Solomon

They were also the chief officers over Solomon’s projects: 550 supervisors over the people who did the work.

As 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.

Three times a year Solomon offered burnt offerings and peace offerings on the altar he had built for the LORD, burning incense with them before the LORD. So he completed the temple.

King Solomon also assembled a fleet of ships at Ezion-geber, which is near Eloth in Edom, on the shore of the Red Sea.

And Hiram sent his servants, men who knew the sea, to serve in the fleet with Solomon’s servants.

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

Now when the queen of Sheba heard about the fame of Solomon concerning the name of the LORD, she came to test him with difficult questions.

She arrived in Jerusalem with a very large caravan—with camels bearing spices, gold in great abundance, and precious stones. So she came to Solomon and spoke to him all that was on her mind.

And Solomon answered all her questions; nothing was too difficult for the king to explain.

When the queen of Sheba saw all the wisdom of Solomon, the palace he had built,

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

King Solomon gave the queen of Sheba all she desired—whatever she asked—besides what he had given her out of his royal bounty. Then she left and returned to her own country, along with her servants.

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

King Solomon made two hundred large shields of hammered gold; six hundred shekels of gold went into each shield.

All 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.

So King Solomon surpassed all the kings of the earth in riches and wisdom.

The whole world sought an audience with Solomon to hear the wisdom that God had put in his heart.

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

Solomon’s horses were imported from Egypt and Kue; the royal merchants purchased them from Kue.

King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women along with the daughter of Pharaoh—women of Moab, Ammon, Edom, and Sidon, as well as Hittite women.

These women were from the nations about which the LORD had told the Israelites, “You must not intermarry with them, for surely they will turn your hearts after their gods.” Yet Solomon clung to these women in love.

For 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.

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

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

At that time on a hill east of Jerusalem, Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the abomination of Moab and for Molech the abomination of the Ammonites.