For I have been armed by you with strength for the fight: you have made low under me those who came out against me.

They were crying out, but there was no one to come to their help: even to the Lord, but he gave them no answer.

They will be wasted away, they will come out of their secret places shaking with fear.

It is God who sends punishment on my haters, and puts peoples under my rule.

It is as the light of the morning, when the sun comes up, a morning without clouds; making young grass come to life from the earth

For is not my house so with God? For he has made with me an eternal agreement, ordered in all things and certain: as for all my salvation and all my desire, will he not give it increase?

These are the names of David's men of war: Ishbaal the Hachmonite, chief of the three; his axe was lifted up against eight hundred put to death at one time.

And three of the thirty went down at the start of the grain-cutting, and they came to David at the strong place of Adullam; and the band of Philistines had taken up their position in the valley of Rephaim.

And at that time David had taken cover in the strong place, and an armed force of the Philistines was in Beth-lehem

And the three men, forcing their way through the Philistine army, got water from the water-hole of Beth-lehem, by the doorway into the town, and took it back to David: but he would not take it, but, draining it out, made an offering of it to the Lord.

And he said, Far be it from me, O Lord, to do this; how may I take as my drink the life-blood of men who have put their lives in danger? So he would not take it. These things did the three great men of war.

And he made an attack on an Egyptian, a tall man: and the Egyptian had a spear in his hand; but he went down to him with a stick, and pulling the spear out of the hands of the Egyptian, put him to death with that same spear

Heldai, the son of Baanah the Netophathite, Ittai, the son of Ribai of Gibeah of the children of Benjamin,

And Joab said to the king, Whatever the number of the people, may the Lord make it a hundred times as much, and may the eyes of my lord the king see it: but why does my lord the king take pleasure in doing this thing?

But the king's order was stronger than Joab and the captains of the army. And Joab and the captains of the army went out from the king, to take the number of the children of Israel.

And to the walled town of Tyre, and to all the towns of the Hivites and the Canaanites: and they went out to the South of Judah at Beer-sheba.

So after going through all the land in every direction, they came to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days.

And Joab gave the king the number of all the people: there were in Israel eight hundred thousand fighting men able to take up arms; and the men of Judah were five hundred thousand.

Go and say to David, The Lord says, Three things are offered to you: say which of them you will have, and I will do it to you.

So Gad came to David, and gave him word of this and said to him, Are there to be three years when there is not enough food in your land? or will you go in flight from your haters for three months, while they go after you? or will you have three days of violent disease in your land? take thought and say what answer I am to give to him who sent me.

And when the hand of the angel was stretched out in the direction of Jerusalem, for its destruction, the Lord had regret for the evil, and said to the angel who was sending destruction on the people, It is enough; do no more. And the angel of the Lord was by the grain-floor of Araunah the Jebusite.

And when David saw the angel who was causing the destruction of the people, he said to the Lord, Truly, the sin is mine; I have done wrong: but these are only sheep; what have they done? let your hand be against me and against my family.

And Araunah, looking out, saw the king and his servants coming to him: and Araunah went out, and went down on his face to the earth before the king.

And Araunah said to David, Let my lord the king take whatever seems right to him, and make an offering of it: see, here are the oxen for the burned offering, and the grain-cleaning instruments and the ox-yokes for wood:

And the king said to Araunah, No, but I will give you a price for it; I will not give to the Lord my God burned offerings for which I have given nothing. So David got the grain-floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.

Now she was very beautiful; and she took care of the king, waiting on him at all times; but the king had no connection with her.

Then Nathan said to Bath-sheba, the mother of Solomon, Has it not come to your ears that Adonijah, the son of Haggith, has made himself king without the knowledge of David our lord?

And Bath-sheba went down on her face on the earth before the king giving him honour. And he said, What is your desire?

For as things are, it will come about, when my lord the king is sleeping with his fathers, that I and Solomon my son will be made outlaws.

And Benaiah, the son of Jehoiada, answering the king, said, So be it: and may the Lord, the God of my lord the king, say so.

And Zadok the priest took the vessel of oil out of the Tent, and put the holy oil on Solomon. And when the horn was sounded, all the people said, Long life to King Solomon!

And it came to the ears of Adonijah and all the guests who were with him, when their meal was ended. And Joab, hearing the sound of the horn, said, What is the reason of this noise as if the town was worked up?

