Now King Solomon was king over all Israel.

And these were the officials with him: Azariah the son of Zadok, the priest;

Elihoreph and Ahijah, the sons of Shisha, scribes; Jehoshaphat the son of Ahilud, the recorder;

And Benaiah the son of Jehoiada was over the army; and Zadok and Abiathar were high priests;

And Azariah the son of Nathan was over the superintendents; and Zabud the son of Nathan was the principal officer, the king's friend;

And Ahishar was over the household; and Adoniram the son of Abda was over the forced labor.

And Solomon had twelve superintendents over all Israel, who provided food for the king and his house; each month of the year one had to provide food.

And these are their names: Ben-hur, in the hill country of Ephraim;

Ben-deker, in Makaz and in Shaalbim and Beth-shemesh and Elon-beth-hanan;

Ben-hesed, in Arubboth (to him pertained Socoh and all the land of Hepher);

Ben-abinadab, in all the highland of Dor (he had Taphath the daughter of Solomon as his wife);

Baana the son of Ahilud, in Taanach and Megiddo and all Beth-shean, which is beside Zarethan, beneath Jezreel, from Beth-shean to Abel-meholah, as far as beyond Jokmeam;

Ben-geber, in Ramoth-gilead (to him pertained the villages of Jair the son of Manasseh, which are in Gilead; and to him pertained the region of Argob, which is in Bashan, sixty great cities with walls and bronze bars);

Ahinadab the son of Iddo, in Mahanaim;

Ahimaaz, in Naphtali (he also took Basemath the daughter of Solomon as his wife);

Baana the son of Hushai, in Asher and  ¹Bealoth;

Jehoshaphat the son of Paruah, in Issachar;

Shimei the son of Ela, in Benjamin;

Geber the son of Uri, in the land of Gilead, the land of Sihon the king of the Amorites and Og the king of Bashan (and there was only one superintendent in that land).

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

And Solomon ruled over all the kingdoms from the  ¹River to the land of the Philistines and unto the border of Egypt; they brought tribute and served Solomon all the days of his life.

And Solomon's provisions for one day were thirty  ¹cors of fine flour and sixty cors of meal,

Ten fattened oxen and twenty pastured oxen and a hundred sheep, besides deer and gazelles and roebucks and fattened fowl.

For he had dominion over all the area west of the River, from Tiphsah to Gaza, over all the kings west of the River; and he had peace on all sides around him.

And Judah and Israel dwelt securely, every man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan to Beer-sheba, throughout all Solomon's days.

And Solomon had forty thousand stalls of horses for his chariots and twelve thousand horsemen.

And those superintendents provided food for King Solomon and for all who came to King Solomon's table, each in his month; they left nothing lacking.

And they also brought to the place where it should be, barley and straw for the horses and steeds, each according to his charge.

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

And Solomon's  ¹wisdom was greater than the wisdom of all the children of the east and all the wisdom of Egypt.

For he became wiser than all men, wiser than Ethan the Ezrahite, and Heman, and Calcol and Darda, the sons of Mahol. And his fame was among all the surrounding nations.

And he spoke three thousand proverbs, and his songs numbered a thousand and five.

And he discoursed about trees, from the cedar that is in Lebanon to the hyssop that shoots forth out of the wall; he also discoursed about animals and about birds and about creeping things and about fish.

And they  ¹came from all the peoples to hear the wisdom of Solomon, from all the kings of the earth who had heard of his wisdom.

Now Hiram the king of Tyre sent his servants to Solomon when he heard that they had anointed him king in place of his father, for Hiram had always loved David.

And Solomon sent word to Hiram, saying,

You know about David my father that he was not able to build a house for the name of Jehovah his God because of the warfare that his enemies surrounded him with, until Jehovah put them under the soles of his feet.

But now Jehovah my God has given me rest all around; there is no adversary or evil occurrence.

And now I intend to build a house for the name of Jehovah my God according to what Jehovah spoke to David my father, saying, Your son, whom I will put on your throne in your place, he will build the house for My name.

Now therefore command that they cut for me cedars from Lebanon. And my servants will be with your servants, and I will give you payment for your servants, according to whatever you say; for you know that among us there is no one who knows how to cut timber like the Sidonians.

And when Hiram heard Solomon's words, he rejoiced greatly and said, Blessed be Jehovah this day, who has given David a wise son over this great people.

And Hiram sent word to Solomon, saying, I have heard the message which you have sent me. I will do all your desire concerning  ¹cedar timber and  ¹cypress timber.

My servants will bring them down from Lebanon to the sea, and I will make them into rafts to go by sea to the place that you direct me; and I will break them apart there, and you can carry them off. And you can fulfill my desire by giving food to my household.

So Hiram gave Solomon cedar timber and cypress timber, all that he desired.

And Solomon gave Hiram twenty thousand  ¹cors of wheat as food for his household and twenty cors of the finest oil; this did Solomon give to Hiram year by year.

And Jehovah gave Solomon wisdom, as He had promised him; and there was peace between Hiram and Solomon, and the two of them made a treaty.

