Now king David was old and stricken in years; and they covered him with clothes, but he got no heat.

Therefore his servants said unto him, Let there be sought for my lord the king a young virgin: and let her stand before the king, and let her cherish him, and let her lie in your bosom, that my lord the king may get heat.

And his father had not rebuked him at any time in saying, Why have you done so? and he also was a very handsome man; and his mother bore him after Absalom.

And Adonijah sacrificed sheep and oxen and fatlings by the stone of Zoheleth, which is by En-rogel, and invited all his brethren the king's sons, and all the men of Judah the king's servants:

Now therefore come, let me, I pray you, give you counsel, that you may save your own life, and the life of your son Solomon.

Go and get in unto king David, and say unto him, Did not you, my lord, O king, swear unto your handmaid, saying, Assuredly Solomon your son shall reign after me, and he shall sit upon my throne? why then does Adonijah reign?

Behold, while you yet talk there with the king, I also will come in after you, and confirm your words.

And Bath-sheba went in unto the king into the chamber: and the king was very old; and Abishag the Shunammite ministered unto the king.

And he has slain oxen and fatlings and sheep in abundance, and has called all the sons of the king, and Abiathar the priest, and Joab the captain of the army: but Solomon your servant has he not called.

And you, my lord, O king, the eyes of all Israel are upon you, that you should tell them who shall sit on the throne of my lord the king after him.

Otherwise it shall come to pass, when my lord the king shall sleep with his fathers, that I and my son Solomon shall be counted offenders.

And, lo, while she yet talked with the king, Nathan the prophet also came in.

And they told the king, saying, Behold Nathan the prophet. And when he was come in before the king, he bowed himself before the king with his face to the ground.

For he has gone down this day, and has slain oxen and fatlings and sheep in abundance, and has invited all the king's sons, and the captains of the army, and Abiathar the priest; and, behold, they eat and drink before him, and say, God save king Adonijah.

Is this thing done by my lord the king, and you have not showed it unto your servant, who should sit on the throne of my lord the king after him?

Even as I swore unto you by the LORD God of Israel, saying, Assuredly Solomon your son shall reign after me, and he shall sit upon my throne in my place; even so will I certainly do this day.

The king also said unto them, Take with you the servants of your lord, and cause Solomon my son to ride upon my own mule, and bring him down to Gihon:

Then you shall come up after him, that he may come and sit upon my throne; for he shall be king in my place: and I have appointed him to be ruler over Israel and over Judah.

And all the people came up after him, and the people played on flutes, and rejoiced with great joy, so that the earth shook with the sound of them.

And Adonijah and all the guests that were with him heard it as they had made an end of eating. And when Joab heard the sound of the trumpet, he said, Why is this noise of the city being in an uproar?

And while he yet spoke, behold, Jonathan the son of Abiathar the priest came: and Adonijah said unto him, Come in; for you are a valiant man, and bring good tidings.

And Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet have anointed him king in Gihon: and they have come up from there rejoicing, so that the city resounds with it. This is the noise that you have heard.

And also Solomon sits on the throne of the kingdom.

And also thus said the king, Blessed be the LORD God of Israel, who has given one to sit on my throne this day, my eyes even seeing it.

And Solomon said, If he will show himself a worthy man, there shall not a hair of him fall to the earth: but if wickedness shall be found in him, he shall die.

And keep the charge of the LORD your God, to walk in his ways, to keep his statutes, and his commandments, and his judgments, and his testimonies, as it is written in the law of Moses, that you may prosper in all that you do, and wherever you turn yourself:

That the LORD may continue his word which he spoke concerning me, saying, If your children take heed to their way, to walk before me in truth with all their heart and with all their soul, there shall not fail you (said he) a man on the throne of Israel.

Moreover you know also what Joab the son of Zeruiah did to me, and what he did to the two captains of the armies of Israel, unto Abner the son of Ner, and unto Amasa the son of Jether, whom he slew, and shed the blood of war in peace, and put the blood of war upon his belt that was about his loins, and in his shoes that were on his feet.

Do therefore according to your wisdom, and let not his gray head go down to the grave in peace.

But show kindness unto the sons of Barzillai the Gileadite, and let them be of those that eat at your table: for so they came to me when I fled because of Absalom your brother.

