Beginning

Chapter 6

¹ Then Solomon said:

³ Then the king turned around and blessed the entire assembly of Israelites as they stood before him. ⁴ He said: “Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who has fulfilled with his hand what he promised with his mouth to my father David, when he said: ⁵ ‘From the day I brought my people out of the land of Egypt, I have not chosen a city from any of the tribes of Israel in which to have a temple built to honor my name, nor did I choose any man to be the ruler over my people Israel. ⁶ However, now I have chosen Jerusalem, where I shall be honored, and I have chosen David to rule my people Israel.’

⁷ “My father David was determined to build a temple to honor the Lord, the God of Israel. ⁸ However, the Lord said to him: ‘In wishing to build a temple in my honor, you did well. ⁹ But nevertheless you shall not build the temple. Rather, your son who shall be born to you shall be the one who will build the temple in my name.’

¹⁰ “Now the Lord has fulfilled his promise that he made. For I have succeeded my father David and taken his place on the throne of Israel, as the Lord foretold. In addition, I have built the temple to honor the name of the Lord, the God of Israel. ¹¹ There I have installed the Ark containing the covenant of the Lord that he made with the people of Israel.”

¹² Solomon’s Prayer.^[a] Then, in the presence of the whole assembly of Israel, Solomon stood before the altar of the Lord and spread out his hands. ¹³ Solomon had made a bronze platform, measuring five cubits long, five cubits wide, and three cubits high, which he directed to be placed in the center of the courtyard, and he stood on it. Then he knelt down^[b] in the presence of the whole assembly of Israel and spread out his hands toward heaven.

¹⁴ “Lord, God of Israel,” he said, “there is no God like you in heaven or on earth, as you keep your covenant and show steadfast love to your servants who walk before you with all their heart. ¹⁵ You have kept the promise you made to my father David. Indeed, what you promised him with your words you have fulfilled by your deeds.

¹⁶ “And now, Lord, God of Israel, keep the promise you made to your servant David, my father, when you said: ‘You shall never fail to have a successor to sit in my presence on the throne of Israel, provided that your sons are careful to keep to their ways and conform to my law, as you yourself have done.’ ¹⁷ Therefore, O Lord, God of Israel, let this promise be confirmed which you promised to your servant David.

¹⁸ “And yet, will God indeed dwell with the people on earth? If the heavens and even the highest heavens cannot contain you, how much less this temple which I have built! ¹⁹ Look with kindness on your servant’s prayer and his plea, O Lord, my God, heeding the cry and the prayer that your servant makes before you.

²⁰ “May your eyes be forever on this house day and night, the place where you decreed that you would establish your name. Listen to the prayer that your servant offers in your presence. ²¹ Also hear the supplications of your servant and of your people Israel which they direct toward this place. Listen from your heavenly dwelling, and when you hear, grant us forgiveness.

²² “When anyone sins against his neighbor and is required to take an oath, and he comes forth and swears before your altar in this temple, ²³ then listen from heaven and take the necessary action. Judge your servants, requiting the guilty person and holding him responsible for his conduct, but absolving the innocent person and rewarding him in accordance with his righteousness.

²⁴ “Should your people Israel sin against you and as a result be defeated by an enemy, but then return to you and confess your name and pray and plead to you in this temple, ²⁵ listen to them and forgive the sin of your people Israel and then bring them back to the land that you gave to them and their ancestors.

²⁶ “When the heavens are shut and there is no rain because your people have sinned against you, but then they pray toward this place, praise your name, and desist from sin because you have afflicted them, ²⁷ listen to their pleas in heaven and forgive the sin of your servants and of your people Israel. Show them the path of righteousness along which they should walk and send down rain upon your land which you have given to your people as an inheritance.