Then the king said, May the God of Israel be praised, who has given one of my seed to be king in my place this day and has let my eyes see it.

And they gave Solomon word of it, saying, See, Adonijah goes in such fear of King Solomon, that he has put his hands on the horns of the altar, saying, Let King Solomon first give me his oath that he will not put his servant to death with the sword.

So that the Lord may give effect to what he said of me, If your children give attention to their ways, living uprightly before me with all their heart and their soul, you will never be without a man to be king in Israel.

Now you have knowledge of what Joab, the son of Zeruiah, did to me, and to the two captains of the army of Israel, Abner, the son of Ner, and Amasa, the son of Jether, whom he put to death, taking payment for the blood of war in time of peace, and making the band of my clothing and the shoes on my feet red with the blood of one put to death without cause.

So be guided by your wisdom, and let not his white head go down to the underworld in peace.

But be good to the sons of Barzillai the Gileadite, and let them be guests at your table; for so they came to me when I went in flight from Absalom your brother.

Now you have with you Shimei, the son of Gera the Benjamite of Bahurim, who put a bitter curse on me on the day when I went to Mahanaim; but he came down to see me at Jordan, and I gave him my oath by the Lord, saying, I will not put you to death by the sword.

But do not let him be free from punishment, for you are a wise man; and it will be clear to you what you have to do with him; see that his white head goes down to the underworld in blood.

And he said, You saw how the kingdom was mine, and all Israel had the idea that I would be their king; but now the kingdom is turned about, and has become my brother's, for it was given to him by the Lord.

So Bath-sheba went to King Solomon to have talk with him on Adonijah's account. And the king got up to come to her, and went down low to the earth before her; then he took his place on the king's seat and had a seat made ready for the king's mother and she took her place at his right hand.

And Benaiah came to the Tent of the Lord and said to him, The king says, Come out. And he said, No; but let death come to me here. And Benaiah went back to the king and gave him word of the answer which Joab had given.

For be certain that on the day when you go out and go over the stream Kidron, death will overtake you: and your blood will be on your head.

Then the king sent for Shimei, and said to him, Did I not make you take an oath by the Lord, protesting to you and saying, Be certain that on the day when you go out from here, wherever you go, death will overtake you? and you said to me, Very well!

So the king gave orders to Benaiah, the son of Jehoiada; and he went out and, falling on him, put him to death. And Solomon's authority over the kingdom was complete.

And the king went to Gibeon to make an offering there, because that was the chief high place: it was Solomon's way to make a thousand burned offerings on that altar.

In Gibeon, Solomon had a vision of the Lord in a dream by night; and God said to him, Say what I am to give you.

And now, O Lord my God, you have made your servant king in the place of David my father; and I am only a young boy, with no knowledge of how to go out or come in.

Give your servant, then, a wise heart for judging your people, able to see what is good and what evil; for who is able to be the judge of this great people?

And with this I have given you what you made no request for: wealth and honour, so that no king was ever your equal.

And Solomon, awakening, saw that it was a dream; then he came to Jerusalem, where he went before the ark of the agreement of the Lord, offering burned offerings and peace-offerings; and he made a feast for all his servants.

And she got up in the middle of the night and took my son from my side while your servant was sleeping; and she took it in her arms and put her dead child in my arms.

And when I got up to give my child the breast, I saw that it was dead; but in the morning, looking at it with care, I saw that it was not my son.

Then the mother of the living child came forward, for her heart went out to her son, and she said, O my lord, give her the child; do not on any account put it to death. But the other woman said, It will not be mine or yours; let it be cut in two.

Then the king made answer and said, Give her the child, and do not put it to death; she is the mother of it.

Ahinadab, the son of Iddo, in Mahanaim;

And God gave Solomon a great store of wisdom and good sense, and a mind of wide range, as wide as the sand by the seaside.

And so it is my purpose to make a house for the name of the Lord my God, as he said to David my father, Your son, whom I will make king in your place, will be the builder of a house for my name.

So now, will you have cedar-trees from Lebanon cut down for me, and my servants will be with your servants; and I will give you payment for your servants at whatever rate you say; for it is common knowledge that we have no such wood-cutters among us as the men of Zidon.

Then Hiram sent to Solomon, saying; The words you sent have been given to me: I will do all your desire in the question of cedar-wood and cypress-wood.

