Now, Yahweh my God, you have made your servant king instead of David my father. I am but a little child. I don't know how to go out or come in.

Behold, I have done according to thy words: lo, I have given thee a wise and an understanding heart; so that there was none like thee before thee, neither after thee shall any arise like unto thee.

Then two loose women of the town came and took their places before the king;

Then said the king, Divide the living child, in twain, - and give half to the one, and half to the other.

The woman whose son was alive spoke to the king because she felt great compassion for her son. “My lord, give her the living baby,” she said, “but please don’t have him killed!”

But the other one said, “He will not be mine or yours. Cut him in two!”

The king responded, “Give the living baby to the first woman, and don’t kill him. She is his mother.”

When this decision that the king had handed down was announced, everybody in Israel was amazed at the king, because they all saw that God's wisdom was in him, enabling him to administer justice.

Elihoreph and Ahijah, the sons of Shisha, wrote down what happened. Jehoshaphat son of Ahilud was in charge of the records.

Ten fat oxen, and twenty oxen out of the pastures, and an hundred sheep, beside harts, and roebucks, and fallowdeer, and fatted fowl.

And Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan even to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon.

'And now, command, and they cut down for me cedars out of Lebanon, and my servants are with thy servants, and the hire of thy servants I give to thee according to all that thou sayest, for thou hast known that there is not among us a man acquainted with cutting wood, like the Sidonians.'

My servants shall bring them down from Lebanon unto the sea: and I will convey them by sea in floats unto the place that thou shalt appoint me, and will cause them to be discharged there, and thou shalt receive them: and thou shalt accomplish my desire, in giving food for my household.

And he sent them to Lebanon, ten thousand a month by courses: a month they were in Lebanon, and two months at home: and Adoniram was over the levy.

And Solomon had threescore and ten thousand that bare burdens, and fourscore thousand hewers in the mountains;

And the porch before the temple of the house, twenty cubits was the length thereof, according to the breadth of the house; and ten cubits was the breadth thereof before the house.

The bottom floor of the extension was seven and a half feet wide, the middle floor nine feet wide, and the third floor ten and a half feet wide. He made ledges on the temple's outer walls so the beams would not have to be inserted into the walls.

This house that thou art building -- if thou dost walk in My statutes, and My judgments dost do, yea, hast done all My commands, to walk in them, then I have established My word with thee, which I spake unto David thy father,

And within the oracle he made two cherubims of olive tree, each ten cubits high.

And five cubits was the one wing of the cherub, and five cubits the other wing of the cherub: from the uttermost part of the one wing unto the uttermost part of the other were ten cubits.

And the other cherub was ten cubits: both the cherubims were of one measure and one size.

The height of the one cherub was ten cubits, and so was it of the other cherub.

And the two doors are of the oil-tree, and he hath carved upon them carvings of cherubs, and palm-trees, and openings of flowers, and overlaid with gold, and he causeth the gold to go down on the cherubs and on the palm-trees.

And the foundation was of costly stones, even great stones, stones of ten cubits, and stones of eight cubits.

And he made a molten sea, ten cubits from the one brim to the other: it was round all about, and his height was five cubits: and a line of thirty cubits did compass it round about.

And under the brim of it round about there were knops compassing it, ten in a cubit, compassing the sea round about: the knops were cast in two rows, when it was cast.

And he made ten bases of brass; four cubits was the length of one base, and four cubits the breadth thereof, and three cubits the height of it.

and on the borders between the cross-pieces were lions, oxen, and cherubim. A pedestal was placed above the cross-pieces, and beneath the lions and oxen there were wreaths hanging down.

After this manner he made the ten bases: all of them had one casting, one measure, and one size.

Then made he ten lavers of brass: one laver contained forty baths: and every laver was four cubits: and upon every one of the ten bases one laver.

And the ten bases, and ten lavers on the bases;

So all the work King Solomon had done in the house of the Lord was complete. Then Solomon took the holy things which David his father had given, the silver and the gold and all the vessels, and put them in the store-houses of the house of the Lord.

Then Solomon sent for all the responsible men of Israel, and all the chiefs of the tribes, and the heads of families of the children of Israel, to come to him in Jerusalem to take the ark of the Lord's agreement up out of the town of David, which is Zion.

Nothing in the ark only the two tables of stones that Moses set down there in Horeb which Jehovah cut out with the sons of Israel in their coming out of the land of Egypt

From the day when I took my people Israel out of Egypt, no town in all the tribes of Israel has been marked out by me for the building of a house for the resting-place of my name; but I made selection of David to be king over my people Israel.

and Jehovah saith unto David my father, Because that it hath been with thy heart to build a house for My name, thou hast done well that it hath been with thy heart;

There I have made a place [in the Holy of Holies] for the ark, in which is the covenant (solemn agreement) of the Lord, which He made with our fathers when He brought them out of the land of Egypt.”

