and the wall between cells was five. The beams were 17 Amos long. They were put over the wall of one cell to the wall of the cell next to it, along the length 1 . Had they been put along the width, one end would have rested on Kir ha'Bayis. This was only for the inner (middle) cells [in the north and south]. The outer cells, their beams were placed from the outer wall (of the outer cell) to the wall between cells.
I.e. on the north and south walls, from north to south. (PF)
