King James Version · The united kingdom
2 Chronicles 9
Touch any underlined name to see who or where it is. Tap a verse number to see where it is taken up elsewhere.
And when the queen of heard of the fame of , she came to prove with hard questions at , with a very great company, and camels that spices, and gold in abundance, and precious stones: and when she was come to , she communed with him of all that was in her . And told her all her questions: and there was nothing hid from which he told her not. And when the queen of had seen the of , and the house that he had built, And the meat of his table, and the sitting of his servants, and the attendance of his ministers, and their apparel; his cupbearers also, and their apparel; and his ascent by which he went up into the ; there was no more in her. And she said to the king, It was a true report which I heard in mine own land of thine acts, and of thy : Howbeit I not their words, until I came, and mine eyes had seen it: and, behold, the one half of the greatness of thy was not told me: for thou exceedest the fame that I heard. Happy are thy men, and happy are these thy servants, which stand continually before thee, and hear thy . be thy , which delighted in thee to set thee on his , to be king for thy : because thy loved Israel, to establish them for ever, therefore made he thee king over them, to do and justice. And she gave the king an hundred and twenty of gold, and of spices great abundance, and precious stones: neither was there any such spice as the queen of gave king . And the servants also of Huram, and the servants of , which brought gold from , brought algum trees and precious stones. And the king made of the algum trees terraces to the , and to the king’s palace, and harps and psalteries for singers: and there were none such seen before in the land of Judah. And king gave to the queen of all her , whatsoever she asked, beside that which she had brought unto the king. So she turned, and went away to her own land, she and her servants. Now the weight of gold that came to in one year was six hundred and threescore and six of gold; Beside that which chapmen and merchants brought. And all the kings of and governors of the country brought gold and silver to . And king made two hundred targets of beaten gold: six hundred of beaten gold went to one target. And three hundred shields made he of beaten gold: three hundred of gold went to one shield. And the king put them in the house of the forest of . Moreover the king made a great of ivory, and overlaid it with pure gold. And there were six steps to , with a of gold, which were fastened to , and stays on each side of the sitting place, and two lions standing by the stays: And twelve lions stood there on the one side and on the other upon the six steps. There was not the like made in any kingdom. And all the drinking vessels of king were of gold, and all the vessels of the house of the forest of were of pure gold: none were of silver; it was not any thing accounted of in the days of . For the king’s ships went to with the servants of Huram: every three years once came the ships of bringing gold, and silver, ivory, and apes, and peacocks. And king passed all the kings of the earth in riches and . And all the kings of the earth sought the of , to hear his , that had put in . And they brought every man his present, vessels of silver, and vessels of gold, and raiment, harness, and spices, horses, and mules, a rate year by year. And had four thousand stalls for horses and chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen; whom he bestowed in the chariot cities, and with the king at . And he reigned over all the kings from the river even unto the land of the , and to the border of . And the king made silver in as stones, and cedar trees made he as the sycomore trees that are in the low plains in abundance. And they brought unto horses out of , and out of all lands. Now the rest of the acts of , first and last, are they not written in the book of the , and in the of the Shilonite, and in the of the against Jeroboam the son of ? And reigned in over all Israel forty years. And slept with his fathers, and he was buried in his : and his son reigned in his stead.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
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.