1 Kings 9

¹¹When Solomon had finished the house of the Lord and the royal palace, successfully carrying out all that was in his heart to do for the house of the Lord and for his own palace,

¹⁹as well as all the store cities that Solomon had for his chariots and horses—whatever he desired to build in Jerusalem, Lebanon, and throughout the land of his dominion.

⁵¹So all the work that King Solomon had performed for the house of the Lord was completed. Then Solomon brought in the items his father David had dedicated—the silver, the gold, and the furnishings—and he placed them in the treasuries of the house of the Lord.

¹¹King Solomon gave twenty towns in the land of Galilee to Hiram king of Tyre, who had supplied him with cedar and cypress logs and gold for his every desire.

⁴I expanded my pursuits. I built houses and planted vineyards for myself.

¹⁰Anything my eyes desired, I did not deny myself. I refused my heart no pleasure. For my heart took delight in all my work, and this was the reward for all my labor.

⁵One night at Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon in a dream, and God said, “Ask, and I will give it to you!”

¹²the Lord appeared to him at night and said to him: “I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice.

⁹Now the Lord grew angry with Solomon, because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice.

⁷That night God appeared to Solomon and said, “Ask, and I will give it to you!”

⁸Solomon replied to God: “You have shown much loving devotion to my father David, and You have made me king in his place.

²⁹May Your eyes be open toward this temple night and day, toward the place of which You said, ‘My Name shall be there,’ so that You may hear the prayer that Your servant prays toward this place.

⁵“Go back and tell Hezekiah the leader of My people that this is what the Lord, the God of your father David, says: ‘I have heard your prayer; I have seen your tears. I will surely heal you. On the third day from now you will go up to the house of the Lord.

¹⁷You have heard, O Lord, the desire of the humble; You will strengthen their hearts. You will incline Your ear,

¹⁴And this is the confidence that we have before Him: If we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.

¹²It is a land for which the Lord your God cares; the eyes of the Lord your God are always on it, from the beginning to the end of the year.

¹I love the Lord, for He has heard my voice—my appeal for mercy.

⁵For David had done what was right in the eyes of the Lord and had not turned aside from anything the Lord commanded all the days of his life, except in the matter of Uriah the Hittite.

¹⁴So if you walk in My ways and keep My statutes and commandments, just as your father David did, I will prolong your days.”

¹When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to him and said, “I am God Almighty. Walk before Me and be blameless.

⁴For when Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and he was not wholeheartedly devoted to the Lord his God, as his father David had been.

⁶So Solomon did evil in the sight of the Lord; unlike his father David, he did not follow the Lord completely.

¹¹But I will walk with integrity; redeem me and be merciful to me.

⁴and so that the Lord may fulfill His promise to me: ‘If your descendants take heed to walk faithfully before Me with all their heart and soul, you will never fail to have a man on the throne of Israel.’

¹²“As for this temple you are building, if you walk in My statutes, carry out My ordinances, and keep all My commandments by walking in them, I will fulfill through you the promise I made to your father David.

¹⁶Your house and kingdom will endure forever before Me, and your throne will be established forever.”

¹²And when your days are fulfilled and you rest with your fathers, I will raise up your descendant after you, who will come from your own body, and I will establish his kingdom.

²⁸I will forever preserve My loving devotion for him, and My covenant with him will stand fast.

²⁹I will establish his line forever, his throne as long as the heavens endure.

²⁰Now the Lord has fulfilled the word that He spoke. I have succeeded my father David, and I sit on the throne of Israel, as the Lord promised. I have built the house for the Name of the Lord, the God of Israel.

¹⁴I will be his Father, and he will be My son. When he does wrong, I will discipline him with the rod of men and with the blows of the sons of men.

¹⁵But My loving devotion will never be removed from him as I removed it from Saul, whom I removed from before you.

⁹As for you, Solomon my son, know the God of your father and serve Him wholeheartedly and with a willing mind, for the Lord searches every heart and understands the intent of every thought. If you seek Him, He will be found by you; but if you forsake Him, He will reject you forever.

¹⁹But if you turn away and forsake the statutes and commandments I have set before you, and if you go off to serve and worship other gods,

²⁰then I will uproot Israel from the soil I have given them, and I will banish from My presence this temple I have sanctified for My Name. I will make it an object of scorn and ridicule among all the peoples.

⁴For when Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and he was not wholeheartedly devoted to the Lord his God, as his father David had been.

