World English Bible · The united kingdom
2 Chronicles 8
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At the end of twenty years, in which had built house and his own house, built the cities which Huram had given to , and caused the to there. went to , and prevailed against it. He built Tadmor in , and all the storage cities, which he built in . Also he built the upper and the lower, fortified cities with walls, , and bars; and Baalath, and all the storage cities that had, and all the cities for his chariots, the cities for his horsemen, and all that to build for his pleasure in , in , and in all the land of his . As for all the people who were left of the , the , the , the , and the , who were not of Israel— of their children who were left after them in the land, whom the didn't consume—of them conscripted forced labor to this day. But of the , made no servants for his work, but they were men of war, chief of his captains, and of his chariots and of his horsemen. These were the chief officers of King , even two-hundred fifty, who ruled over the people. brought up daughter out of city to the house that he had built for her; for he said, "My wife shall not in the house of king of Israel, because the places where ark has come are ." Then offered burnt offerings to on which he had built before the porch, even as the duty of every day required, according to the of on the , on the new moons, and on the set feasts, three times per year, during the feast of , during the , and during the feast of . He appointed, according to the of his , the divisions of the priests to their , and the to their offices, to and to minister before the priests, as the duty of every day required, the doorkeepers also by their divisions at every , for the had so commanded. They didn't depart from the of the king to the priests and concerning any matter or concerning the . Now all the work of was accomplished from the day of the foundation of house until it was finished. So house was completed. Then went to and to , on the seashore in the land of . Huram sent him ships and servants who had knowledge of the sea by the hands of his servants; and they came with the servants of to , and brought from there four hundred fifty of gold, and brought them to King .
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The world at this moment · The united kingdom, 1050 BC to 931 BC ›
Saul, David, and Solomon. A rare window when both Egypt and Mesopotamia are weak, which is how a small kingdom in the corridor between them could briefly become a regional power.
- The power vacuum
- This is the whole political explanation for the united kingdom. Egypt is fragmented, Assyria is recovering but still local, the Hittites are gone, and nobody is in a position to object to a strong state in the corridor. It lasts about a century, and Israel's golden age fits exactly inside it.
- Phoenicia
- Tyre under Hiram is the commercial power of the coast, and supplies the cedar, the craftsmen, and the shipping for Solomon's building programme. The alliance is trade, not charity: Israel had grain and a land route, Tyre had timber and ships.
- Egypt
- Weak enough that a pharaoh gives a daughter in marriage to an Israelite king, which is the opposite of Egyptian practice in stronger centuries. Late in the era it recovers under a new house, and Shishak will invade within five years of Solomon's death.
- Further afield
- Greece is still in its dark age but beginning to recover, and will adopt the Phoenician alphabet within a century or two. Carthage is founded by settlers from Tyre by tradition in 814 BC. In the Americas the Olmec centre shifts to La Venta.