And, behold, you have with you Shimei the son of Gera, a Benjamite of Bahurim, who cursed me with a grievous curse in the day when I went to Mahanaim: but he came down to meet me at Jordan, and I swore to him by the LORD, saying, I will not put you to death with the sword.

So David slept with his fathers, and was buried in the city of David.

And the days that David reigned over Israel were forty years: seven years reigned he in Hebron, and thirty and three years reigned he in Jerusalem.

He said moreover, I have somewhat to say unto you. And she said, Say on.

And he said, You know that the kingdom was mine, and that all Israel set their faces on me, that I should reign: however the kingdom has turned about, and has become my brother's: for it was his from the LORD.

And now I ask one petition of you, deny me not. And she said unto him, Say on.

Bath-sheba therefore went unto king Solomon, to speak unto him for Adonijah. And the king rose up to meet her, and bowed himself unto her, and sat down on his throne, and caused a seat to be set for the king's mother; and she sat on his right hand.

Then she said, I desire one small petition of you; I pray you, say not nay to me. And the king said unto her, Ask on, my mother: for I will not say nay to you.

Then king Solomon swore by the LORD, saying, God do so to me, and more also, if Adonijah has not spoken this word against his own life.

Now therefore, as the LORD lives, who has established me, and set me on the throne of David my father, and who has made me a house, as he promised, Adonijah shall be put to death this day.

And unto Abiathar the priest said the king, Get you to Anathoth, unto your own fields; for you are worthy of death: but I will not at this time put you to death, because you bore the ark of the Lord GOD before David my father, and because you have been afflicted in all in which my father was afflicted.

So Solomon thrust out Abiathar from being priest unto the LORD; that he might fulfill the word of the LORD, which he spoke concerning the house of Eli in Shiloh.

Then tidings came to Joab: for Joab had turned after Adonijah, though he turned not after Absalom. And Joab fled unto the tabernacle of the LORD, and caught hold on the horns of the altar.

And the LORD shall return his blood upon his own head, who struck down two men more righteous and better than he, and slew them with the sword, my father David not knowing of it, Abner the son of Ner, captain of the army of Israel, and Amasa the son of Jether, captain of the army of Judah.

So Benaiah the son of Jehoiada went up, and struck him down, and slew him: and he was buried in his own house in the wilderness.

And the king put Benaiah the son of Jehoiada in his place over the army: and Zadok the priest did the king put in the place of Abiathar.

And the king sent and called for Shimei, and said unto him, Build you a house in Jerusalem, and dwell there, and go not forth from there anywhere.

For it shall be, that on the day you go out, and pass over the brook Kidron, you shall know for certain that you shall surely die: your blood shall be upon your own head.

And Shimei said unto the king, The saying is good: as my lord the king has said, so will your servant do. And Shimei dwelt in Jerusalem many days.

And it came to pass at the end of three years, that two of the servants of Shimei ran away unto Achish son of Maachah king of Gath. And they told Shimei, saying, Behold, your servants are in Gath.

And the king sent and called for Shimei, and said unto him, Did I not make you to swear by the LORD, and admonished you, saying, Know for a certain, on the day you go out, and travel anywhere, that you shall surely die? and you said unto me, The word that I have heard is good.

The king said moreover to Shimei, You know all the wickedness which was in your heart, that you did to David my father: therefore the LORD shall return your wickedness upon your own head;

So the king commanded Benaiah the son of Jehoiada; who went out, and struck him, so that he died. And the kingdom was established in the hand of Solomon.

And Solomon made a treaty with Pharaoh king of Egypt, and took Pharaoh's daughter, and brought her into the city of David, until he had made an end of building his own house, and the house of the LORD, and the wall of Jerusalem round about.

However the people sacrificed in high places, because there was no house built unto the name of the LORD, until those days.

And Solomon loved the LORD, walking in the statutes of David his father: except that he sacrificed and burnt incense in high places.

In Gibeon the LORD appeared to Solomon in a dream by night: and God said, Ask what I shall give you.

And Solomon said, You have shown unto your servant David my father great mercy, according as he walked before you in truth, and in righteousness, and in uprightness of heart with you; and you have kept for him this great kindness, that you have given him a son to sit on his throne, as it is this day.

And now, O LORD my God, you have made your servant king instead of David my father: and I am but a little child: I know not how to go out or come in.

