Chronological

Chapter 9

The Lord’s Promise to Solomon.¹ When Solomon had completed the construction of the temple of the Lord and the royal palace, Solomon had accomplished all that he desired to do.

² The Lord appeared to Solomon a second time, as he had appeared to him at Gibeon. ³ The Lord said to him, “I have heard your prayer and your supplication that you made before me, and I have consecrated the temple that you built by establishing my name there forever. My eyes and my heart will always be there. ⁴ And as for you, if you walk before me as David, your father, walked, in integrity of heart and righteousness, and you do all that I command you, and you observe my statutes and my ordinances, ⁵ then I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever just as I promised David, your father, when I said, ‘You will not fail to have one who will reign upon the throne of Israel.’

⁶ “But if your children turn away from me, and they do not follow me nor do they observe my commandments or my statutes that I have set before you, and they go off to serve other gods, and they worship them, ⁷ then I will cut Israel off from the land that I have given them, and I will reject from my sight this temple that I have consecrated for my name. Israel will become a byword and a laughingstock among all the nations. ⁸ Although this temple is now exalted, everyone who passes by it will be astonished and will hiss at it, and they will say, ‘Why has the Lord done this to this land and to this temple?’ ⁹ Then they will answer, ‘Because they abandoned the Lord, their God, who brought their fathers forth from the land of Egypt. They have embraced other gods, and they have worshiped them and served them. This is why the Lord has brought all of these disasters upon them.’ ”

¹⁰ Taking Account. At the end of twenty years during which Solomon built two buildings, the temple of the Lord and the royal palace, ¹¹ King Solomon gave twenty towns that were in the land of Galilee to King Hiram, the king of Tyre, who had provided Solomon with all the cedar wood, fir, and gold that he desired. ¹² When King Hiram traveled out from Tyre to inspect the towns that Solomon had given him, he was not pleased with them. ¹³ He said, “What kind of cities have you given me, my brother?” He has called the land Cabul up to the present day. ¹⁴ Now Hiram had sent the king one hundred twenty talents of gold.^[a]

¹⁵ This is an account of the forced labor that King Solomon raised in order to build the temple of the Lord, his own palace, Millo, the walls of Jerusalem, Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer. ¹⁶ (Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, had gone up and captured Gezer. He burned it down and killed the Canaanites who were living there. He gave it as a dowry to his daughter, Solomon’s wife. ¹⁷ Solomon then rebuilt Gezer.) He also built lower Beth-horon, ¹⁸ Baalath, and Tadmor in the desert, all of which were within his land. ¹⁹ Solomon also had storage cities for provisions, cities for his chariots, and cities for his horses. Solomon built whatever he desired in Jerusalem, Lebanon, and all the land that he ruled.

²⁰ All of the people who survived from among the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites (for these people were not Israelites), ²¹ that is, their descendants who remained in the land (for the Israelites had not been able to wipe them out) were conscripted by Solomon to serve as slave labor, as is still true today.

²² Solomon did not reduce the Israelites to slavery. They were his fighting men, his officials, his princes, his captains, the commanders of his chariots, and his charioteers. ²³ They were also the chief officials who were in charge of Solomon’s work projects. There were five hundred and fifty of them, and they supervised the men who did the work. ²⁴ After Pharaoh’s daughter came up to the City of David, to the palace that he had built for her, he then built Millo.

²⁵ Three times a year^[b] Solomon offered up burnt offerings and peace offerings upon the altar that he had built for the Lord. He also burnt incense on the altar before the Lord, and so he fulfilled his temple duties. ²⁶ King Solomon built ships at Ezion-geber, which is near Elath on the Red Sea in the land of Edom. ²⁷ Hiram sent some of his men who were sailors, seafaring men who knew the sea, to sail with Solomon’s men. ²⁸ They sailed to Ophir^[c] and brought back and delivered to King Solomon four hundred and twenty talents of gold.

Chapter 8

Solomon’s Buildings.^{[a] 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.^{[b] 4} After that he fortified Tadmor^[c] 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.^[d]

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.^{[e] 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.