²⁸ “Should there be famine afflicting the land, or plague, or blight, or mildew, or locusts, or caterpillars, or should enemies besiege your people in any of their cities, or should plague or sickness befall them, ²⁹ then mercifully listen to the prayer or supplication of everyone among your people Israel, each one knowing his own suffering and his own sorrows and stretching out his hands toward this temple. ³⁰ Listen from heaven, your dwelling place, as you grant forgiveness and deal with each man according to his deeds, since you alone know what is in each person’s heart.^{[c] 31} As a result, the people will fear you and walk in your ways throughout all the days that they live in the land that you gave to our ancestors.

³² “Likewise, when foreigners who do not belong to your people Israel come from a distant land because of your great name and your mighty hand and your outstretched arm, and they approach and pray in your temple, ³³ listen from heaven, your dwelling place, and grant whatever they ask of you, in order that all the peoples of the earth may acknowledge your name and fear you, as do your people Israel, and that they may know that this house which I have built bears your name.

³⁴ “If your people go forth to engage in war against their enemies, wherever you choose to send them, and they pray to you, facing toward this city that you have chosen and toward this house that I have built to honor your name, ³⁵ then listen from heaven to their prayer and their supplication, and defend their cause.

³⁶ “When your people sin against you—for there is no one who does not sin—and in your anger against them you deliver them into the power of the enemy who will carry them away captive to a land far or near, ³⁷ and then, later on, if they come to their senses in the land to which they have been taken as captives and they repent, entreating you in the land of their captivity as they say: ‘We have sinned and done wrong; we have acted wickedly,’ ³⁸ and they repent with all their heart and soul in the land of their captivity to which they have been taken, and they pray, turning toward the land which you gave to their ancestors, toward the city you have chosen and the temple I have built to honor your name, ³⁹ then from heaven, your dwelling place, hear their prayer and their pleas, uphold their cause, and forgive your people who have sinned against you.

⁴⁰ “Now, O my God, let your eyes be open and your ears be attentive to the prayer offered in this place.

Chapter 7

¹ When Solomon had ended his prayer, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, after which the glory of the Lord filled the temple. ² The priests could not enter the house of the Lord because the glory of the Lord had filled it.

³ When all the Israelites beheld the fire descending and the glory of the Lord upon the temple, they bowed down upon the pavement with their faces to the ground. Then they worshiped and gave thanks to the Lord, saying:

⁴ Then the king and all the people offered sacrifices before the Lord. ⁵ King Solomon offered as a sacrifice twenty-two thousand oxen and one hundred and twenty thousand sheep. Thus the king and all the people dedicated the house of God.

The Dedication. ⁶ The priests stood at their appointed posts, as did the Levites, with the musical instruments for the Lord that King David had made for giving thanks to the Lord—for his love endures forever—whenever David used them to offer praise to their accompaniment. Opposite them the priests sounded their trumpets while all the Israelites stood.^[d]

⁷ Then Solomon consecrated the middle part of the court that lay in front of the house of the Lord. There he presented the burnt offerings and the fatty portions of the shared offerings because the bronze altar which he had made could not hold the burnt offering and the grain offering and the fatty parts.

⁸ After that Solomon, and all Israel with him, a massive congregation, from Lebo-hamath to the Wadi of Egypt, celebrated the festival for seven days. ⁹ On the eighth day they held a solemn assembly, inasmuch as they had celebrated the dedication of the altar for seven days.

¹⁰ On the twenty-third day of the seventh month, Solomon sent the people back to their homes rejoicing and happy in heart because of all the wonderful things that the Lord had granted to David, to Solomon, and to his people Israel. ¹¹ Solomon had completed the house of the Lord and the royal palace. Everything that he had been determined to accomplish in the house of the Lord and in his own house had been successfully completed.

¹² God’s Warning to Solomon. Then the Lord appeared to Solomon during the night and said to him: “I have heard your prayer, and I have chosen this place for myself as a house of sacrifice. ¹³ When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send a pestilence to overcome my people, ¹⁴ and if then my people who bear my name humble themselves and pray to me and seek my presence as they turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear them from heaven and forgive their sins and restore their land.

