The Lord Appears to Solomon Again

9 So Solomon finished building the Temple of the Lord and his royal palace. Solomon finished building everything he wanted to build. ² Then the Lord appeared to him again. This was just as he had done before, in Gibeon. ³ The Lord said to him: “I have heard your prayer. I have heard what you asked me to do. You built this Temple. And I have made it a holy place. So I will be worshiped there forever. I will watch over it and protect it always.

⁴ “But you must serve me as your father David did. He was fair and sincere. You must obey my laws and do everything I command. ⁵ If you do these things, I will allow your family to rule Israel forever. I made this promise to your father David. I told him that someone from his family would always be king over Israel.

⁶ “But you and your children must follow me. You must obey the laws and commands I have given you. You must not go off to serve or worship other gods. ⁷ If you do, I will force Israel to leave the land I have given them. I made the Temple holy for people to worship me there. But if you don’t obey me, I will tear it down. Then Israel will become a bad example, a joke, to other people. ⁸ If the Temple is destroyed, everyone who sees it will be shocked. They will make fun of you and ask, ‘Why did the Lord do this? Why did he do this terrible thing to this land and this Temple?’ ⁹ Other people will answer, ‘This happened because they left the Lord their God. He brought their ancestors out of Egypt. But they decided to follow other gods. They worshiped and served those gods. That is why the Lord brought all this disaster to them.’”

Solomon’s Other Activities

¹⁰ By the end of 20 years, King Solomon had built the Temple of the Lord. And he had built the royal palace. ¹¹ At that time King Solomon gave 20 towns in Galilee to Hiram king of Tyre. Solomon did this because Hiram had helped with the buildings. Hiram had given him all the cedar, pine and gold he wanted. ¹² So Hiram traveled from Tyre to see the towns Solomon had given him. When Hiram saw them, he was not pleased. ¹³ He asked, “What are these towns you have given me, my brother?” So he named that land the Land of Cabul.^[a] And it is still called that today. ¹⁴ Hiram had sent to King Solomon about 9,000 pounds of gold.

¹⁵ King Solomon had forced slaves to build the Temple and the palace. Then he had them fill in the land on the east side of the city. And he had them build the wall around Jerusalem. He also had them rebuild the cities of Hazor, Megiddo and Gezer. ¹⁶ (In the past the king of Egypt had attacked Gezer and captured it. He had burned it and killed the Canaanites who lived there. Then he gave it to his daughter as a wedding present. His daughter married Solomon. ¹⁷ So Solomon rebuilt it.) He also built the cities of Lower Beth Horon, ¹⁸ Baalath and Tadmor, which is in the Judean desert. ¹⁹ King Solomon also built cities where he could store grain and supplies. And he built cities for his chariots and chariot soldiers. Solomon built whatever he wanted in Jerusalem, Lebanon and everywhere he ruled.

²⁰ There were people in the land who were not Israelites. There were some Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. ²¹ The Israelites had not been able to destroy them from the land. So Solomon forced them to work for him as slaves. And they are still slaves today. ²² But Solomon did not force any Israelites to be his slaves. The Israelites were his soldiers, government leaders, officers, captains and chariot commanders and drivers.

²³ There were 550 supervisors over Solomon’s projects. They were supervisors over the men who did the work.

²⁴ The daughter of the king of Egypt moved from the old part of Jerusalem to the palace. This was the palace Solomon had built for her. Then Solomon filled in the land on the east side of the city.

²⁵ Three times each year Solomon offered whole burnt offerings and fellowship offerings on the altar. This is the altar he had built for the Lord. Solomon also burned incense before the Lord. So he finished the work on the Temple.

²⁶ Solomon also built ships at Ezion Geber. This town is near Elath. It is on the shore of the Gulf of Aqaba, in the land of Edom. ²⁷ King Hiram had sailors who knew much about the sea. So he sent them to serve in Solomon’s ships with Solomon’s men. ²⁸ Solomon’s ships sailed to Ophir. From there they brought back about 32,000 pounds of gold to King Solomon.