II Chronicles

aCf. 1 Kings 5.15–30. Solomon mustered 70,000 basket carriers and 80,000 quarriers in the hills, with 3,600 supervisors.

Solomon sent this message to King Huram of Tyre, “In view of what you did for my father David in sending him cedars to build a palace for his residence—

see, I intend to build a House for the name of the ETERNAL my God, to whom I will dedicate it and in whose honor I will make incense offering of sweet spices, regular rows of bread, and the morning and evening burnt offerings on sabbaths, new moons, and festivals, as is Israel’s eternal duty.

The House that I intend to build will be great, since our God is greater than all gods.

Who indeed is capable of building such a House! Even the heavens to their uttermost reaches cannot contain [God], and who am I that I should build such a House—except as a place for making burnt offerings?

Now send me someone skillful to work in gold, silver, bronze, and iron, and in purple, crimson, and blue yarn, and who knows how to engrave, alongside the skilled workers I have here in Judah and in Jerusalem, whom my father David provided.

Send me cedars, cypress, and algum wood from the Lebanon, for I know that your servants are skilled at cutting the trees of Lebanon. My servants will work with yours

to provide me with a great stock of timber; for the House that I intend to build will be singularly great.

I have allocated for your servants, the wood-cutters who fell the trees, 20,000 kors of crushed wheat and 20,000 kors of barley, 20,000 baths of wine and 20,000 baths of oil.”

Huram, king of Tyre, sent Solomon this written message in reply, “Because GOD loved the people of Israel,bthe people of Israel Lit. “His people.” you were made king over them.”

Huram continued, “Blessed is the ETERNAL, God of Israel, who made the heavens and the earth, who gave King David a wise son, endowed with intelligence and understanding, to build a House for the ETERNAL and a royal palace for himself.

Now I am sending you someone skillful and intelligent, my mastercmaster Lit. “father.” Huram,

the son of a Danite woman, his father a Tyrian. He is skilled at working in gold, silver, bronze, iron, precious stones, and wood; in purple, blue, and crimson yarn and in fine linen; and at engraving and designing whatever will be required of him, alongside your skilled workers and those of my lord, your father David.

As to the wheat, barley, oil, and wine that my lord mentioned, let him send them to his servants.

We undertake to cut down as many trees of Lebanon as you need, and deliver them to you as rafts by sea to Jaffa; you will transport them to Jerusalem.”

Solomon took a census of all the resident aliens in the land of Israel, besides the census taken by his father David, and they were found to be 153,600.

He made 70,000 of them basket carriers, and 80,000 of them quarriers, with 3,600 supervisors to see that the people worked.