2Chronicles:9-12
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Now when the queen of Sheba heard of the fame of Solomon ,
she came to Jerusalem to test Solomon with hard questions ,
having a very great retinue ,
camels that bore spices ,
gold in abundance ,
and precious stones ;
and when she came to Solomon ,
she spoke with him about all that was in her heart .
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So Solomon answered all her questions ;
there was nothing so difficult for Solomon that he could not explain it to her .
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And when the queen of Sheba had seen the wisdom of Solomon ,
the house that he had built ,
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the food on his table ,
the seating of his servants ,
the service of his waiters and their apparel ,
his cupbearers and their apparel ,
and his entryway by which he went up to the house of the LORD ,
there was no more spirit in her .
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Then she said to the king : "
It was a true report which I heard in my own land about your words and your wisdom .
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However I did not believe their words until I came and saw with my own eyes ;
and indeed the half of the greatness of your wisdom was not told me .
You exceed the fame of which I heard .
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Happy are your men and happy are these your servants ,
who stand continually before you and hear your wisdom !
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Blessed be the LORD your God ,
who delighted in you ,
setting you on His throne to be king for the LORD your God !
Because your God has loved Israel ,
to establish them forever ,
therefore He made you king over them ,
to do justice and righteousness ."
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And she gave the king one hundred and twenty talents of gold ,
spices in great abundance ,
and precious stones ;
there never were any spices such as those the queen of Sheba gave to King Solomon .
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Also ,
the servants of Hiram and the servants of Solomon ,
who brought gold from Ophir ,
brought algum wood and precious stones .
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And the king made walkways of the algum wood for the house of the LORD and for the king '
s house ,
also harps and stringed instruments for singers ;
and there were none such as these seen before in the land of Judah .
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Now King Solomon gave to the queen of Sheba all she desired ,
whatever she asked ,
much more than she had brought to the king .
So she turned and went to her own country ,
she and her servants .
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The weight of gold that came to Solomon yearly was six hundred and sixty-six talents of gold ,
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besides what the traveling merchants and traders brought .
And all the kings of Arabia and governors of the country brought gold and silver to Solomon .
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And King Solomon made two hundred large shields of hammered gold ;
six hundred shekels of hammered gold went into each shield .
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He also made three hundred shields of hammered gold ;
three hundred shekels of gold went into each shield .
The king put them in the House of the Forest of Lebanon .
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Moreover the king made a great throne of ivory ,
and overlaid it with pure gold .
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The throne had six steps ,
with a footstool of gold ,
which were fastened to the throne ;
there were armrests on either side of the place of the seat ,
and two lions stood beside the armrests .
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Twelve lions stood there ,
one on each side of the six steps ;
nothing like this had been made for any other kingdom .
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All King Solomon '
s drinking vessels were gold ,
and all the vessels of the House of the Forest of Lebanon were pure gold .
Not one was silver ,
for this was accounted as nothing in the days of Solomon .
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For the king '
s ships went to Tarshish with the servants of Hiram .
Once every three years the merchant ships came ,
bringing gold ,
silver ,
ivory ,
apes ,
and monkeys .
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So King Solomon surpassed all the kings of the earth in riches and wisdom .
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And all the kings of the earth sought the presence of Solomon to hear his wisdom ,
which God had put in his heart .
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Each man brought his present :
articles of silver and gold ,
garments ,
armor ,
spices ,
horses ,
and mules ,
at a set rate year by year .
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Solomon had four thousand stalls for horses and chariots ,
and twelve thousand horsemen whom he stationed in the chariot cities and with the king at Jerusalem .
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So he reigned over all the kings from the River to the land of the Philistines ,
as far as the border of Egypt .
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The king made silver as common in Jerusalem as stones ,
and he made cedar trees as abundant as the sycamores which are in the lowland .
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And they brought horses to Solomon from Egypt and from all lands .
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Now the rest of the acts of Solomon ,
first and last ,
are they not written in the book of Nathan the prophet ,
in the prophecy of Ahijah the Shilonite ,
and in the visions of Iddo the seer concerning Jeroboam the son of Nebat ?
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Solomon reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel forty years .
