Israel's Revolt

10¹ And Rehoboam went to Shechem, where all Israel had come together to make him king. ² And when Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, had news of it, (for he was in Egypt where he had gone in flight from King Solomon,) he came back from Egypt. ³ And they sent for him; and Jeroboam and all Israel came to Rehoboam and said, ⁴ Your father put a hard yoke on us: if you will make the conditions under which your father kept us down less cruel, and the weight of the yoke he put on us less hard, then we will be your servants. ⁵ And he said to them, Come to me again after three days. So the people went away. ⁶ Then King Rehoboam took the opinion of the old men who had been with Solomon his father when he was living, and said, In your opinion, what answer am I to give to this people? ⁷ And they said to him, If you are kind to this people, pleasing them and saying good words to them, then they will be your servants for ever. ⁸ But he gave no attention to the opinion of the old men, but went to the young men of his generation who were waiting before him. ⁹ And he said to them, What is your opinion? What answer are we to give to this people who have said to me, Make less the weight of the yoke which your father put on us? ¹⁰ And the young men of his generation said to him, This is the answer to give to the people who came to you saying, Your father put a hard yoke on us, but will you make it less; say to them, My little finger is thicker than my father's body; ¹¹ If my father put a hard yoke on you, I will make it harder: my father gave you punishment with whips, but I will give you blows with snakes.

¹² So Jeroboam and all the people came to Rehoboam on the third day, as the king had given orders, saying, Come to me again on the third day. ¹³ And the king gave them a rough answer. So King Rehoboam gave no attention to the suggestion of the old men, ¹⁴ But gave them the answer put forward by the young men, saying, My father made your yoke hard, but I will make it harder; my father gave you punishment with whips, but I will give it with snakes. ¹⁵ So the king did not give ear to the people; for this came about by the purpose of God, so that the Lord might give effect to his word which he had said by Ahijah the Shilonite to Jeroboam, the son of Nebat. ¹⁶ And when all Israel saw that the king would give no attention to them, the people in answer said to the king, What part have we in David? what is our heritage in the son of Jesse? every man to your tents, O Israel; now see to your house, David. So all Israel went to their tents. ¹⁷ But Rehoboam was still king over those of the children of Israel who were living in the towns of Judah. ¹⁸ Then Rehoboam sent Adoniram, the overseer of the forced work; and he was stoned to death by all Israel. And King Rehoboam went quickly and got into his carriage to go in flight to Jerusalem. ¹⁹ So Israel was turned away from the family of David to this day.

Solomon Builds the House of the LORD

3¹ Then Solomon made a start at building the house of the Lord on Mount Moriah in Jerusalem, where the Lord had been seen by his father David, in the place which David had made ready in the grain-floor of Ornan the Jebusite. ² The building was started in the second month in the fourth year of his rule. ³ And Solomon put the base of the house of God in position; by the older measure it was sixty cubits long and twenty cubits wide. ⁴ And the covered way in front of the house was twenty cubits long, as wide as the house, and a hundred and twenty cubits high, all plated inside with the best gold. ⁵ And the greater house was roofed with cypress-wood, plated with the best gold and ornamented with designs of palm-trees and chains. ⁶ And the house was made beautiful with stones of great value, and the gold was gold of Parvaim. ⁷ All the house was plated with gold, the supports, the steps, the walls and the doors; and the walls were ornamented with designs of winged ones. ⁸ And he made the most holy place; it was twenty cubits long, and twenty cubits wide, like the greater house, and was plated all over with the best gold; six hundred talents were used for it. ⁹ And fifty shekels weight of gold was used for the nails. He had all the higher rooms plated with gold.

¹⁰ And in the most holy place he made images of two winged beings, covering them with gold. ¹¹ Their outstretched wings were twenty cubits across; one wing, five cubits long, touching the wall of the house, and the other, of the same size, meeting the wing of the other winged one. ¹² And in the same way, the wings of the other, five cubits long, were stretched out, one touching the wall and the other meeting the wing of the first winged one. ¹³ Their outstretched wings were twenty cubits across; they were placed upright on their feet, facing the inner part of the house. ¹⁴ And he made the veil of blue and purple and red, of the best linen, worked with winged ones.

The Two Pillars

¹⁵ And in front of the house he made two pillars, thirty-five cubits high, with crowns on the tops of them, five cubits high. ¹⁶ And he made chains, like neck ornaments, and put them on the tops of the pillars, and a hundred apples on the chains. ¹⁷ He put up the pillars in front of the Temple, one on the right side and one on the left, naming the one on the right Jachin and that on the left Boaz.