¹⁵ “Then my eyes will be open and my ears will be attentive to the prayers that are offered in this place. ¹⁶ For now I have chosen and consecrated this house so that my name may be there forever and my eyes and my heart shall constantly be there.

¹⁷ “As for you, if you on your part live in my presence as your father David lived, doing everything that I have commanded you and observing my laws and my decrees, ¹⁸ then I will establish your royal throne, as I promised by a covenant with your father David when I said: ‘You shall never lack a male successor of yours to rule over Israel.’

¹⁹ “However, if you turn away and forsake my laws and my commandments which I have laid down for you, and then proceed to serve other gods and worship them, ²⁰ then I will uproot the people from the land which I have given them. I will cast from my sight this temple which I have consecrated for my name, cast it out of my sight, and make it a byword and an object of ridicule for all people.

²¹ “And in regard to this temple that was once so exalted, everyone who passes by it will be appalled at the sight and ask: ‘Why has the Lord allowed this to happen^[e] to this land and to this house?’ ²² Then others will reply: ‘Because the people abandoned the Lord, the God of their fathers, who brought them out of the land of Egypt. Instead, they adopted other gods, whom they worshiped and served. That is why the Lord has brought all these disasters upon them.’ ”

Chapter 8

Solomon’s Buildings.^{[f] 1} At the end of the twenty years that Solomon had taken to build the house of the Lord and his own palace, ² he rebuilt the cities that Huram had given to him, and he settled the Israelites in them.

³ Then Solomon went to Hamath-zobah and captured it.^{[g] 4} After that he fortified Tadmor^[h] in the wilderness and all the storage towns that he had built in Hamath. ⁵ He also built Upper Beth-horon and Lower Beth-horon, fortified cities with walls, gates, and bars, ⁶ and Baalath, all the supply cities belonging to Solomon, and all the towns for his chariots and for his cavalry and whatever else Solomon decided to build in Jerusalem, in Lebanon, and throughout his entire dominion.

⁷ All the people who still remained of the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites who did not belong to Israel— ⁸ that is, from their descendants still surviving in the land, whom the people of Israel had not destroyed—Solomon subjected to forced labor, as is still the case today.^[i]

⁹ However, Solomon did not use the people of Israel as slaves for all the work he wanted done. Rather, they were assigned as soldiers and his officers, as well as the commanders of his soldiers and his cavalry.^{[j] 10} These served as King Solomon’s officials, two hundred and fifty in number, who exercised authority over the people.

¹¹ Solomon’s Piety. Solomon brought the daughter of Pharaoh up from the City of David to the place that he had built for her, for he said: “No wife of mine shall live in the house of King David of Israel, for the places that the Ark of the Lord has entered are sacred.”

¹² Then Solomon sacrificed burnt offerings to the Lord upon the altar of the Lord that he had built in front of the portico, ¹³ in accordance with what was required for each day, offerings in accordance with the law of Moses for the Sabbaths, the new moons, and the annual dedicated feasts—the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Weeks, and the Feast of Booths.

¹⁴ Following the ordinances of his father David, Solomon designated the various divisions of the priests for their service, and the Levites for their offices of praise and ministry alongside the priests as the duty of each day required, and the gatekeepers designated for specific gates, for such was the command of David, the man of God. ¹⁵ The instructions that David had specified in regard to the priests and Levites and also concerning the treasuries were never disregarded.

¹⁶ Thus all of Solomon’s work was accomplished, from the day that the foundation of the house of the Lord was laid until the house of the Lord was completed.

¹⁷ Solomon’s Glory. Then Solomon went to Ezion-geber and Elath on the seacoast of Edom, ¹⁸ and Huram sent ships under the command of his own officers and manned by experienced seamen familiar with the sea. They went to Ophir, together with the servants of Solomon, and brought back from there four hundred and fifty talents that they presented to King Solomon.