The First of Kings
5 And Hiʹram+ the king of Tyre+ proceeded to send his servants+ to Solʹo·mon, for he had heard that it was he that they had anointed as king in place of his father; for a lover* of David Hiʹram had always proved to be.+ 2 In turn Solʹo·mon sent to Hiʹram, saying:+ 3 “You yourself well know that David my father was not able to build a house to the name of Jehovah his God because of the warfare+ with which they surrounded him, until Jehovah put them under the soles of his feet. 4 And now Jehovah my God has given me rest all around.+ There is no resister,* and there is nothing bad happening.+ 5 And here I am thinking of building* a house to the name of Jehovah my God,+ just as Jehovah promised to David my father, saying, ‘Your son whom I shall put upon your throne in place of you, he is the one that will build the house to my name.’+ 6 And now command that they cut for me cedars* from Lebʹa·non;+ and my servants themselves will prove to be with your servants, and the wages of your servants I shall give to you according to all that you may say, for you yourself well know that there is among us no one knowing how to cut trees like the Si·doʹni·ans.”+
7 And it came about that as soon as Hiʹram+ heard the words of Solʹo·mon, he began to rejoice greatly, and he went on to say: “Blessed+ is Jehovah today in that he has given David a wise+ son over this numerous people!”+ 8 Accordingly Hiʹram sent to Solʹo·mon, saying: “I have heard what you sent to me. For my part, I shall do all your delight in the matter of timbers of cedar trees and timbers of juniper+ trees. 9 My servants themselves will bring them down out of Lebʹa·non+ to the sea; and I, for my part, shall put them in log rafts [to go] by sea clear to the place that you will send me notice of;+ and I shall certainly have them broken up there, and you, for your part, will carry them; and you, for your part, will do my delight by giving the food for my household.”+
10 So Hiʹram became a giver of timbers of cedar trees and timbers of juniper trees to Solʹo·mon according to all his delight. 11 And Solʹo·mon, for his part, gave Hiʹram twenty thousand cor+ measures of wheat as food supplies for his household and twenty cor* measures of beaten-out+ oil.* That was what Solʹo·mon kept giving Hiʹram year by year.+ 12 And Jehovah, for his part, gave Solʹo·mon wisdom, just as he had promised him;+ and there came to be peace between Hiʹram and Solʹo·mon, and both of them proceeded to conclude a covenant.
13 And King Solʹo·mon kept bringing up those conscripted for forced labor out of all Israel; and those conscripted for forced labor+ amounted to thirty thousand men. 14 And he would send them to Lebʹa·non in shifts of ten thousand a month. For a month they would continue in Lebʹa·non, for two months at their homes;+ and Ad·o·niʹram+ was over those conscripted+ for forced labor.+ 15 And Solʹo·mon came to have+ seventy thousand burden bearers+ and eighty thousand cutters+ in the mountain,+ 16 besides Solʹo·mon’s princely deputies*+ who were over the work, three thousand three hundred foremen+ over the people who were active in the work. 17 Accordingly the king commanded that they should quarry great stones, expensive stones,+ to lay the foundation+ of the house with hewn stones.+ 18 So Solʹo·mon’s builders and Hiʹram’s builders and the Geʹbal·ites+ did the cutting, and they kept preparing the timbers and the stones to build the house.