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Then Solomon rested with his fathers ,
and was buried in the City of David his father .
And Rehoboam his son reigned in his place .
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And Rehoboam went to Shechem ,
for all Israel had gone to Shechem to make him king .
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So it happened ,
when Jeroboam the son of Nebat heard it (
he was in Egypt ,
where he had fled from the presence of King Solomon ),
that Jeroboam returned from Egypt .
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Then they sent for him and called him .
And Jeroboam and all Israel came and spoke to Rehoboam ,
saying ,
* "
Your father made our yoke heavy ;
now therefore ,
lighten the burdensome service of your father and his heavy yoke which he put on us ,
and we will serve you ."
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So he said to them , "
Come back to me after three days ."
And the people departed .
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Then King Rehoboam consulted the elders who stood before his father Solomon while he still lived ,
saying , "
How do you advise me to answer these people ?"
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And they spoke to him ,
saying , "
If you are kind to these people ,
and please them ,
and speak good words to them ,
they will be your servants forever ."
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But he rejected the advice which the elders had given him ,
and consulted the young men who had grown up with him ,
who stood before him .
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And he said to them , "
What advice do you give ?
How should we answer this people who have spoken to me ,
saying , "
Lighten the yoke which your father put on us '?"
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Then the young men who had grown up with him spoke to him ,
saying , "
Thus you should speak to the people who have spoken to you ,
saying , "
Your father made our yoke heavy ,
but you make it lighter on us '--
thus you shall say to them : "
My little finger shall be thicker than my father '
s waist !
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And now ,
whereas my father put a heavy yoke on you ,
I will add to your yoke ;
my father chastised you with whips ,
but I will chastise you with scourges !"'
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So Jeroboam and all the people came to Rehoboam on the third day ,
as the king had directed ,
saying , "
Come back to me the third day ."
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Then the king answered them roughly .
King Rehoboam rejected the advice of the elders ,
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and he spoke to them according to the advice of the young men ,
saying , "
My father made your yoke heavy ,
but I will add to it ;
my father chastised you with whips ,
but I will chastise you with scourges !"
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So the king did not listen to the people ;
for the turn of events was from God ,
that the LORD might fulfill His word ,
which He had spoken by the hand of Ahijah the Shilonite to Jeroboam the son of Nebat .
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Now when all Israel saw that the king did not listen to them ,
the people answered the king ,
saying : "
What share have we in David ?
We have no inheritance in the son of Jesse .
Every man to your tents ,
O Israel !
Now see to your own house ,
O David !"
So all Israel departed to their tents .
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But Rehoboam reigned over the children of Israel who dwelt in the cities of Judah .
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Then King Rehoboam sent Hadoram ,
who was in charge of revenue ;
but the children of Israel stoned him with stones ,
and he died .
Therefore King Rehoboam mounted his chariot in haste to flee to Jerusalem .
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So Israel has been in rebellion against the house of David to this day .
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Now when Rehoboam came to Jerusalem ,
he assembled from the house of Judah and Benjamin one hundred and eighty thousand chosen men who were warriors ,
to fight against Israel ,
that he might restore the kingdom to Rehoboam .
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But the word of the LORD came to Shemaiah the man of God ,
saying ,
* "
Speak to Rehoboam the son of Solomon ,
king of Judah ,
and to all Israel in Judah and Benjamin ,
saying ,
* "
Thus says the LORD : "
You shall not go up or fight against your brethren !
Let every man return to his house ,
for this thing is from Me ."
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So Rehoboam dwelt in Jerusalem ,
and built cities for defense in Judah .
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And he built Bethlehem ,
Etam ,
Tekoa ,
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Beth Zur ,
Sochoh ,
Adullam ,
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Gath ,
Mareshah ,
Ziph ,
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Adoraim ,
Lachish ,
Azekah ,
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Zorah ,
Aijalon ,
and Hebron ,
which are in Judah and Benjamin ,
fortified cities .
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And he fortified the strongholds ,
and put captains in them ,
and stores of food ,
oil ,
and wine .
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Also in every city he put shields and spears ,
and made them very strong ,
having Judah and Benjamin on his side .
