King Solomon was king over all the people of Israel. 2 These were his chief officials: Azariah the ¹son of Zadok was ^athe high priest; 3 Elihoreph and Ahijah the sons of Shisha, were scribes; ^aJehoshaphat the son of Ahilud was the recorder of important events; 4 ^aBenaiah the son of Jehoiada was in command of the army; Zadok and ^bAbiathar were priests; 5 Azariah the son of Nathan was in charge of ^athe deputies; Zabud the son of Nathan was priest and was the king’s friend and trusted advisor; 6 Ahishar was in charge of the household (palace) ; and Adoniram the son of Abda was in charge of the forced labor.

7 Solomon had twelve deputies over all Israel, who ¹secured provisions for the king and his household; each man had to provide for a month in the year. 8 These were their names: Ben-hur, in the ^ahill country of the tribe of Ephraim; 9 Ben-deker in Makaz and ^aShaalbim and ^bBeth-shemesh and Elon-beth-hanan; 10 Ben-hesed, in Arubboth (to him belonged ^aSocoh and all the land of ^bHepher); 11 Ben-abinadab, in all the hills of ^aDor (Taphath, Solomon’s daughter, was his wife); 12 Baana the son of Ahilud, in ^aTaanach, Megiddo, and all ^bBeth-shean which is beside ^cZarethan below Jezreel, from Beth-shean to ^dAbel-meholah as far as beyond ^eJokmeam; 13 Ben-geber, in ^aRamoth-gilead (^bthe villages of Jair the son of Manasseh, which are in Gilead belonged to him, also ^cthe region of Argob, which is in Bashan, sixty great cities with walls and bronze bars); 14 Ahinadab the son of Iddo, in ^aMahanaim; 15 ^aAhimaaz, in the tribe of Naphtali (he also married Basemath, Solomon’s daughter); 16 Baana the son of ^aHushai, in the tribe of Asher and Bealoth; 17 Jehoshaphat the son of Paruah, in the tribe of Issachar; 18 ^aShimei the son of Ela, in the tribe of Benjamin; 19 Geber the son of Uri, in the land of Gilead, ^athe country of Sihon king of the Amorites and of Og king of Bashan; and he was the only officer who was in the land.

20 ^aThe people of Judah and Israel were as numerous as the sand that is in abundance by the sea; they were eating and drinking and rejoicing.

21 ^1aNow Solomon reigned over all the kingdoms ^bfrom the Euphrates River to the land of the Philistines and to the border of Egypt; ^cthey brought tribute (money) and served Solomon all the days of his life.

22 Solomon’s food for the royal household for one day was thirty ¹kors of finely milled flour, sixty kors of wheat flour, 23 ten fat oxen, twenty pasture-fed oxen, a hundred sheep not counting fallow deer, gazelles, roebucks, and fattened fowl. 24 For he was ruling over everything west of the Euphrates River, from Tiphsah to ^aGaza, ^bover all the kings west of the Euphrates River; and ^che had peace on all sides around him. 25 ^aJudah and Israel lived in security, every man under his vine and fig tree in peace and prosperity, ^bfrom Dan in the north to Beersheba in the south, during all the days of Solomon. Mic 4:3, 4 26 ^aSolomon also had ¹40,000 stalls of horses for his chariots, and 12,000 horsemen. 27 Those deputies provided food for King Solomon and for all the staff who came to King Solomon’s table, each in his month; they let nothing be lacking. 28 They also brought the barley and straw for the horses and ^aswift steeds (warhorses, chargers) to the place where it was needed, each man according to his assignment.

29 Now ^aGod gave Solomon exceptional wisdom and very great discernment and breadth of mind, ^blike the sand of the seashore. 30 Solomon’s wisdom surpassed the wisdom of all ^athe sons of the east and ^ball the wisdom of Egypt. 31 For ^ahe was wiser ¹than all other men, wiser than ^2bEthan the Ezrahite, and Heman, ^cCalcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol. His fame was known in all the surrounding nations. 32 ^aHe also spoke 3,000 proverbs, and his songs were 1,005. 33 He spoke of trees, from the cedar which is in Lebanon to the hyssop vine that grows on the wall; he spoke also of animals, of birds, of creeping things, and fish. 34 People ^acame from all the peoples (nations) to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and from all the kings of the earth who had heard of his wisdom.