As David's son Solomon consolidated his administration, the LORD his God was with him to make him very successful.

In that night did God appear unto Solomon, and said unto him, Ask what I shall give thee.

Solomon replied to God, "You showed great gracious love to my father David, and have established me as king in his place.

Now, Jehovah Elohim, let thy word unto David my father be firm; for thou hast made me king over a people numerous as the dust of the earth.

And God saith to Solomon, 'Because that this hath been with thy heart, and thou hast not asked riches, wealth, and honour, and the life of those hating thee, and also many days hast not asked, and dost ask for thyself wisdom and knowledge, so that thou dost judge My people over which I have caused thee to reign --

Wisdom and knowledge is granted unto thee; and I will give thee riches, and wealth, and honour, such as none of the kings have had that have been before thee, neither shall there any after thee have the like.

And the king made silver and gold at Jerusalem as plenteous as stones, and cedar trees made he as the sycomore trees that are in the vale for abundance.

And they imported chariots from Egypt for 600 shekels of silver apiece, and horses for 150 apiece; and in the same way they exported horses to all the kings of the Hittites and the kings of the Arameans (Syrians).

Now it was Solomon's purpose to put up a house for the name of the Lord and a house for himself as king.

so he assigned 70,000 men as porters, 80,000 men as stonecutters in the mountains, and 3,600 as supervisors over them.

And Solomon sent to Huram the king of Tyre, saying, As thou didst deal with David my father, and didst send him cedars to build him an house to dwell therein, even so deal with me.

Observe, I am about to build a house for the Name of the Lord my God, dedicated to Him, to burn fragrant incense [of sweet spices] before Him, to set out the showbread continually, and to offer burnt offerings morning and evening, on Sabbaths, New Moons, and on the festivals of the Lord our God, as ordained forever in Israel.

But who is able to build a house for Him, since the heavens and [even] the highest heavens cannot contain Him? Who am I to build a house for Him, except [as a place] to burn incense before Him?

"At any rate, send me an individual who is a skilled craftsman in gold, silver, bronze, and iron, as well as in purple, crimson, and blue materials, who knows how to craft engravings, so he may work with the craftsmen whom I have assembled in Judah and Jerusalem, as provided for by my father David.

And I will give as food to your servants, the wood-cutters, twenty thousand measures of grain, and twenty thousand measures of barley and twenty thousand measures of wine and twenty thousand measures of oil.

Then King Hiram of Tyre wrote a letter and sent it to Solomon:

Because the Lord loves His people, He set you over them as king.

Hiram said also, “Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who made heaven and earth, who has given King David a wise son, endowed with discretion and understanding, who will build a house for the Lord and a royal palace for himself.

And now I am sending you a wise and expert man, Huram who is as my father,

He is the son of a mother from the tribe of Dan, and his father is from Tyre. He's skilled in working with gold, silver, bronze, iron, stone, and timber, as well as in purple, blue, linen, and crimson materials. He is skilled in engravings, and can craft any design to which he may be assigned. He will work with your skilled artisans and with all of your craftsmen who have been assigned by my lord David, your father.

'And, now, the wheat, and the barley, the oil, and the wine, as my lord said, let him send to his servants,

And we will cut wood out of Lebanon, as much as thou shalt need: and we will bring it to thee in floats by sea to Joppa; and thou shalt carry it up to Jerusalem.

Then Solomon took the number of all the men from strange lands who were living in Israel, as his father David had done; there were a hundred and fifty-three thousand, six hundred.

He assigned 70,000 of them to carry loads and 80,000 to quarry stone in the mountain, and 3,600 as overseers to make the people work.

As to the porch that is on the front, the length is by the front of the breadth of the house, twenty cubits, and the height a hundred and twenty, and he overlayeth it within with pure gold.

Then he overlaid the house with precious stone as decoration. (Now the gold [was] the gold of Parvaim.)

as to the wings of the cherubs, their length is twenty cubits, the wing of the one is five cubits, touching the wall of the house, and the other wing is five cubits, touching the wing of the other cherub.

The wings of these cherubim extended for 20 cubits as they stood on their feet and faced the front of the Temple.

And he made chains, as in the oracle, and put them on the heads of the pillars; and made an hundred pomegranates, and put them on the chains.

Under it [were] figures of oxen all around it, ten cubits [high], encircling the sea all around. The oxen [were] in two rows {cast as one piece with it}.

And its thickness is a handbreadth, and its lip as the work of the lip of a cup flowered with lilies; taking hold -- baths three thousand it containeth.

He made also ten lavers, and put five on the right hand, and five on the left, to wash in them: such things as they offered for the burnt offering they washed in them; but the sea was for the priests to wash in.

And he made ten golden lampstands just as directed and set them in the temple, five on the right side and five on the left.

