The Lord Makes Solomon Wise

(1 Kings 3.1-15)

1 King Solomon, the son of David, was now in complete control of his kingdom, because the Lord God had blessed him and made him a powerful king.

^2-5 (A) At that time, the sacred tent that Moses the servant of the Lord had made in the desert was still kept at Gibeon, and in front of the tent was the bronze altar that Bezalel^[a] had made.

One day, Solomon told the people of Israel, the army commanders, the officials, and the family leaders, to go with him to the place of worship at Gibeon, even though his father King David had already moved the sacred chest from Kiriath-Jearim to the tent that he had set up for it in Jerusalem. Solomon and the others went to Gibeon to worship the Lord, ⁶ and there at the bronze altar, Solomon offered a thousand animals as sacrifices to please the Lord.^[b]

⁷ God appeared to Solomon that night in a dream and said, “Solomon, ask for anything you want, and I will give it to you.”

⁸ Solomon answered:

Lord God, you were always loyal to my father David, and now you have made me king of Israel. ^9 (B) I am supposed to rule these people, but there are as many of them as there are specks of dust on the ground. So keep the promise you made to my father ¹⁰ and make me wise. Give me the knowledge I'll need to be the king of this great nation of yours.

¹¹ God replied:

Solomon, you could have asked me to make you rich or famous or to let you live a long time. Or you could have asked for your enemies to be destroyed. Instead, you asked for wisdom and knowledge to rule my people. ¹² So I will make you wise and intelligent. But I will also make you richer and more famous than any king before or after you.

¹³ Solomon then left Gibeon and returned to Jerusalem, the capital city of Israel.

Solomon's Wealth

(1 Kings 10.26-29)

^14 (C) Solomon had a force of 1,400 chariots and 12,000 horses that he kept in Jerusalem and other towns.

¹⁵ While Solomon was king of Israel, there was silver and gold everywhere in Jerusalem, and cedar was as common as ordinary sycamore trees in the foothills.

^16-17 (D) Solomon's merchants bought his horses and chariots in the regions of Musri and Kue.^[c] They paid 600 pieces of silver for a chariot and 150 pieces of silver for a horse. They also sold horses and chariots to the Hittite and Syrian kings.

Solomon Asks Hiram To Help Build the Temple

(1 Kings 5.1-12)

2 Solomon decided to build a temple where the Lord would be worshiped, and also to build a palace for himself. ² He assigned 70,000 men to carry building supplies and 80,000 to cut stone from the hills. And he chose 3,600 men to supervise these workers.

³ Solomon sent the following message to King Hiram of Tyre:

Years ago, when my father David was building his palace, you supplied him with cedar logs. Now will you send me supplies? ⁴ I am building a temple where the Lord my God will be worshiped. Sweet-smelling incense will be burned there, and sacred bread will be offered to him. Worshipers will offer sacrifices to the Lord every morning and evening, every Sabbath, and on the first day of each month, as well as during all our religious festivals. These things will be done for all time, just as the Lord has commanded.

⁵ This will be a great temple, because our God is greater than all other gods. ^6 (E) No one can ever build a temple large enough for God—even the heavens are too small a place for him to live in! All I can do is build a place where we can offer sacrifices to him.

⁷ Send me a worker who can not only carve, but who can work with gold, silver, bronze, and iron, as well as make brightly colored cloth. The person you send will work here in Judah and Jerusalem with the skilled workers that my father has already hired.

⁸ I know that you have workers who are experts at cutting lumber in Lebanon. So would you please send me some cedar, pine, and juniper logs? My workers will be there to help them, ⁹ because I'll need a lot of lumber to build such a large and glorious temple. ¹⁰ I will pay your woodcutters 2,000 tons of wheat, the same amount of barley, 400,000 liters of wine, and that same amount of olive oil.

¹¹ Hiram sent his answer back to Solomon:

I know that the Lord must love his people, because he has chosen you to be their king. ¹² Praise the Lord God of Israel who made heaven and earth! He has given David a son who isn't only wise and smart, but who has the knowledge to build a temple for the Lord and a palace for himself.

¹³ I am sending Huram Abi to you. He is wise and very skillful. ¹⁴ His mother was from the Israelite tribe of Dan, and his father was from Tyre. Not only is Huram an expert at working with gold, silver, bronze, iron, stone, and wood, but he can also make colored cloth and fine linen. And he can carve anything if you give him a pattern to follow. He can help your workers and those hired by your father King David.

¹⁵ Go ahead and send the wheat, barley, olive oil, and wine you promised to pay my workers. ¹⁶ I will tell them to start cutting down trees in Lebanon. They will cut as many as you need, then tie them together into rafts, and float them down along the coast to Joppa. Your workers can take them to Jerusalem from there.

Solomon's Work Force

¹⁷ Solomon counted all the foreigners who were living in Israel, just as his father David had done when he was king, and the total was 153,600. ¹⁸ He assigned 70,000 of them to carry building supplies and 80,000 of them to cut stone from the hills. He chose 3,600 others to supervise the workers and to make sure the work was completed.

The Temple Is Built

(1 Kings 6.1-38)

3 ^1-2 (F) Solomon's workers began building the temple in Jerusalem on the second day of the second month,^[d] four years after Solomon had become king of Israel. It was built on Mount Moriah where the Lord had appeared to David at the threshing place that had belonged to Araunah^[e] from Jebus.

³ The inside of the temple was 27 meters long and 9 meters wide, according to the older standards.^{[f] 4} Across the front of the temple was a porch 9 meters wide and 9 meters^[g] high. The inside walls of the porch were covered with pure gold.

⁵ Solomon had the inside walls of the temple's main room paneled first with pine and then with a layer of gold, and he had them decorated with carvings of palm trees and designs that looked like chains. ⁶ He used precious stones to decorate the temple, and he used gold imported from Parvaim^{[h] 7} to decorate the ceiling beams, the doors, the door frames, and the walls. Solomon also told the workers to carve designs of winged creatures into the walls.

^8 (G) The most holy place was nine meters square, and its walls were covered with over 20 tons of fine gold. ⁹ Five hundred and seventy grams of gold was used to cover the heads of the nails. The walls of the small storage rooms were also covered with gold.^[i]

^10 (H) Solomon had two statues of winged creatures^[j] made to put in the most holy place, and he covered them with gold. ^11-13 Each creature had two wings and was four and a half meters from the tip of one wing to the tip of the other wing. Solomon set them next to each other in the most holy place, facing the doorway. Their wings were spread out and reached all the way across the nine-meter room.

^14 (I) A curtain^[k] was made of fine linen woven with blue, purple, and red wool, and embroidered with designs of winged creatures.

The Two Columns

(1 Kings 7.15-22)

¹⁵ Two columns were made for the entrance to the temple. Each one was 16 meters tall and had a cap on top that was over 2 meters high. ¹⁶ The top of each column was decorated with designs that looked like chains^[l] and with 100 carvings of pomegranates.^{[m] 17} Solomon had one of the columns placed on the south side of the temple's entrance; it was called Jachin.^[n] The other one was placed on the north side of the entrance; it was called Boaz.^[o]