'King' in the Bible

So they conducted a search throughout the territory of Israel for a beautiful young woman, and Abishag the Shunammite was located and brought to the king.

The young woman was absolutely beautiful. She served the king and was very useful to him. The king was not sexually involved with her.

Meanwhile, about this time Haggith's son Adonijah began to seek a reputation for himself and decided, "I'm going to be king!" So he prepared chariots, cavalry, and 50 soldiers to serve as a security detail to guard him.

Adonijah sacrificed sheep, oxen, and fatted cattle by the Serpent Stone near En-rogel, inviting all of his relatives, the king's sons, and all of the men of Judah who worked for the king,

"Haven't you heard?" Nathan asked Solomon's mother Bathsheba. "Haggith's son Adonijah has become king and David, our true king, isn't aware of it.

Go right now to King David and ask him, "Your majesty, you promised your servant that "Your son Solomon will certainly become king after me and will sit on my throne," didn't you? So why has Adonijah become king?'

Then, while you are still talking to the king, I'll come in after you and verify your statement."

So Bathsheba went to the king in his private room. Now the king was very old, and Abishag the Shunammite was attending to him.

Bathsheba knelt and bowed down to the king, and the king asked her, "What do you wish?"

"Your majesty," she replied, "you promised your servant in the name of the LORD your God, "Your son Solomon will certainly become king after me and will sit on my throne.'

Now look, Adonijah has become king, and your majesty is not aware of it.

While she was still talking to the king, Nathan the prophet arrived.

They informed the king, "Nathan the prophet is here."

When he had been ushered into the presence of the king, Nathan bowed low in front of the king with his face to the ground and asked, "Your majesty, did you say "Adonijah will be king after me and will sit on my throne'?

Well now, he went down today and sacrificed lots of oxen, fattened cattle, and sheep, and has invited all the king's sons, the army commanders, and Abiathar the priest. They're having a party together and saying, "Long live King Adonijah!'

"Call Bathsheba for me," King David replied. So she came in and stood in front of the king.

"As the LORD lives," the king said with an oath, "who has redeemed me from all sorts of troubles,

I certainly did tell you in the name of the LORD God of Israel, "Your son Solomon will be king after me and will sit on my throne in my place.' I'm certainly going to make this happen today!"

"King David," Bathsheba said as she bowed low in front of the king with her face to the ground, "your majesty, may you live forever."

"Get me Zadok the priest," King David said, "along with Nathan the prophet, and Jehoiada's son Benaiah." So they were ushered into the king's presence

Have Zadok the priest and Nathan the prophet anoint him there as king over Israel. Then sound a trumpet and declare "Long live King Solomon!'

After this, you are to follow him back here, and he is to come and sit on my throne and take my place as king, because I've appointed him to be Commander-in-Chief over Israel and Judah."

"Amen!" replied Jehoiada's son Benaiah to the king. "May the LORD God of your majesty make this happen!

As the LORD has been with your majesty the king, so may he be with Solomon. May he make his throne greater than the throne of your majesty, King David."

Zadok the priest brought from his tent a horn filled with oil and anointed Solomon, a trumpet was sounded, and everybody yelled out, "Long live King Solomon!"

"No," Jonathan answered. "Our lord King David has installed Solomon as king.

The king has sent Zadok the priest, Nathan the prophet, Jehoiada's son Benaiah, the special forces and mercenaries, along with Solomon, who is riding the king's personal mule.

In addition to all of this, the king's servants have come along to congratulate our lord King David. They've been telling David "May your God make Solomon's reputation even more famous than yours, and may he make his throne greater than yours!' The king has himself bowed in worship on his own bed

"Hey look!" somebody informed Solomon. "Adonijah is terrified of King Solomon! He's gone out, grabbed hold of the horns of the altar, and now he's begging King Solomon, "Swear to me that you won't put your servant to death with a sword!'"

So King Solomon sent for him, and he was brought down from the altar. When he had arrived, he fell on his face in front of King Solomon, so Solomon told him, "Go home!"

So he replied, "You know that the kingdom should have come to me, and that everyone in Israel intended to place me as the next king. However, the kingdom has turned around and now belongs to my brother, because it went to him from the LORD.

Then he asked her, "Please talk to King Solomon for me, since he won't refuse you. Ask him to give me Abishag the Shunammite as a wife."

"Okay," Bathsheba replied. "I'll talk to the king for you."

So Bathsheba went to talk to King Solomon for Adonijah. The king rose to meet her, bowed to her, and sat down on his throne. He ordered a throne be set in place for his mother. She sat on a throne to his right

and told him, "I would like to make a minor request of you. Please don't refuse me." "What is your request, mother?" the king asked her. "I won't turn you down."