Now therefore, O Lord, the God of Israel, keep for Your servant my father David that which You promised him when You said, ‘You shall not be without a man (descendant) to sit on the throne of Israel, if only your sons take heed to their way [of life] to walk before Me [according to my laws] as you have done.’

then Thou dost hear in the heavens, and hast done, and hast judged Thy servants, to declare wicked the wicked, to put his way on his head, and to declare righteous the righteous, to give him according to his righteousness.

When thy people Israel be smitten down before the enemy, because they have sinned against thee, and shall turn again to thee, and confess thy name, and pray, and make supplication unto thee in this house:

then Thou dost hear in the heavens, the settled place of Thy dwelling, and hast forgiven, and hast done, and hast given to each according to all his ways, whose heart Thou knowest, (for Thou hast known -- Thyself alone -- the heart of all the sons of man),

Thou dost hear in the heavens, the settled place of Thy dwelling, and hast done according to all that the stranger calleth unto Thee for, in order that all the peoples of the earth may know Thy name, to fear Thee like Thy people Israel, and to know that Thy name hath been called on this house which I have builded.

If your people go out to war against their attackers, by whatever way you may send them, if they make their prayer to the Lord, turning their faces to this town of yours and to this house which I have made for your name:

Give ear in heaven to their prayer and their cry for grace, and see right done to them.

Yet if they shall bethink themselves in the land whither they were carried captives, and repent, and make supplication unto thee in the land of them that carried them captives, saying, We have sinned, and have done perversely, we have committed wickedness;

And with all their heart and soul are turned again to you, in the land of those who took them prisoners, and make their prayer to you, turning their eyes to this land which you gave to their fathers, and to the town which you took for yourself, and the house which I made for your name:

Then give ear to their prayer and to their cry in heaven your living-place, and see right done to them;

Answering with forgiveness the people who have done wrong against you, and overlooking the evil which they have done against you; let those who made them prisoners be moved with pity for them, and have pity on them;

It happened that when Solomon finished praying to Yahweh all of the prayer and this plea, he got up from before the altar of Yahweh, from kneeling down on his knees with his palms outstretched to heaven.

And may these my words, the words of my prayer to the Lord, be before the Lord our God day and night, so that he may see right done to his servant and to his people Israel, day by day as we have need.

On the eighth day he sent the people away: and they blessed the king, and went unto their tents joyful and glad of heart for all the goodness that the LORD had done for David his servant, and for Israel his people.

The Lord came to him again in a vision, as he had done at Gibeon;

"If ever you or any of your descendants turn from [following] me and do not keep my commandments [and] my ordinances that I have set before you and you go and serve other gods and bow down to them,

And at this house, which is high, every one that passeth by it shall be astonished, and shall hiss; and they shall say, Why hath the LORD done thus unto this land, and to this house?

And they will say, 'Because they have forsaken Yahweh their God who brought their ancestors out from the land of Egypt and they embraced other gods and bowed down to them and served them. Therefore, Yahweh brought on them all of this disaster.'"

Pharaoh king of Egypt had attacked and captured Gezer. He then burned it down, killed the Canaanites who lived in the city, and gave it as a dowry to his daughter, Solomon’s wife.

These the chiefs being stationed which were over the work to Solomon, fifty and five hundred going down among the people working in the work

At that time Solomon made Pharaoh's daughter come up from the town of David to the house which he had made for her: then he made the Millo.

And she came to Jerusalem with a very great train, with camels weighted down with spices, and stores of gold and jewels: and when she came to Solomon she had talk with him of everything in her mind.

And Solomon will gather together chariots and horsemen: and there will be to him a thousand and four hundred chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen; and he will set them down in the cities of chariots and with the king in Jerusalem.

Solomon did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and did not follow the Lord fully, as David his father had done.

and so he hath done for all his strange women, who are perfuming and sacrificing to their gods.

Wherefore the LORD said unto Solomon, Forasmuch as this is done of thee, and thou hast not kept my covenant and my statutes, which I have commanded thee, I will surely rend the kingdom from thee, and will give it to thy servant.

Still I will not take all the kingdom from him; but I will give one tribe to your son, because of my servant David, and because of Jerusalem, the town of my selection.

Earlier, when David was in Edom, Joab, the commander of the army, had gone to bury the dead and had struck down every male in Edom.

And Hadad heard in Egypt that David lay down with his fathers, and that Joab chief of the army died, and Hadad will say to Pharaoh, Send me away, and I will go to my land.

He gathered some men and organized a raiding band. When David tried to kill them, they went to Damascus, where they settled down and gained control of the city.