My men will take them down from Lebanon to the sea, where I will have them corded together to go by sea to whatever place you say, and I will have them cut up there so that you may take them away; as for payment, it will be enough if you give me food for my people.

So Hiram gave Solomon all the cedar-wood and cypress-wood he had need of;

By the king's orders great stones, stones of high price, were cut out, so that the base of the house might be made of squared stone.

Solomon's builders and Hiram's builders did the work of cutting them, and put edges on them, and got the wood and the stone ready for the building of the house.

In the four hundred and eightieth year after the children of Israel came out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year that Solomon was king of Israel, in the month Ziv, which is the second month, the building of the Lord's house was started.

The house which Solomon made for the Lord was sixty cubits long, twenty cubits wide and thirty cubits high.

The covered way before the Temple of the house was twenty cubits long, as wide as the house, and ten cubits wide in front of the house.

The lowest line of them being five cubits wide, the middle six cubits wide and the third seven cubits; for there was a space all round the outside walls of the house so that the boards supporting the rooms did not have to be fixed in the walls of the house.

(And the stones used in the building of the house were squared at the place where they were cut out; there was no sound of hammer or axe or any iron instrument while they were building the house.)

So he put up the house and made it complete, roofing it with boards of cedar-wood.

And he put up the line of side rooms against the walls of the house, fifteen cubits high, resting against the house on boards of cedar-wood.

The walls of the house were covered inside with cedar-wood boards; from the floor to the roof of the house they were covered inside with wood; and the floor was covered with boards of cypress-wood.

And at the back of the house a further space of twenty cubits was shut in with boards of cedar-wood, for the inmost room.

(All the inside of the house was cedar-wood, ornamented with designs of buds and flowers; no stonework was to be seen inside.)

And the inmost room was twenty cubits square and twenty cubits high, plated over with clear gold, and he made an altar of cedar-wood, plating it with gold.

Plates of gold were put all through the house till it was covered completely (and the altar in the inmost room was all covered with gold).

In the inmost room he made two winged beings of olive-wood, ten cubits high;

With outstretched wings five cubits wide; the distance from the edge of one wing to the edge of the other was ten cubits.

And all the walls of the house inside and out were ornamented with forms of winged ones and palm-trees and open flowers.

And the floor of the house was covered with gold, inside and out.

For the way into the inmost room he made doors of olive-wood, the arch and the door supports forming a five-sided opening.

On the olive-wood doors were cut designs of winged ones and palm-trees and open flowers, all of them, with the doors, plated with gold.

Then he made pillars of olive-wood for the way into the Temple; the pillars were square:

And two folding doors of cypress-wood, with two leaves.

And the inner space was walled with three lines of squared stones and a line of cedar-wood boards.

And in the eleventh year, in the month Bul, which is the eighth month, the building of the house was complete in every detail, as it had been designed. So he was seven years building it.

Solomon was thirteen years building a house for himself till it was complete.

And he made the house of the Woods of Lebanon, which was a hundred cubits long and fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high, resting on four lines of cedar-wood pillars with cedar-wood supports on the pillars.

And it was covered with cedar over the forty-five supports which were on the pillars, fifteen in a line.

And he made a covered room of pillars, fifty cubits long and thirty cubits wide, and ... with steps before it.

Then he made a covered room for his high seat when he gave decisions; this was the covered room of judging; it was covered with cedar-wood from floor to roof.

And the house for his living-place, the other open square in the covered room, was made in the same way. And then he made a house like it for Pharaoh's daughter, whom Solomon had taken as his wife.

All these buildings were made, inside and out, from base to crowning stone, and outside to the great walled square, of highly priced stone, cut to different sizes with cutting-instruments.

And the base was of great masses of highly priced stone, some ten cubits and some eight cubits square.

Overhead were highly priced stones cut to measure, and cedar-wood.

The great outer square all round was walled with three lines of squared stones and a line of cedar-wood boards, round about the open square inside the house of the Lord and the covered room of the king's house.

He was the son of a widow of the tribe of Naphtali, and his father was a man of Tyre, a worker in brass; he was full of wisdom and knowledge and an expert worker in brass. He came to King Solomon and did all his work for him.

He it was who made the two brass pillars; the first pillar was eighteen cubits high, and a line of twelve cubits went round it; and the second was the same.

He put up the pillars at the doorway of the Temple, naming the one on the right Jachin, and that on the left Boaz.