⁵Solomon followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians and Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites.

³⁰If his sons forsake My law and do not walk in My judgments,

³⁰Therefore, the Lord, the God of Israel, declares: ‘I did indeed say that your house and the house of your father would walk before Me forever. But now the Lord declares: Far be it from Me! For I will honor those who honor Me, but those who despise Me will be disdained.

¹⁴You have made us a byword among the nations, a laughingstock among the peoples.

⁹I will make them a horror and an offense to all the kingdoms of the earth, a disgrace and an object of scorn, ridicule, and cursing wherever I have banished them.

³⁷You will become an object of horror, scorn, and ridicule among all the nations to which the Lord will drive you.

²⁶I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you this day that you will quickly perish from the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess. You will not live long upon it, but will be utterly destroyed.

²¹There at Riblah in the land of Hamath, the king of Babylon struck them down and put them to death. So Judah was taken into exile, away from its own land.

²⁴Do not defile yourselves by any of these practices, for by all these things the nations I am driving out before you have defiled themselves.

²⁵Even the land has become defiled, so I am punishing it for its sin, and the land will vomit out its inhabitants.

⁸And many nations will pass by this city and ask one another, ‘Why has the Lord done such a thing to this great city?’

⁹Then people will reply, ‘Because they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord their God and have worshiped and served other gods.’”

²⁴So all the nations will ask, ‘Why has the Lord done such a thing to this land? Why this great outburst of anger?’

²⁵And the people will answer, ‘It is because they abandoned the covenant of the Lord, the God of their fathers, which He made with them when He brought them out of the land of Egypt.

²¹And when this temple has become a heap of rubble, all who pass by it will be appalled and say, ‘Why has the Lord done such a thing to this land and to this temple?’

⁸I will make this city a desolation and an object of scorn. All who pass by will be appalled and will scoff at all her wounds.

²⁸Is this man Coniah a despised and shattered pot, a jar that no one wants? Why are he and his descendants hurled out and cast into a land they do not know?

¹³Because of the wrath of the Lord, she will not be inhabited; she will become completely desolate. All who pass through Babylon will be horrified and will hiss at all her wounds.

¹⁹Your own evil will discipline you; your own apostasies will reprimand you. Consider and realize how evil and bitter it is for you to forsake the Lord your God and to have no fear of Me,” declares the Lord God of Hosts.

¹⁹And when the people ask, ‘For what offense has the Lord our God done all these things to us?’ You are to tell them, ‘Just as you have forsaken Me and served foreign gods in your land, so will you serve foreigners in a land that is not your own.’”

¹⁰Cross over to the coasts of Cyprus and take a look; send to Kedar and consider carefully; see if there has ever been anything like this:

¹¹Has a nation ever changed its gods? (Yet they are not gods at all.) But My people have exchanged their Glory for useless idols.

²²And others will answer, ‘Because they have forsaken the Lord, the God of their fathers, who brought them out of the land of Egypt, and have embraced other gods, worshiping and serving them—because of this, He has brought all this disaster upon them.’”

²⁵And the people will answer, ‘It is because they abandoned the covenant of the Lord, the God of their fathers, which He made with them when He brought them out of the land of Egypt.

²⁶They went and served other gods, and they worshiped gods they had not known—gods that the Lord had not given to them.

⁴“I will stretch out My hand against Judah and against all who dwell in Jerusalem. I will cut off from this place every remnant of Baal, the names of the idolatrous and pagan priests—

⁵those who bow on the rooftops to worship the host of heaven, those who bow down and swear by the Lord but also swear by Milcom,

³⁷The foundation of the house of the Lord was laid in the fourth year of Solomon’s reign, in the month of Ziv.

¹Now at the end of the twenty years during which Solomon had built the house of the Lord and his own palace,

²Solomon rebuilt the cities Hiram had given him and settled Israelites there.

¹Now when Solomon had finished building the house of the Lord and the royal palace, and had achieved all that he had desired to do,

²Solomon rebuilt the cities Hiram had given him and settled Israelites there.

¹⁶We will cut logs from Lebanon, as many as you need, and we will float them to you as rafts by sea down to Joppa. Then you can take them up to Jerusalem.”

⁷So they set apart Kedesh in Galilee in the hill country of Naphtali, Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim, and Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the hill country of Judah.