But King Solomon replied to his mother, "Why are you asking Abishag the Shunammite for Adonijah? Why not ask me to give up the kingdom for him, since he's my older brother, and why not ask for Abiathar the priest, and for Zeruiah's son Joab?"

Then King Solomon took this oath in the name of the LORD: "May God do so to me, and more besides, if Adonijah hasn't endangered his life by bringing up this subject.

So King Solomon sent for Jehoiada's son Benaiah, who attacked and killed Adonijah.

The king also told Abiathar the priest, "Go home to Anathoth. You deserve to die, but I won't kill you today, because you carried the ark of the Lord GOD before my father David and because you shared all the troubles that my father went through."

Somebody informed King Solomon, "Joab just ran to the LORD's tent and now he's standing beside the altar!" But Solomon ordered Jehoiada's son Benaiah, "Go kill him!"

So Benaiah went into the LORD's tent and told Joab, "The king orders you to come out!" "No," Joab said, "I'd rather die here!" So Benaiah went and informed the king, "This is how Joab answered me."

The king replied to him, "Do just what he asked. Kill him and bury him so that you may remove from me and from my father's household the guilt that Joab shed needlessly.

The king appointed Jehoiada's son Benaiah in charge of the army to replace Joab and also appointed Zadok the priest to replace Abiathar.

The king sent for Shimei and told him, "Build yourself a house in Jerusalem and live there, but don't go anywhere from there.

Shimei replied to the king, "What your majesty has decreed is acceptable to me. I'll do what you've said." So Shimei lived in Jerusalem for quite some time.

But three years later, two of Shimei's servants escaped to Maacah's son Achish, the king of Gath.

so the king sent for Shimei and asked him, "Didn't I make a promise to the LORD and warn you, "The day you leave and go anywhere else, you can be sure you'll die'? And you told me, "What your majesty has decreed is acceptable to me.'

The king also reminded Shimei, "You know all the evil things that you admit you did to my father David. Therefore the LORD is going to repay you for all of your evil.

But King Solomon will be blessed, and David's throne will be established in the presence of the LORD forever."

So the king gave orders to Jehoiada's son Benaiah to go out, attack Shimei, and kill him. That is how the kingdom was established under Solomon's control.

Later, Solomon intermarried with the family of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt by taking his daughter and bringing her to the City of David to live until he had completed building his own palace, the LORD's Temple, and the wall around Jerusalem.

The king used to go to Gibeon to sacrifice, since there was a famous high place there, where Solomon once offered 1,000 burnt offerings on that altar.

"You have demonstrated abundant gracious love to your servant David, my father, as he lived in your presence truthfully, righteously, and uprightly in his heart. In addition, you have kept on showing this abundant gracious love by giving him a son to sit on his throne today. Now, LORD my God, you have set me as king to replace my father David, but I'm still young. I don't have any leadership skills.

I'm also giving you what you haven't requested: both riches and honor, so that no other king will be comparable to you during your lifetime.

Right about then, two prostitutes approached the king and requested an audience with him.

"Not so," claimed the other woman. "The living child is my son, and the dead one is yours." But the first woman said, "Not so! The dead child is your son and the living one is my son." This is what they testified before the king.

The king said, "One of them claims, "This living son is mine, and your son is the dead one' and the other claims "No. Your son is the dead one and my son is the living one.'

"Somebody get me a sword." So they brought a sword to the king.

The woman whose child was still alive cried out to the king, because her heart yearned for her son. "Oh no, your majesty!" she said. "Give her the living child. Please don't kill him." But the other woman said, "Cut him in half! That way, he'll belong to neither one of us."

The king announced his decision: "Give the living child to the first woman. Don't kill him. She is his mother."

When this decision that the king had handed down was announced, everybody in Israel was amazed at the king, because they all saw that God's wisdom was in him, enabling him to administer justice.

And so King Solomon ruled over all of Israel.

Solomon also appointed twelve governors over all of Israel, each of whom were responsible for providing one month's food provisions to the king and to his administration during each year.

and Uri's son Geber served in the territory of Gilead, the territory formerly ruled by King Sihon of the Amorites and King Og of Bashan (he was the only governor over that territory).

His officers supplied provisions for King Solomon and for everyone who visited King Solomon's palace, each in their respective month of service responsibility. Nothing ever ran out.

People came from everywhere to hear Solomon's advice. Every king on the earth heard of his wisdom.

King Hiram of Tyre sent his servants to Solomon when he learned that Solomon had been anointed king to replace his father, because Hiram had been David's lifelong friend.