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And from all their territories the priests and the Levites who were in all Israel took their stand with him .
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For the Levites left their common-lands and their possessions and came to Judah and Jerusalem ,
for Jeroboam and his sons had rejected them from serving as priests to the LORD .
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Then he appointed for himself priests for the high places ,
for the demons ,
and the calf idols which he had made .
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And after the Levites left ,
those from all the tribes of Israel ,
such as set their heart to seek the LORD God of Israel ,
came to Jerusalem to sacrifice to the LORD God of their fathers .
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So they strengthened the kingdom of Judah ,
and made Rehoboam the son of Solomon strong for three years ,
because they walked in the way of David and Solomon for three years .
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Then Rehoboam took for himself as wife Mahalath the daughter of Jerimoth the son of David ,
and of Abihail the daughter of Eliah the son of Jesse .
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And she bore him children :
Jeush ,
Shamariah ,
and Zaham .
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After her he took Maachah the granddaughter of Absalom ;
and she bore him Abijah ,
Attai ,
Ziza ,
and Shelomith .
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Now Rehoboam loved Maachah the granddaughter of Absalom more than all his wives and his concubines ;
for he took eighteen wives and sixty concubines ,
and begot twenty-eight sons and sixty daughters .
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And Rehoboam appointed Abijah the son of Maachah as chief ,
to be leader among his brothers ;
for he intended to make him king .
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He dealt wisely ,
and dispersed some of his sons throughout all the territories of Judah and Benjamin ,
to every fortified city ;
and he gave them provisions in abundance .
He also sought many wives for them .
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Now it came to pass ,
when Rehoboam had established the kingdom and had strengthened himself ,
that he forsook the law of the LORD ,
and all Israel along with him .
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And it happened in the fifth year of King Rehoboam that Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem ,
because they had transgressed against the LORD ,
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with twelve hundred chariots ,
sixty thousand horsemen ,
and people without number who came with him out of Egypt--the Lubim and the Sukkiim and the Ethiopians .
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And he took the fortified cities of Judah and came to Jerusalem .
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Then Shemaiah the prophet came to Rehoboam and the leaders of Judah ,
who were gathered together in Jerusalem because of Shishak ,
and said to them , "
Thus says the LORD : "
You have forsaken Me ,
and therefore I also have left you in the hand of Shishak ."'
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So the leaders of Israel and the king humbled themselves ;
and they said , "
The LORD is righteous ."
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Now when the LORD saw that they humbled themselves ,
the word of the LORD came to Shemaiah ,
saying , "
They have humbled themselves ;
therefore I will not destroy them ,
but I will grant them some deliverance .
My wrath shall not be poured out on Jerusalem by the hand of Shishak .
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Nevertheless they will be his servants ,
that they may distinguish My service from the service of the kingdoms of the nations ."
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So Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem ,
and took away the treasures of the house of the LORD and the treasures of the king '
s house ;
he took everything .
He also carried away the gold shields which Solomon had made .
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Then King Rehoboam made bronze shields in their place ,
and committed them to the hands of the captains of the guard ,
who guarded the doorway of the king '
s house .
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And whenever the king entered the house of the LORD ,
the guard would go and bring them out ;
then they would take them back into the guardroom .
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When he humbled himself ,
the wrath of the LORD turned from him ,
so as not to destroy him completely ;
and things also went well in Judah .
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Thus King Rehoboam strengthened himself in Jerusalem and reigned .
Now Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he became king ;
and he reigned seventeen years in Jerusalem ,
the city which the LORD had chosen out of all the tribes of Israel ,
to put His name there .
His mother '
s name was Naamah ,
an Ammonitess .
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And he did evil ,
because he did not prepare his heart to seek the LORD .
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The acts of Rehoboam ,
first and last ,
are they not written in the book of Shemaiah the prophet ,
and of Iddo the seer concerning genealogies ?
And there were wars between Rehoboam and Jeroboam all their days .
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So Rehoboam rested with his fathers ,
and was buried in the City of David .
Then Abijah his son reigned in his place .
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In the eighteenth year of King Jeroboam ,
Abijah became king over Judah .
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