⁶Now therefore, order that cedars of Lebanon be cut down for me. My servants will be with your servants, and I will pay your servants whatever wages you set, for you know that there are none among us as skilled in logging as the Sidonians.”

⁷When Hiram received Solomon’s message, he rejoiced greatly and said, “Blessed be the Lord this day! He has given David a wise son over this great people!”

⁸Send me also cedar, cypress, and algum logs from Lebanon, for I know that your servants have skill to cut timber there. And indeed, my servants will work with yours

⁹to prepare for me timber in abundance, because the temple I am building will be great and wonderful.

³⁴“I have sinned,” Balaam said to the angel of the Lord, “for I did not realize that you were standing in the road to confront me. And now, if this is displeasing in your sight, I will go back home.”

³But his father and mother replied, “Can’t you find a young woman among your relatives or among any of our people? Must you go to the uncircumcised Philistines to get a wife?” But Samson told his father, “Get her for me, for she is pleasing to my eyes.”

²⁷then turned eastward toward Beth-dagon, touched Zebulun and the Valley of Iphtah-el, and went north to Beth-emek and Neiel, passing Cabul on the left.

⁹This is what the Lord says: “For three transgressions of Tyre, even four, I will not revoke My judgment, because they delivered up a whole congregation of exiles to Edom and broke a covenant of brotherhood.

¹Now when Hiram king of Tyre heard that Solomon had been anointed king in his father’s place, he sent envoys to Solomon; for Hiram had always been a friend of David.

²And Solomon relayed this message to Hiram:

¹¹King Solomon gave twenty towns in the land of Galilee to Hiram king of Tyre, who had supplied him with cedar and cypress logs and gold for his every desire.

¹⁴The weight of gold that came to Solomon each year was 666 talents,

¹⁰Then she gave the king 120 talents of gold, a great quantity of spices, and precious stones. Never again were spices in such abundance brought in as those the queen of Sheba gave to King Solomon.

²¹All King Solomon’s drinking cups were gold, and all the utensils of the House of the Forest of Lebanon were pure gold. There was no silver, because it was accounted as nothing in the days of Solomon.

²⁸They sailed to Ophir and imported gold from there—420 talents—and delivered it to Solomon.

²⁴As soon as Pharaoh’s daughter had come up from the City of David to the palace that Solomon had built for her, he built the supporting terraces.

⁹So David took up residence in the fortress and called it the City of David. He built it up all the way around, from the supporting terraces inward.

¹¹Within Issachar and Asher, Manasseh was assigned Beth-shean, Ibleam, Dor (that is, Naphath), Endor, Taanach, and Megiddo, each with their surrounding settlements.

¹³Then King Solomon conscripted a labor force of 30,000 men from all Israel.

³⁶Adamah, Ramah, Hazor,

¹Now when Jabin king of Hazor heard about these things, he sent word to Jobab king of Madon; to the kings of Shimron and Achshaph;

¹Later, Solomon formed an alliance with Pharaoh king of Egypt by marrying his daughter. Solomon brought her to the City of David until he had finished building his palace and the house of the Lord, as well as the wall around Jerusalem.

²⁴As soon as Pharaoh’s daughter had come up from the City of David to the palace that Solomon had built for her, he built the supporting terraces.

⁸And the palace where Solomon would live, set further back, was of similar construction. He also made a palace like this hall for Pharaoh’s daughter, whom he had married.

¹⁰But they did not drive out the Canaanites who lived in Gezer. So the Canaanites dwell among the Ephraimites to this day, but they are forced laborers.

³Then it descended westward to the border of the Japhletites as far as the border of Lower Beth-horon and on to Gezer, and it ended at the Sea.

²²Kibzaim, and Beth-horon—four cities, together with their pasturelands.

¹⁰And the Lord threw them into confusion before Israel, who defeated them in a great slaughter at Gibeon, pursued them along the ascent to Beth-horon, and struck them down as far as Azekah and Makkedah.

⁴He built Tadmor in the wilderness, in addition to all the store cities that he had built in Hamath.

⁵He rebuilt Upper and Lower Beth-horon as fortified cities with walls, gates, and bars,

⁴⁴Eltekeh, Gibbethon, Baalath,

⁴⁴Eltekeh, Gibbethon, Baalath,

⁴He built Tadmor in the wilderness, in addition to all the store cities that he had built in Hamath.

