Solomon’s Towns, Labour and Ordered Worship
1At the end of the twenty years during which Solomon built the house of Yahweh and his own house, 2he rebuilt the towns that Huram had given him and settled Israelites in them. 3Solomon then marched against Hamath-zobah and overpowered it. 4He built Tadmor out in the wilderness, along with every one of the store towns he built in Hamath. 5He built Upper Beth-horon and Lower Beth-horon as fortified towns, with walls, gates and bars, 6and Baalath as well, and all the store towns that belonged to Solomon, and all the chariot towns and the towns for the horsemen — everything Solomon had a mind to build in Jerusalem, in Lebanon and throughout the territory under his rule. 7There remained a population of Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, who were not Israelites; 8their descendants who remained after them in the land, whom the Israelites had not destroyed — Solomon conscripted them for forced labour, as they are to this day. 9But Solomon made none of the Israelites slaves for his work; they were his fighting men, the commanders of his officers, and the commanders of his chariotry and cavalry. 10These were King Solomon’s chief deputies: two hundred and fifty of them, supervising the people. 11Solomon brought Pharaoh’s daughter up from the City of David to the house he had built for her, saying, “No wife of mine shall live in the house of David king of Israel, because any place the ark of Yahweh has entered is holy.” 12Then Solomon offered burnt offerings to Yahweh on the altar of Yahweh that he had built in front of the portico, 13as each day required, presenting them according to the command of Moses: on the Sabbaths, at the new moons and at the appointed feasts three times a year — at the Festival of Unleavened Bread, the Festival of Weeks and the Festival of Tabernacles. 14Following the ruling of his father David, he appointed the divisions of the priests to their service and the Levites to their duties — to offer praise and to minister alongside the priests as each day required — and the gatekeepers by their divisions, gate by gate; for this was the command of David the man of God. 15They deviated in nothing from the king’s command to the priests and the Levites, not even in the matter of the treasuries. 16So all Solomon’s work was carried through, from the day the house of Yahweh was founded to the day it was finished. The house of Yahweh was complete. 17Solomon then travelled to Ezion-geber and Eloth, on the coast in the land of Edom. 18Huram sent him, through his servants, ships and crews who knew the sea; they went with Solomon’s servants to Ophir, took four hundred and fifty talents of gold from there, and brought them to King Solomon.