And King Solomon levied forced labor out of all Israel, and the forced labor amounted to thirty thousand men.

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

And Solomon had seventy thousand burden bearers and eighty thousand stonecutters in the mountains,

Besides Solomon's three thousand three hundred chief officers over the work, who directed the people who did the work.

And the king commanded, and they quarried great stones, costly stones, in order to lay the foundation of the house with hewn stone.

And Solomon's builders and Hiram's builders and the Gebalites fashioned the stone and prepared the timber and the stones in order to build the house.

Then in the four hundred eightieth year after the children of Israel had come forth out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of his reign over Israel, in the month of Ziv (this is the second month),  ¹Solomon began to build the  ²house of Jehovah.

And the house which King Solomon built to Jehovah was  ¹sixty cubits long and twenty cubits wide and thirty cubits high.

And the portico that was before the temple of the house was twenty cubits long, across the width of the house, and ten cubits deep, in front of the house.

And for the house he made  ¹windows with  ²fixed lattices.

And against the wall of the house he built a structure with stories all around, next to the walls of the house all around the  ¹temple and the  ²innermost sanctuary; and he made  ³side chambers all around.

The lowest  ¹story was five cubits wide; and the middle, six cubits wide; and the third, seven cubits wide; for he provided for outsets to the house all around the outside, so that the beams would not be inserted into the walls of the house.

And the house, when it was being built, was built of finished  ¹stone, cut at the quarry, so that neither hammer nor ax nor any iron tool was heard in the house when it was being built.

The  ¹door of the middle side chamber was on the right side of the house; and they went up by winding stairs into the middle story, and from the middle into the third.

So he built the house and finished it, and he covered the house with beams and planks of cedar.

And he built the stories against all the house, five cubits high; and the structure was held to the house by cedar timbers.

Then the word of Jehovah came to Solomon, saying,

As for this house that you are building, if you walk in My statutes and execute My ordinances and keep all My commandments by walking in them, then I will establish My word with you, which I spoke to David your father;

And I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel, and I will not forsake My people Israel.

So Solomon built the house and finished it.

And he built the walls of the house within with  ¹cedar boards; from the floor of the house to the wall of the ceiling he covered them on the inside with wood. And he overlaid the floor of the house with boards of  ¹cypress.

And he built twenty cubits of the rear part of the house with cedar boards from the floor to the walls of the ceiling; and he built it within as an innermost sanctuary, as the Holy of Holies.

And the house, that is, the  ¹temple before the Holy of Holies, was forty cubits long.

And there was cedar on the house within, carved with gourds and open flowers. It was all cedar; there was no stone showing.

And he prepared an innermost sanctuary in the midst of the house within, in order to put the  ¹Ark of the Covenant of Jehovah there.

And the interior of the innermost sanctuary was twenty cubits long and twenty cubits wide and twenty cubits high; and he overlaid it with pure  ¹gold, and he overlaid the cedar  ²altar.

And Solomon overlaid the house within with pure gold; and he drew gold chains before the innermost sanctuary, and overlaid  ¹it with gold.

So he overlaid all the house with gold, until all the house was complete; and the whole altar, which belonged to the innermost sanctuary, he overlaid with gold.

And in the innermost sanctuary he made two cherubim of  ¹olive wood, ten cubits high.

And the one wing of the cherub was five cubits, and the second wing of the cherub was five cubits; ten cubits from the end of its one wing to the end of its other wing.

And the second cherub was ten cubits; both cherubim had one measure and one shape.

The height of the one cherub was ten cubits, and so was that of the second cherub.

And he put the cherubim in the midst of the inner house. And the wings of the cherubim were spread out so that the wing of the one cherub was touching the wall and the wing of the second cherub was touching the second wall; and their other wings were touching at the middle of the house, wing to wing.

And he overlaid the cherubim with gold.

And he carved all the walls of the house all around with engraved carvings of  ¹cherubim and  ¹palm trees and open flowers, in both the inner chamber and the outer one.

And the floor of the house he overlaid with gold, in both the inner chamber and the outer one.

And for the entrance of the innermost sanctuary he made doors of olive wood; the lintel and doorposts were a fifth of the breadth of the wall.

And there were two doors of olive wood. And he carved carvings of cherubim and palm trees and open flowers upon them, and he overlaid them with gold and spread the gold upon the cherubim and the palm trees.

So also he made for the entrance of the temple doorposts of olive wood, out of a fourth of the breadth of the wall,

And two doors of cypress wood; the two leaves of the one door folded, and the two leaves of the second door folded.

And he carved cherubim and palm trees and open flowers on them, and he overlaid them with gold evenly applied over the carved work.

And he built the  ¹inner court with three courses of hewn stone and a course of cedar beams.

In the fourth year the foundation of the house of Jehovah was laid, in the month of Ziv;

And in the eleventh year, in the month of Bul (which is the eighth month) the house was completed in all its parts and according to all its specifications. Thus he was seven years building it.