¹Now when Solomon had finished building the house of the Lord and the royal palace, and had achieved all that he had desired to do,

²⁶Solomon accumulated 1,400 chariots and 12,000 horses, which he stationed in the chariot cities and also with him in Jerusalem.

¹⁰Anything my eyes desired, I did not deny myself. I refused my heart no pleasure. For my heart took delight in all my work, and this was the reward for all my labor.

¹¹So the Egyptians appointed taskmasters over the Israelites to oppress them with forced labor. As a result, they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh.

⁹Better what the eye can see than the wandering of desire. This too is futile and a pursuit of the wind.

¹⁴Solomon accumulated 1,400 chariots and 12,000 horses, which he stationed in the chariot cities and also with him in Jerusalem.

²⁸I will send the hornet before you to drive the Hivites and Canaanites and Hittites out of your way.

²⁹I will not drive them out before you in a single year; otherwise the land would become desolate and wild animals would multiply against you.

⁷As for all the people who remained of the Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites (these people were not Israelites)—

⁸their descendants who remained in the land, those whom the Israelites had not destroyed—Solomon conscripted these people to be forced laborers, as they are to this day.

¹¹Observe what I command you this day. I will drive out before you the Amorites, Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites.

¹²Be careful not to make a treaty with the inhabitants of the land you are entering, lest they become a snare in your midst.

²³For My angel will go before you and bring you into the land of the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites, and Jebusites, and I will annihilate them.

¹When the Lord your God brings you into the land that you are entering to possess, and He drives out before you many nations—the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites, seven nations larger and stronger than you—

²and when the Lord your God has delivered them over to you to defeat them, then you must devote them to complete destruction. Make no treaty with them and show them no mercy.

¹⁹the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites,

²⁰Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites,

⁶³But the descendants of Judah could not drive out the Jebusites living in Jerusalem. So to this day the Jebusites live there among the descendants of Judah.

²¹The Benjamites, however, failed to drive out the Jebusites living in Jerusalem. So to this day the Jebusites live there among the Benjamites.

¹²But the descendants of Manasseh were unable to occupy these cities, because the Canaanites were determined to stay in this land.

²⁵he said, “Cursed be Canaan! A servant of servants shall he be to his brothers.”

²⁶He also declared: “Blessed be the Lord, the God of Shem! May Canaan be the servant of Shem.

⁵⁵The descendants of the servants of Solomon: the descendants of Sotai, the descendants of Hassophereth, the descendants of Peruda,

⁵⁶the descendants of Jaala, the descendants of Darkon, the descendants of Giddel,

⁵⁷The descendants of the servants of Solomon: the descendants of Sotai, the descendants of Sophereth, the descendants of Perida,

³⁹If a countryman among you becomes destitute and sells himself to you, then you must not force him into slave labor.

⁹But Solomon did not consign any of the Israelites to slave labor, because they were his men of war, the leaders of his captains, and the commanders of his chariots and cavalry.

¹⁰They were also the chief officers for King Solomon: 250 supervisors.

¹So King Solomon ruled over Israel,

²and these were his chief officials: Azariah son of Zadok was the priest;

¹¹He said, “This will be the manner of the king who will reign over you: He will take your sons and appoint them to serve his own chariots and horses, and to run in front of his chariots.

¹²He will appoint some for himself as commanders of thousands and of fifties, and others to plow his ground, to reap his harvest, and to make his weapons of war and equipment for his chariots.

¹⁶not including his 3,300 foremen who supervised the workers.

¹⁰They were also the chief officers for King Solomon: 250 supervisors.

¹⁸Solomon made 70,000 of them porters, 80,000 stonecutters in the mountains, and 3,600 supervisors.

⁸And the palace where Solomon would live, set further back, was of similar construction. He also made a palace like this hall for Pharaoh’s daughter, whom he had married.

⁹So David took up residence in the fortress and called it the City of David. He built it up all the way around, from the supporting terraces inward.

⁵Then Hezekiah worked resolutely to rebuild all the broken sections of the wall and to raise up towers on it. He also built an outer wall and reinforced the supporting terraces of the City of David, and he produced an abundance of weapons and shields.

²⁷and this is the account of his rebellion against the king. Solomon had built the supporting terraces and repaired the gap in the wall of the city of his father David.

¹Later, Solomon formed an alliance with Pharaoh king of Egypt by marrying his daughter. Solomon brought her to the City of David until he had finished building his palace and the house of the Lord, as well as the wall around Jerusalem.

