Rabbi Simlai interpreted the verse regarding the priestly watches. “Behold the bed [mitato],” behold his tribes [matotav] and his clans, just as you say: “The oaths to the tribes [matot], sela” (Habakkuk 3:9); “of Solomon [Shlomo],” to the king [of Whom it may be said] that peace [shalom] is His; “sixty valiant men surround it,” these are the twenty-four priestly watches, the twenty-four Levite watches, and the twelve divisions; “from the valiant of Israel,” as they protect Israel.
“Each armed with a sword,” Rabbi Ze’eira and Rabbi Yehuda [said] in the name of Shmuel: These are the Torah scholars who teach the priests ritual slaughter and the laws of sprinkling and collecting,82Sprinkling and collecting the blood of animal offerings. and of the handful.83The handful taken from the meal offering and burned on the altar. Rabbi Yitzḥak said in the name of Rabbi Ami: These are the inspectors of the blemishes of sacrificial animals, who collect their wages from the collection of the chamber.84Each man would donate a half-shekel per year to the Temple treasury.
The donations would be stored in a chamber. Periodically, a portion of the money would be collected from that chamber. These funds, known as the collection of the chamber, covering the running expenses of the Temple. The rest of the money was used for upkeep.
Rabbi Gidel bar Binyamin [said] in the name of Rabbi Yesa: There were in Jerusalem two judges of [cases concerning] robbery, and they would collect their wages from the collection of the chamber. Shmuel says: The women who would weave the curtain85This refers to the curtain that separated the Temple Sanctuary from the Holy of Holies. would collect their wages from the collection of the chamber; Rav Ḥuna said: From the collection for Temple maintenance.
This one [Shmuel] deems it like an offering. That one [Rav Huna] deems it like building. “Trained in war,” as [the Sages] would teach the priests how to perform the Temple service; “each armed with a sword…,” as they would caution them when they were slaughtering so that none of the offerings would be disqualified due to pigul,86This is an offering that is disqualified when the priest performing one of the essential services of the offering thinks that another of the services will be performed, or the meat will be eaten, after the appointed time. and none of the offerings would be disqualified as leftovers.87If an offering is not consumed within the appointed time, whatever is left becomes disqualified.