Add parallel Print Page Options

(A) After the Lord's temple was finished, Solomon put in its storage rooms everything that his father David had dedicated to the Lord, including the gold and silver, and the objects used in worship.

Solomon Brings the Sacred Chest to the Temple

(1 Kings 8.1-13)

2-3 (B) The sacred chest had been kept on Mount Zion, also known as the city of David. But Solomon decided to have the chest moved to the temple while everyone was in Jerusalem to celebrate the Festival of Shelters during the seventh month.[a]

Solomon called together all the important leaders of Israel. 4-5 Then the priests and the Levites picked up the sacred chest, the sacred tent, and the objects used for worship, and they carried them to the temple. Solomon and a crowd of people stood in front of the chest and sacrificed more sheep and cattle than could be counted.

The priests carried the chest into the most holy place and put it under the winged creatures, whose wings covered both the chest and the poles used for carrying it. The poles were so long that they could be seen from just outside the most holy place, but not from anywhere else. And they stayed there from then on.

10 (C) The only things kept in the chest were the two flat stones Moses had put there when the Lord made his agreement with the people of Israel at Mount Sinai,[b] after bringing them out of Egypt.

11-13 (D) The priests of every group had gone through the ceremony to make themselves clean and acceptable to the Lord. The Levite musicians, including Asaph, Heman, Jeduthun, and their sons and relatives, were wearing robes of fine linen. They were standing on the east side of the altar, playing cymbals, small harps, and other stringed instruments. One hundred and twenty priests were with these musicians, and they were blowing trumpets.

They were praising the Lord by playing music and singing:

“The Lord is good,
    and his love never ends.”

Suddenly a cloud filled the temple as the priests were leaving the holy place. 14 The Lord's glory was in that cloud, and the light from it was so bright that the priests could not stay inside to do their work.

Footnotes

  1. 5.2,3 seventh month: Tishri (also called Ethanim), the seventh month of the Hebrew calendar, from about mid-September to mid-October.
  2. 5.10 Sinai: Hebrew “Horeb.”

When all the work Solomon had done for the temple of the Lord was finished,(A) he brought in the things his father David had dedicated(B)—the silver and gold and all the furnishings—and he placed them in the treasuries of God’s temple.

The Ark Brought to the Temple(C)

Then Solomon summoned to Jerusalem the elders of Israel, all the heads of the tribes and the chiefs of the Israelite families, to bring up the ark(D) of the Lord’s covenant from Zion, the City of David. And all the Israelites(E) came together to the king at the time of the festival in the seventh month.

When all the elders of Israel had arrived, the Levites took up the ark, and they brought up the ark and the tent of meeting and all the sacred furnishings in it. The Levitical priests(F) carried them up; and King Solomon and the entire assembly of Israel that had gathered about him were before the ark, sacrificing so many sheep and cattle that they could not be recorded or counted.

The priests then brought the ark(G) of the Lord’s covenant to its place in the inner sanctuary of the temple, the Most Holy Place, and put it beneath the wings of the cherubim. The cherubim(H) spread their wings over the place of the ark and covered the ark and its carrying poles. These poles were so long that their ends, extending from the ark, could be seen from in front of the inner sanctuary, but not from outside the Holy Place; and they are still there today. 10 There was nothing in the ark except(I) the two tablets(J) that Moses had placed in it at Horeb, where the Lord made a covenant with the Israelites after they came out of Egypt.

11 The priests then withdrew from the Holy Place. All the priests who were there had consecrated themselves, regardless of their divisions.(K) 12 All the Levites who were musicians(L)—Asaph, Heman, Jeduthun and their sons and relatives—stood on the east side of the altar, dressed in fine linen and playing cymbals, harps and lyres. They were accompanied by 120 priests sounding trumpets.(M) 13 The trumpeters and musicians joined in unison to give praise and thanks to the Lord. Accompanied by trumpets, cymbals and other instruments, the singers raised their voices in praise to the Lord and sang:

“He is good;
    his love endures forever.”(N)

Then the temple of the Lord was filled with the cloud,(O) 14 and the priests could not perform(P) their service because of the cloud,(Q) for the glory(R) of the Lord filled the temple of God.