1 Kings 3:1–4:34
1 Then aSolomon 1formed a marriage alliance with Pharaoh king of Egypt, and took Pharaoh’s daughter band brought her to the city of David cuntil he had finished building his own house and the house of the Lord and dthe wall around Jerusalem.
2 aThe people were still sacrificing on the high places, because there was no house built for the name of the Lord until those days.
3 Now aSolomon loved the Lord, bwalking in the statutes of his father David, except he sacrificed and burned incense on the high places.
4 aThe king went to bGibeon to sacrifice there, cfor that was the great high place; Solomon offered a thousand burnt offerings on that altar.
5 aIn Gibeon the Lord appeared to Solomon bin a dream at night; and God said, “cAsk what you wish me to give you.”
6 Then Solomon said, “aYou have shown great lovingkindness to Your servant David my father, baccording as he walked before You in 1truth and righteousness and uprightness of heart toward You; and cYou have 2reserved for him this great lovingkindness, that You have given him a son to sit on his throne, as it is this day.
7 “Now, O Lord my God, aYou have made Your servant king in place of my father David, yet bI am but a little child; cI do not know how to go out or come in.
8 “aYour servant is in the midst of Your people which You have chosen, ba great people who are too many to be numbered or counted.
9 “So agive Your servant 1an understanding heart to judge Your people bto discern between good and evil. For who is able to judge this 2great people of Yours?”
10 1It was pleasing in the sight of the Lord that Solomon had asked this thing.
11 God said to him, “Because you have asked this thing and have anot asked for yourself 1long life, nor have asked riches for yourself, nor have you asked for the life of your enemies, but have asked for yourself 2discernment to understand justice,
12 behold, aI have done according to your words. Behold, bI have given you a wise and discerning heart, so that there has been no one like you before you, nor shall one like you arise after you.
13 “aI have also given you what you have not asked, both briches and honor, so that there will not be any among the kings like you all your days.
14 “aIf you walk in My ways, keeping My statutes and commandments, as your father David walked, then I will bprolong your days.”
15 Then aSolomon awoke, and behold, it was a dream. And he came to Jerusalem and stood before the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and offered burnt offerings and made peace offerings, and bmade a feast for all his servants.
16 Then two women who were harlots came to the king and stood before him.
17 The one woman said, “Oh, my lord, 1this woman and I live in the same house; and I gave birth to a child while she was in the house.
18 “It happened on the third day after I gave birth, that this woman also gave birth to a child, and we were together. There was no stranger with us in the house, only the two of us in the house.
19 “This woman’s son died in the night, because she lay on it.
20 “So she arose in the middle of the night and took my son from beside me while your maidservant slept, and laid him in her bosom, and laid her dead son in my bosom.
21 “When I rose in the morning to nurse my son, behold, he was dead; but when I looked at him carefully in the morning, behold, he was not my son, whom I had borne.”
22 Then the other woman said, “No! For the living one is my son, and the dead one is your son.” But 1the first woman said, “No! For the dead one is your son, and the living one is my son.” Thus they spoke before the king.
23 Then the king said, “1The one says, ‘This is my son who is living, and your son is the dead one’; and 1the other says, ‘No! For your son is the dead one, and my son is the living one.’ ”
24 The king said, “Get me a sword.” So they brought a sword before the king.
25 The king said, “Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one and half to the other.”
26 Then the woman whose child was the living one spoke to the king, for 1ashe was deeply stirred over her son and said, “Oh, my lord, give her the living child, and by no means kill him.” But the other said, “He shall be neither mine nor yours; divide him!”
27 Then the king said, “Give 1the first woman the living child, and by no means kill him. She is his mother.”
28 When all Israel heard of the judgment which the king had 1handed down, they feared the king, for athey saw that the wisdom of God was in him to 2administer justice.
1 Now King Solomon was king over all Israel.
2 These were his officials: Azariah the son of Zadok was athe priest;
3 Elihoreph and Ahijah, the sons of Shisha were secretaries; aJehoshaphat the son of Ahilud was the recorder;
4 and aBenaiah the son of Jehoiada was over the army; and Zadok and bAbiathar were priests;
5 and Azariah the son of Nathan was over athe deputies; and Zabud the son of Nathan, a priest, was the king’s friend;
6 and Ahishar was over the household; and Adoniram the son of Abda was over the men subject to forced labor.
7 Solomon had twelve deputies over all Israel, who 1provided for the king and his household; each man had to 2provide for a month in the year.
8 These are their names: Ben-hur, in the ahill country of Ephraim;
9 Ben-deker in Makaz and aShaalbim and bBeth-shemesh and Elonbeth-hanan;
10 Ben-hesed, in Arubboth (aSocoh was his and all the land of bHepher);
11 Ben-abinadab, in all 1the aheight of Dor (Taphath the daughter of Solomon was his wife);
12 Baana the son of Ahilud, in aTaanach and Megiddo, and all bBeth-shean which is beside cZarethan below Jezreel, from Beth-shean to dAbel-meholah as far as the other side of eJokmeam;
13 Ben-geber, in aRamoth-gilead (bthe towns of Jair, the son of Manasseh, which are in Gilead were his: cthe region of Argob, which is in Bashan, sixty great cities with walls and bronze bars were his);
14 Ahinadab the son of Iddo, in aMahanaim;
15 aAhimaaz, in Naphtali (he also married Basemath the daughter of Solomon);
16 Baana the son of aHushai, in Asher and 1Bealoth;
17 Jehoshaphat the son of Paruah, in Issachar;
18 aShimei the son of Ela, in Benjamin;
19 Geber the son of Uri, in the land of Gilead, athe country of Sihon king of the Amorites and of Og king of Bashan; and he was the only deputy who was in the land.
Solomon’s Power, Wealth and Wisdom
20 aJudah and Israel were as numerous as the sand that is on the 1seashore in abundance; they were eating and drinking and rejoicing.
21 1aNow Solomon ruled over all the kingdoms bfrom the 2River to the land of the Philistines and to the border of Egypt; cthey brought tribute and served Solomon all the days of his life.
22 Solomon’s 1provision for one day was thirty 2kors of fine flour and sixty 2kors of meal,
23 ten fat oxen, twenty 1pasture-fed oxen, a hundred sheep besides deer, gazelles, roebucks, and fattened fowl.
24 For he had dominion over everything 1west of the 2River, from Tiphsah even to aGaza, bover all the kings 1west of the 2River; and che had peace on all sides around about him.
25 aSo Judah and Israel lived in safety, every man under his vine and his fig tree, bfrom Dan even to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon.
26 aSolomon had 140,000 stalls of horses for his chariots, and 12,000 horsemen.
27 Those deputies 1provided for King Solomon and all who came to King Solomon’s table, each in his month; they left nothing lacking.
28 They also brought barley and straw for the horses and aswift steeds to the place where it should be, each according to his charge.
29 Now aGod gave Solomon wisdom and very great discernment and breadth of 1mind, blike the sand that is on the seashore.
30 Solomon’s wisdom surpassed the wisdom of all athe sons of the east and ball the wisdom of Egypt.
31 For ahe was wiser than all men, than bEthan the Ezrahite, Heman, cCalcol and 1Darda, the sons of Mahol; and his 2fame was known in all the surrounding nations.
32 aHe also spoke 3,000 proverbs, and his songs were 1,005.
33 He spoke of trees, from the cedar that is in Lebanon even to the hyssop that grows on the wall; he spoke also of animals and birds and creeping things and fish.
34 1Men acame from all peoples to hear the wisdom of Solomon, from all the kings of the earth who had heard of his wisdom.