And your servant is in the midst of your people whom you have chosen, a great people, that cannot be numbered nor counted for multitude.

Give therefore your servant an understanding heart to judge your people, that I may discern between good and bad: for who is able to judge this your so great a people?

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

And if you will walk in my ways, to keep my statutes and my commandments, as your father David did walk, then I will lengthen your days.

And the one woman said, O my lord, I and this woman dwell in one house; and I was delivered of a child with her in the house.

And it came to pass the third day after that I was delivered, that this woman was delivered also: and we were together; there was no stranger with us in the house, except we two in the house.

And this woman's child died in the night; because she laid on it.

And she arose at midnight, and took my son from beside me, while your handmaid slept, and laid it in her bosom, and laid her dead child in my bosom.

And when I rose in the morning to nurse my child, behold, it was dead: but when I had looked at it in the morning, behold, it was not my son, whom I did bear.

Then said the king, The one says, This is my son that lives, and your son is dead: and the other says, Nay; but your son is dead, and my son is living.

And the king said, Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one, and half to the other.

And all Israel heard of the judgment which the king had judged; and they feared the king: for they saw that the wisdom of God was in him, to do justice.

And Solomon had twelve officers over all Israel, who provided food for the king and his household: each man his month in a year made provision.

And these are their names: The son of Hur, in mount Ephraim:

The son of Dekar, in Makaz, and in Shaalbim, and Beth-shemesh, and Elon-beth-hanan:

The son of Hesed, in Arubboth; to him belonged Socoh, and all the land of Hepher:

The son of Abinadab, in all the region of Dor; who had Taphath the daughter of Solomon as his wife:

Baana the son of Ahilud; in Taanach and Megiddo, and all Beth-shean, which is by Zarethan below Jezreel, from Beth-shean to Abel-meholah, even unto the place that is beyond Jokmeam:

The son of Geber, in Ramoth-gilead; to him belonged the towns of Jair the son of Manasseh, which are in Gilead; to him also belonged the region of Argob, which is in Bashan, threescore great cities with walls and bronze bars:

Ahimaaz was in Naphtali; he also took Basemath the daughter of Solomon as his wife:

Baana the son of Hushai was in Asher and in Aloth:

Jehoshaphat the son of Paruah, in Issachar:

Shimei the son of Ela, in Benjamin:

Geber the son of Uri was in the country of Gilead, in the country of Sihon king of the Amorites, and of Og king of Bashan; and he was the only officer who was in the land.

Judah and Israel were many, as the sand which is by the sea in multitude, eating and drinking, and rejoicing.

And Solomon's provision for one day was thirty cors of fine flour, and threescore cors of meal,

For he had dominion over all the region on this side of the river, from Tiphsah even to Gaza, over all the kings on this side of the river: and he had peace on all sides round about him.

And those officers provided food for king Solomon, and for all that came unto king Solomon's table, every man in his month: they lacked nothing.

And God gave Solomon wisdom and exceedingly great understanding, and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the seashore.

For he was wiser than all men; than Ethan the Ezrahite, and Heman, and Calcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol: and his fame was in all nations round about.

And he spoke of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springs out of the wall: he spoke also of beasts, and of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes.

And Hiram king of Tyre sent his servants unto Solomon; for he had heard that they had anointed him king in the place of his father: for Hiram was always a lover of David.

You know how that David my father could not build a house unto the name of the LORD his God for the wars which were about him on every side, until the LORD put them under the soles of his feet.

But now the LORD my God has given me rest on every side, so that there is neither adversary nor misfortune.

And, behold, I purpose to build a house unto the name of the LORD my God, as the LORD spoke unto David my father, saying, Your son, whom I will set upon your throne in your place, he shall build a house unto my name.

And it came to pass, when Hiram heard the words of Solomon, that he rejoiced greatly, and said, Blessed be the LORD this day, who has given unto David a wise son over this great people.

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

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

And Solomon had threescore and ten thousand that bore burdens, and fourscore thousand quarried stone in the mountains;

Besides the chief of Solomon's officers who were over the work, three thousand and three hundred, who ruled over the people that labored in the work.

And it came to pass in the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel were come out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon's reign over Israel, in the month Ziv, which is the second month, that he began to build the house of the LORD.