1 Kings 6:9

Ceilings are boardwork constructed and adorned with great beauty and fixed to the beams on the lower side, and because the house of the Lord had been built three times the double height, naturally it had three ceilings. What is more fitting for us to believe than these ceilings signify all the just people of most exalted virtue in the holy church? And their work and teaching is held up as an example to all as being much loftier than any other, and by their intercessions and exhortations they keep the spirits of the weak from failing in temptation. These ceilings are indeed rightly described as being of cedarwood. For cedar is by nature a completely incorruptible tree, of pleasant fragrance and luxuriant appearance, and when it is set on fire it drives away and destroys serpents by its dazzling brightness. These things are an apt figure of all the perfect whose patience is indomitable, whose outstanding reputation for virtue is far more pleasing to the good than that of anyone else, whose powers of refuting and proving wrong those who resist the truth are utterly unshakable, and who, both in this life and the life to come, shine with a resplendence that outshines the rest of the saints.

"He also covered the house with cedar ceilings." [1 Kings 6:9] The term "He also covered the house with cedar ceilings" refers to the timber-frame ceilings that, when fastened with nails, display the wondrous beauty of their paintings to those who behold them. There were three ceilings in the temple. The first had thirty cubits from the floor; the second had sixty cubits, aligned with the height of the porticos; the third had one hundred and twenty cubits at the top of the entire house. For in Palestine, as in Egypt, roofs are not raised high but instead built flat, suitable for sitting or walking. Hence, the Lord says in the Gospel: "And what you hear whispered, proclaim upon the housetops." Such a place is most appropriate for proclaiming the word—to those sitting with the speaker or to listeners below. As Solomon says in Proverbs: "It is better to live in a corner of the housetop than in a house shared with a contentious woman" (Prov. XXI); for what is called "roof" in Latin is "doma" in Greek. Moreover, the porticos around the temple had three levels of ceilings. The first from the ground had twenty cubits, the second forty, and the third sixty. Their roofs were also flat. There were thirty porticos on the lower level, thirty in the middle, and thirty above, not separated by walls but by wooden planks, so each of the ninety porticos measured five cubits in width and length, and twenty in height. These porticos are frequently mentioned in the book of Chronicles. Josephus explains their arrangement in more detail. "And he built a platform over the whole house five cubits high;" this is what Moses commanded in Deuteronomy: "When you build a new house, make a parapet for your roof so that you may not bring the guilt of bloodshed on your house if someone falls from it" (Deut. XXII). This platform at the top of the temple walls acted as a parapet to prevent someone ascending to the roof from falling off carelessly. This is mentioned as the cause of King Ahaziah's death, as he fell through the lattice of his upper chamber and suffered fatal injuries. When these panels, walls, or parapets are placed for safety, the common people call them "lattices." "And he covered the house with cedar wood;" signifies the upper covering of the entire structure, that is, the panel added above those beams on which the uppermost ceilings we mentioned earlier were affixed.