The way in which his hand came to be lifted up against the king was this: Solomon was building the Millo and making good the damaged parts of the town of his father David;

Now the man Jeroboam was capable, and Solomon noticed the young man because he was getting things done. So he appointed him over the entire labor force of the house of Joseph.

And he said to Jeroboam, Take thee ten pieces: for thus saith the LORD, the God of Israel, Behold, I will rend the kingdom out of the hand of Solomon, and will give ten tribes to thee:

(But one tribe will be his, because of my servant David, and because of Jerusalem, the town which, out of all the tribes of Israel, I have made mine,)

because he has forsaken me, and they bowed down to Ashtoreth, the god of [the] Sidonians, to Chemosh, the god of Moab, and to Molech, the god of the {Ammonites}. They did not walk in my ways to do right in my eyes, my ordinances, or my judgments, as [did] David his father.

But I will take the kingdom out of his son's hand, and will give it unto thee, even ten tribes.

And one tribe I will give to his son, so that David my servant may have a light for ever burning before me in Jerusalem, the town which I have made mine to put my name there.

and it hath been, if thou dost hear all that I command thee, and hast walked in My ways, and done that which is right in Mine eyes, to keep My statutes and My commands, as did David My servant, that I have been with thee, and have built for thee a stedfast house, as I built for David, and have given to thee Israel,

This is how I'm going to afflict David's descendants because of what they have done, though I won't do it continuously.'"

And Solomon went to rest with his fathers, and was put into the earth in the town of David his father: and Solomon went to rest with his fathers and Rehoboam his son became king in his place.

And, hearing of it, Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, who was still in Egypt, where he had gone in flight from Solomon, and was living there, came back to his town Zeredah, in the hill-country of Ephraim;

Your father put a hard yoke on us: if you will make the conditions under which your father kept us down less cruel, and the weight of the yoke he put on us less hard, then we will be your servants.

Not only that, but since my father loaded you down heavily, I'm going to add to that burden. My father disciplined you with whips, but I'm going to discipline you with scorpions!'"

‘This is what the Lord says: You are not to march up and fight against your brothers, the Israelites. Each of you must return home, for I have done this.’”

So they listened to what the Lord said and went back as He had told them.

Then Jeroboam made the town of Shechem in the hill-country of Ephraim a strong place, and was living there; and from there he went out and did the same to Penuel.

And he set the one in Bethel, and the other put he in Dan.

And this thing became a sin: for the people went to worship before the one, even unto Dan.

Now there dwelt an old prophet in Bethel; and his sons came and told him all the works that the man of God had done that day in Bethel: the words which he had spoken unto the king, them they told also to their father.

Later, while they were sitting down at the table, a message from the LORD was delivered to the prophet who had brought him back,

And crying out to the man of God who came from Judah, he said, The Lord says, Because you have gone against the voice of the Lord, and have not done as you were ordered by the Lord,

And some men, going by, saw the body stretched out in the road with the lion by its side; and they came and gave news of it in the town where the old prophet was living.

And he went and saw the dead body stretched out in the road with the ass and the lion by its side: the lion had not taken the body for its food or done any damage to the ass.

Then the prophet took up the body of the man of God and put it on the ass and took it back; and he came to the town to put the body to rest with weeping.

And he will lay it down in his grave, and they will mourn over him, Alas, my brother!.

And take with thee ten loaves, and cracknels, and a cruse of honey, and go to him: he shall tell thee what shall become of the child.

But hast done evil above all that were before thee: for thou hast gone and made thee other gods, and molten images, to provoke me to anger, and hast cast me behind thy back:

Those of the family of Jeroboam who come to death in the town, will become food for the dogs; and those on whom death comes in the open country, will be food for the birds of the air; for the Lord has said it.

Up, then! go back to your house; and in the hour when your feet go into the town, the death of the child will take place.

And all Israel shall mourn for him, and bury him. For he only of Jeroboam shall come down to the grave, because in him there is found some good thing toward Jehovah, the God of Israel, in the house of Jeroboam.

And even now the hand of the Lord has come down on Israel, shaking it like a river-grass in the water; and, uprooting Israel from this good land, which he gave to their fathers, he will send them this way and that on the other side of the River; because they have made for themselves images, moving the Lord to wrath.

And he will give Israel up because of the sins which Jeroboam has done and made Israel do.

And the days which Jeroboam reigned, twenty and two years, and he will lie down with his fathers; and Nadab his son will reign in his stead.

And Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, was king in Judah. Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he became king, and he was king for seventeen years in Jerusalem, the town which the Lord had made his out of all the tribes of Israel, to put his name there; his mother's name was Naamah, an Ammonite woman.

And Judah did evil in the sight of the LORD, and they provoked him to jealousy with their sins which they had committed, above all that their fathers had done.