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¹ AND it came to pass at the end of twenty years, wherein Solomon had built the house of the LORD and the royal palace,² That Solomon rebuilt the cities which Hiram had given to him, and caused the children of Israel to dwell in them.³ And Solomon went to Hamath and besieged it, and destroyed it.⁴ And he built Tadmor, which had been laid waste like the wilderness, and all the store-cities;⁵ Also he built Beth-hauran the upper and Beth-hauran the lower;⁶ And built all the store-cities that Solomon had and all the chariot cities and the cities for the horsemen and all that Solomon desired to build in Jerusalem and in Lebanon and throughout all the land of his dominion.⁷ As for all the people who were left of the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, who were not of Israel,⁸ But of their descendants, who were left after them in the land, whom the children of Israel could not destroy, these Solomon made servants for himself, and workers and tributaries to this day.⁹ But of the children of Israel Solomon made no servants in his kingdom, for they were men of war and the commanders of his chariots and his horsemen.¹⁰ And these were the governors and overseers of King Solomon, even two hundred and fifty, who exercised authority over the people, who did the work.¹¹ And Solomon brought up the daughter of Pharaoh out of the city of David to the house which he had built for her; for he said, No wife shall dwell with me in the house of David king of Israel, because the place in which the ark of the LORD has come is holy.

¹² Then Solomon offered burnt offerings to the LORD, and peace offerings upon the altar of the LORD which he had built before the porch,¹³ Even after a certain rate every day, offering according to the commandment of Moses, on the sabbaths and on the solemn feasts, three times in the year, in the feast of unleavened bread, and in the feast of the fasting, and in the feast of tabernacles.¹⁴ And he appointed, according to the order of David his father, the courses of the priests to their service, and the Levites to their charges, to praise and minister before the priests, as the duty of every day required; and the porters also by their courses, to guard the doors every day; for so had David the king of Israel, whom the LORD had made king, commanded.¹⁵ And he did not depart from all that King David had commanded him concerning the priests and the Levites and concerning all the service of the house.¹⁶ Thus all the work of Solomon was set in order from the day the foundations of the house of the LORD were laid until all its work was finished.¹⁷ Then Solomon went to Ezion-geber, the town which is opposite Eloth, at the seaside in the land of Edom.¹⁸ And Hiram sent his servants by ships, skilful mariners, who knew how to pilot ships in the sea, and they went with the servants of Solomon to the city of Ophir, and took from there four hundred talents of gold, and brought them to King Solomon.