All the pots and the spades and the meat-hooks and their vessels, which Huram, who was as his father, made for King Solomon for the house of the Lord, were of polished brass.

and the lampstands with their lamps of pure gold, to burn in front of the inner sanctuary (the Holy of Holies) as directed;

and the snuffers, and the basins, and the spoons, and the firepans, of pure gold: and as for the entry of the house, the inner doors thereof for the most holy place, and the doors of the house, to wit , of the temple, were of gold.

As soon as Solomon had completed the LORD's Temple, he installed the holy items that had belonged to his father David, including the silver, gold, and all the other items in the treasure rooms of God's Temple.

As soon as all of Israel's elders had arrived, the descendants of Levi lifted the ark

And it happened as the priests came out of the holy place, for all the priests present were sanctified, and did not wait by division.

All the musicians who were descendants of Levi, including Asaph, Heman, Jeduthun, and their sons and relatives wore linen and played cymbals and stringed instruments as they stood east of the altar. Accompanied by 120 priests who played trumpets,

It came even to pass, as the trumpeters and singers were as one, to make one sound to be heard in praising and thanking the LORD; and when they lifted up their voice with the trumpets and cymbals and instruments of musick, and praised the LORD, saying, For he is good; for his mercy endureth for ever: that then the house was filled with a cloud, even the house of the LORD;

But, I, have built a house as a home for thee, - A settled place for thee to abide in, for ages.

Then the king turned around and pronounced a blessing over the whole Israelite assembly as they stood there.

He told David, 'Since the day I brought my people out of the land of Egypt, I have not chosen a city from all the tribes of Israel to build a temple in which to live. Nor did I choose a man as leader of my people Israel.

But now I have chosen Jerusalem as a place to live, and I have chosen David to lead my people Israel.'

But the LORD said to David my father, Forasmuch as it was in thine heart to build an house for my name, thou didst well in that it was in thine heart:

The LORD therefore hath performed his word that he hath spoken: for I am risen up in the room of David my father, and am set on the throne of Israel, as the LORD promised, and have built the house for the name of the LORD God of Israel.

And he will say, O Jehovah God of Israel, not as thee a God in the heavens and in the earth, watching the covenant and the mercy to thy servants going before thee with all their heart:

Thou which hast kept with thy servant David my father that which thou hast promised him; and spakest with thy mouth, and hast fulfilled it with thine hand, as it is this day.

Now therefore, O LORD God of Israel, keep with thy servant David my father that which thou hast promised him, saying, There shall not fail thee a man in my sight to sit upon the throne of Israel; yet so that thy children take heed to their way to walk in my law, as thou hast walked before me.

Listen to the requests from your servant and from your people Israel as they pray in this direction, and listen from the place where you reside from heaven! then hear and forgive.

"If your people Israel are defeated in a battle with their enemy because they have sinned against you, when they return to you and confess to you, pray, and in this Temple they ask you to show grace to them,

then may you yourself hear from the heavens and forgive the sin of your servants and your people Israel, when you teach them the good way in which they should walk, and give rain upon your land that you have given to your people as an inheritance.

When all your people Israel pray and ask for help, as they acknowledge their intense pain and spread out their hands toward this temple,

thou shalt hear from heaven thy dwelling place, and shalt be merciful, and give every man according unto all his way, even as thou shalt know every man's heart: for thou only knowest the hearts of the children of Adam:

That they may fear thee, to walk in thy ways, so long as they live in the land which thou gavest unto our fathers.

And as to the stranger also, who is not of thy people Israel, but cometh out of a far country for thy great name's sake, and thy mighty hand and thy stretched-out arm; when they shall come and pray toward this house,

Then hear thou from the heavens, even from thy dwelling place, and do according to all that the stranger calleth to thee for; that all people of the earth may know thy name, and fear thee, as doth thy people Israel, and may know that this house which I have built is called by thy name.

When they sin against you--for there is no person who does not sin--and you become angry with them and place them before their enemy that they carry them away as captives to a land far or near,

if they return to you with all of their heart and with all of their soul in the land where they have been taken captive, as they pray in the direction of their land that you have given to their ancestors and to the city that you have chosen, and to the Temple that I have built for your name,

As soon as Solomon finished his prayer, fire descended from heaven and burned up the burnt offerings and sacrifices, and the glory of the LORD filled the Temple.

The priests and the Levites were standing at their stations. The Levites had the musical instruments of the Lord, which King David had made to praise the Lord—“for His faithful love endures forever”—when he offered praise with them. Across from the Levites, the priests were blowing trumpets, and all the people were standing.

So Solomon kept the feast at that time for seven days, and all Israel with him, a very great meeting, for the people had come together from the way into Hamath and from as far as the river of Egypt.

Then the Lord appeared to Solomon by night and said to him: “I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice.