King Solomon conscripted laborers from throughout Israel. The work force numbered 30,000 men.

The king specified that large, expensive stones be quarried so the foundation of the Temple could be laid with cut stones.

King Solomon sent for Hiram from Tyre,

the son of a widow from the tribe of Naphtali, whose father was from Tyre. A bronze worker, he was wise, knowledgeable, and was skilled in all sorts of bronze working. He went to King Solomon and did all of his work.

Hiram also made the basins, shovels, and bowls to complete the work that he performed for King Solomon in the LORD's Temple,

and the pots, shovels, and bowls all of these utensils that Hiram made for King Solomon for the LORD's Temple were made from polished bronze.

The king had them cast in the clay ground between Succoth and Zarethan in the Jordan plain.

Thus all the work that King Solomon performed in the LORD's Temple was finished. Then Solomon brought in the articles that had been dedicated by his father David, including silver, gold, and other utensils, and he placed them into storage in the treasuries of the LORD's Temple.

So all the men gathered together to meet with King Solomon at the Festival of Tents in the month Ethanim, the seventh month.

King Solomon and the entire congregation of Israel that had assembled to be with him stood in front of the ark, sacrificing so many sheep and oxen that they were neither counted nor inventoried.

Then the king turned to face the entire congregation of Israel while the congregation of Israel remained standing.

Then the king and all of Israel with him offered sacrifices to the LORD.

Solomon offered peace offerings to the LORD consisting of 22,000 oxen and 120,000 sheep. So the king and all the Israelis dedicated the LORD's Temple.

That same day, the king consecrated the middle court that stood in front of the LORD's Temple, because that was where he offered burnt offerings, grain offerings, and fat from the peace offerings and because the bronze altar that was in the LORD's presence was too small to hold the burnt offerings, grain offerings, and fat from the peace offerings.

The following day, Solomon sent the people away as they blessed the king. Then they went back to their tents, rejoicing and glad for all the good things that the LORD had done for his servant David and to his people Israel.

after which King Solomon gave Hiram 20 cities in the land of Galilee, because King Hiram of Tyre had provided Solomon with as much cedar, cypress timber, and gold that he wanted.

Then Hiram paid the king 120 talents of gold.

Here is a summary of the conscripted labor that King Solomon required to build the LORD's Temple, his royal palace, the terrace ramparts in the City of David, the wall of Jerusalem, Hazor, Megiddo, and Gezer.

Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, had attacked and captured Gezer, burned it down, killed the Canaanites who lived in the city, and then gave it as a dowry for his daughter, Solomon's wife.

King Solomon also built a fleet of ships at Ezion-geber, which is near Eloth on the shore of the Reed Sea in the land of Edom.

And blessed be the LORD your God, who is delighted with you! He set you in place on the throne of Israel because the LORD loved Israel forever. That's why he made you to be king, so you could carry out justice and implement righteousness."

Then she gave the king 120 talents of gold, a vast quantity of spices, and precious stones. No spices ever came again that were comparable to those that the queen of Sheba gave to King Solomon.

The king used the algum wood to have supports made for the LORD's Temple and for the royal palace, as well as lyres and harps for the choir, and nothing like that wood has ever come again or even been seen since right to this day.

In return, King Solomon gave the queen of Sheba everything she wanted and had requested in addition to what he had given her consistent with his generosity. Afterward, she returned to her own land with her servants.

King Solomon made 200 large shields of beaten gold, overlaying each large shield with the gold from 600 gold pieces,

and 300 shields from beaten gold, overlaying each shield with the gold from 300 gold pieces. The king put them in his palace in the Lebanon forest.

The king also made a great ivory throne and overlaid it with pure gold.

All of King Solomon's drinking vessels were made of gold, and all the vessels in his palace in the Lebanon forest were made of pure gold. None were of silver, because silver was never considered to be valuable during Solomon's lifetime,

because the king had ships that sailed to Tarshish accompanied by Hiram's ships. Once every three years ships from Tarshish returned, bringing gold, silver, ivory, apes, and peacocks.

As a result, King Solomon became greater than all the kings of the earth in regards to wealth and wisdom.

Solomon accumulated chariots and cavalry. He had 1,400 chariots and 12,000 cavalry soldiers. He stationed them in various chariot cities and with the king in Jerusalem.

The king made silver as common as stones in Jerusalem, and made cedar trees as abundant as sycamore trees in the Shephelah.

But King Solomon married many foreign women besides the daughter of Pharaoh: women from Moab, Ammon, Edom, and Sidonia, along with Hittite women, too,