¹⁵This is the account of the forced labor that King Solomon imposed to build the house of the Lord, his own palace, the supporting terraces, and the wall of Jerusalem, as well as Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer.

¹⁶Pharaoh king of Egypt had attacked and captured Gezer. He had set it on fire, killed the Canaanites who lived in the city, and given it as a dowry to his daughter, Solomon’s wife.

¹⁴Three times a year you are to celebrate a feast to Me.

¹⁵You are to keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread as I commanded you: At the appointed time in the month of Abib you are to eat unleavened bread for seven days, because that was the month you came out of Egypt. No one may appear before Me empty-handed.

¹²At that time Solomon offered burnt offerings to the Lord on the altar of the Lord he had built in front of the portico.

¹³He observed the daily requirement for offerings according to the commandment of Moses for Sabbaths, New Moons, and the three annual appointed feasts—the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Weeks, and the Feast of Tabernacles.

¹⁶Three times a year all your men are to appear before the Lord your God in the place He will choose: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Weeks, and the Feast of Tabernacles. No one should appear before the Lord empty-handed.

¹⁶Thus all the work of Solomon was carried out, from the day the foundation was laid for the house of the Lord until it was finished. So the house of the Lord was completed.

²⁵because they have forsaken Me and burned incense to other gods, that they might provoke Me to anger with all the works of their hands. My wrath will be poured out upon this place and will not be quenched.’

¹¹Now, my sons, do not be negligent, for the Lord has chosen you to stand before Him, to serve Him, to minister before Him, and to burn incense.”

⁴⁸Jehoshaphat built ships of Tarshish to go to Ophir for gold, but they never set sail, because they were wrecked at Ezion-geber.

³⁵They set out from Abronah and camped at Ezion-geber.

⁸So we passed by our brothers, the descendants of Esau, who live in Seir. We turned away from the Arabah road, which comes up from Elath and Ezion-geber, and traveled along the road of the Wilderness of Moab.

¹⁷Then Solomon went to Ezion-geber and to Eloth on the coast of Edom.

¹⁸So Hiram sent him ships captained by his servants, along with crews of experienced sailors. They went with Solomon’s servants to Ophir and acquired from there 450 talents of gold, which they delivered to King Solomon.

²²Azariah was the one who rebuilt Elath and restored it to Judah after King Amaziah rested with his fathers.

¹¹Solomon brought the daughter of Pharaoh up from the City of David to the palace he had built for her. For he said, “My wife must not live in the house of David king of Israel, because the places the ark of the Lord has entered are holy.”

¹²At that time Solomon offered burnt offerings to the Lord on the altar of the Lord he had built in front of the portico.

⁹My servants will haul the logs from Lebanon to the Sea, and I will float them as rafts by sea to the place you specify. There I will separate the logs, and you can take them away. And in exchange, you can meet my needs by providing my household with food.”

¹¹(The fleet of Hiram that brought gold from Ophir also brought from Ophir a great cargo of almug wood and precious stones.

⁶Now therefore, order that cedars of Lebanon be cut down for me. My servants will be with your servants, and I will pay your servants whatever wages you set, for you know that there are none among us as skilled in logging as the Sidonians.”

⁴⁹At that time Ahaziah son of Ahab said to Jehoshaphat, “Let my servants sail with your servants,” but Jehoshaphat refused.

³⁶They agreed to make ships to go to Tarshish, and these were built in Ezion-geber.

³⁷Then Eliezer son of Dodavahu of Mareshah prophesied against Jehoshaphat, saying, “Because you have allied yourself with Ahaziah, the Lord has destroyed your works.” So the ships were wrecked and were unable to sail to Tarshish.

⁴three thousand talents of gold (the gold of Ophir) and seven thousand talents of refined silver, to overlay the walls of the buildings,

¹⁸So Hiram sent him ships captained by his servants, along with crews of experienced sailors. They went with Solomon’s servants to Ophir and acquired from there 450 talents of gold, which they delivered to King Solomon.

¹⁶It cannot be valued in the gold of Ophir, in precious onyx or sapphire.

¹¹(The fleet of Hiram that brought gold from Ophir also brought from Ophir a great cargo of almug wood and precious stones.

¹²I will make man scarcer than pure gold, and mankind rarer than the gold of Ophir.

²⁴and consign your gold to the dust and the gold of Ophir to the stones of the ravines,