And as for thee, if thou wilt walk before me, as David thy father walked, and do according to all that I have commanded thee, and shalt observe my statutes and my judgments;

Then will I stablish the throne of thy kingdom, according as I have covenanted with David thy father, saying, There shall not fail thee a man to be ruler in Israel.

then I will tear them up by the roots from the ground that I had given them! And as for this Temple that I have set apart for my name, I will throw it out of my sight and make it the butt of jokes and a means of ridicule among people worldwide!

And [as for] this house, which was exalted, all who pass by it will be appalled and will say, 'Why has Yahweh done thus to this land and to this house?'

As to the cities that Huram hath given to Solomon, Solomon hath built them, and there he causeth the sons of Israel to dwell.

He also built upper and lower Beth-horon as fortified cities, installing walls, gates, and bars,

As for all the people that were left of the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, which were not of Israel,

from the descendants who were left over after them in the land, whom the Israelites had not destroyed, Solomon conscripted them as forced labor until this day.

But from the {Israelites} Solomon did not give as servants for his work, but they [were] men of war, his commanders of his officers, and commanders of his chariots and his horses.

These men worked for Solomon as supervisors; there were a total of 250 of them who were in charge of the people.

even as the duty of every day required, offering according to the commandment of Moses, on the sabbaths, and on the new moons, and on the set feasts, three times in the year, even in the feast of unleavened bread, and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles.

And he appointed, according to the order of David his father, the courses of the priests to their service, and the Levites to their charges, to praise and minister before the priests, as the duty of every day required: the porters also by their courses at every gate: for so had David the man of God commanded.

neither departed they from the commandment of the king, concerning the priests and the Levites as to any duty, or as to the treasuries.

So all the work of Solomon was prepared, from the day of founding the house of Yahweh, even as far as the finishing thereof, - complete was the house of Yahweh.

And, the queen of Sheba, heard the report of Solomon, so she came to prove Solomon with abstruse questions, in Jerusalem, with a very great train, and camels bearing spices, and gold in abundance, and precious stones, - and, when she was come to Solomon, she spake with him, as to all that was near her heart.

Blessed be Yahweh your God who took delight in you, to put you on his throne as king for Yahweh your God! Because your God loved Israel, he established him forever and has put you over them as king to do justice and righteousness!"

And she gave the king an hundred and twenty talents of gold, and of spices great abundance, and precious stones: neither was there any such spice as the queen of Sheba gave king Solomon.

(Huram's servants, aided by Solomon's servants, brought gold from Ophir, as well as fine timber and precious gems.

The king used the algum wood to have steps made for the LORD's Temple and for the royal palace, as well as lyres and harps for the choir, and nothing like that wood had been seen before in the territory of Judah.

All King Solomon’s drinking vessels were of gold, and all the vessels of the house of the Forest of Lebanon were of pure gold; silver was not considered valuable in the days of Solomon.

And so King Solomon became greater than all the kings of the earth, - as to riches, and wisdom.

And each of them brought his gifts, objects of silver, objects of gold, cloaks, myrrh, spices, horses, and mules, [as] an amount year by year.

And he ruled over all the kings from the river as far as the land of the Philistines, and up to the border of Egypt.

And the king made silver in Jerusalem as stones, and cedar trees made he as the sycomore trees that are in the low plains in abundance.

As for the remainder of the words of Solomon [from] the first to the last, are they not written in the chronicles of Nathan the prophet and in the prophecy of Ahijah the Shilonite, and in the visions of Iddo the seer, concerning Jeroboam the son of Nebat?

Then Solomon died, as had his ancestors, and his son Rehoboam reigned in his place.

Rehoboam traveled to Shechem, because all of Israel went there to install him as king.

And it will be as Jeroboam son of Nebat heard, and he in Egypt where he fled from the face of Solomon the king, and Jeroboam will turn back from Egypt

"Your father made us work too hard! Now if you lighten the demands he made and don't make us work as hard, we will serve you."

while King Rehoboam conferred with his advisors who had worked with his father Solomon during his administration. He asked them, "What is your advice as to what response I should return to these people?"

And he said unto them, What do, ye, counsel that we should return as answer, unto this people, - who have spoken unto me saying, Lighten thou somewhat the yoke, which thy father put upon us?

So Jeroboam and all the people came to Rehoboam on the third day, as the king bade, saying, Come again to me on the third day.

But as for the children of Israel that dwelt in the cities of Judah, Rehoboam reigned over them.

And Rehoboam lived in Jerusalem, and he built cities as strongholds in Judah.

as Bethlehem, Etam and Tekoa;

and Zorah, and Aijalon and Hebron, which are in Judah and Benjamin, - as fortified cities.

He fortified these cities and placed officers in them, as well as storehouses of food, olive oil, and wine.