1 Kings 4

¹ King Solomon was king over all Israel.

² These were his officials: Azariah son of Zadok was the priest;

³ Elihoreph and Ahijah, sons of Shisha, were secretaries; Jehoshaphat son of Ahilud was the recorder;

⁴ Benaiah son of Jehoiada was over the army; Zadok and Abiathar were priests;

⁵ Azariah son of Nathan was over the officers; Zabud son of Nathan was priest and friend of the king;

⁶ Ahishar was over the household; and Adoniram son of Abda was over the forced labor.

⁷ Solomon had twelve officers over all Israel who provided food for the king and his household. Each one had to provide food for one month in the year.

⁸ These are their names: Ben-Hur, in the hill country of Ephraim;

⁹ Ben-Deker, in Makaz, Shaalbim, Beth-shemesh, and Elon-beth-hanan;

¹⁰ Ben-Hesed, in Arubboth (to him belonged Socoh and all the land of Hepher);

¹¹ Ben-Abinadab, in all the heights of Dor (Taphath daughter of Solomon was his wife);

¹² Baana son of Ahilud, in Taanach, Megiddo, and all Beth-shean which is beside Zarethan below Jezreel, from Beth-shean to Abel-meholah, as far as beyond Jokmeam;

¹³ Ben-Geber, in Ramoth-gilead (to him belonged the villages of Jair son of Manasseh, which are in Gilead; to him belonged the region of Argob, which is in Bashan—sixty great cities with walls and bronze bars);

¹⁴ Ahinadab son of Iddo, in Mahanaim;

¹⁵ Ahimaaz, in Naphtali (he also took Basemath daughter of Solomon as his wife);

¹⁶ Baana son of Hushai, in Asher and Bealoth;

¹⁷ Jehoshaphat son of Paruah, in Issachar;

¹⁸ Shimei son of Ela, in Benjamin;

¹⁹ Geber son of Uri, in the land of Gilead, the country of Sihon king of the Amorites and Og king of Bashan. And there was one governor over the land.

²⁰ Judah and Israel were as many as the sand by the sea in multitude, eating and drinking and rejoicing.

²¹ Solomon ruled over all the kingdoms from the River to the land of the Philistines and to the border of Egypt. They brought tribute and served Solomon all the days of his life.

²² Solomon's provision for one day was thirty cors of fine flour and sixty cors of meal,

²³ ten fattened cattle, twenty pasture-fed cattle, and a hundred sheep, besides deer, gazelles, roebucks, and fattened fowl.

²⁴ For he had dominion over all the region west of the River, from Tiphsah to Gaza, over all the kings west of the River. And he had peace on every side around him.

²⁵ Judah and Israel lived in safety, each man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon.

²⁶ Solomon had forty thousand stalls of horses for his chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen.

²⁷ Those officers provided food for King Solomon and for all who came to King Solomon's table, each in his month. They let nothing be lacking.

²⁸ They also brought barley and straw for the horses and swift steeds to the place where it was needed, each according to his duty.

²⁹ God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding beyond measure, and breadth of heart like the sand on the seashore.

³⁰ Solomon's wisdom surpassed the wisdom of all the people of the east and all the wisdom of Egypt.

³¹ He was wiser than all men—wiser than Ethan the Ezrahite, and Heman, Calcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol—and his fame was in all the surrounding nations.

³² He spoke three thousand proverbs, and his songs were one thousand and five.

³³ He spoke of trees, from the cedar that is in Lebanon to the hyssop that grows out of the wall. He spoke of beasts and of birds and of creeping things and of fish.

³⁴ People came from all nations to hear the wisdom of Solomon, from all the kings of the earth who had heard of his wisdom.