But as for you, be strong and don’t get discouraged, ¹  for your work will be rewarded.” ² 

“Your father made us work too hard! ¹  Now if you lighten the demands he made and don’t make us work as hard, we will serve you.” ² 

Huram Abi ¹  made the pots, shovels, and bowls. He finished all the work on God’s temple he had been assigned by King Solomon. ² 

Solomon did not assign Israelites to these work crews; ¹  the Israelites served as his soldiers, officers, charioteers, and commanders of his chariot forces. ² 

He designated ¹  70,000 as common laborers, ²  80,000 as stonecutters ³  in the hills, and 3,600 as supervisors to make sure the people completed the work. ⁴ 

All the work ordered by Solomon was completed, from the day the foundation of the Lord’s temple was laid until it was finished; the Lord’s temple was completed.

He built the Upper Gate to the Lord’s temple and did a lot of work on the wall in the area known as Ophel. ¹ 

whose mother is a Danite and whose father is a Tyrian. ¹  He knows how to work with gold, silver, bronze, iron, stones, and wood, as well as purple, violet, white, and crimson fabrics. He knows how to do all kinds of engraving and understands any design given to him. He will work with your skilled craftsmen and the skilled craftsmen of my lord David your father.

Send me cedars, evergreens, and algum ¹  trees from Lebanon, for I know your servants are adept ²  at cutting down trees in Lebanon. My servants will work with your servants

But as for us, the Lord is our God and we have not rejected him. Aaron’s descendants serve as the Lord’s priests and the Levites assist them with the work. ¹ 

“Now send me a man who is skilled in working with gold, silver, bronze, and iron, as well as purple, crimson, and violet colored fabrics, and who knows how to engrave. He will work with my skilled craftsmen here in Jerusalem ¹  and Judah, whom my father David provided.

Their descendants remained in the land (the Israelites were unable to wipe them out). Solomon conscripted them for his work crews and they continue in that role to this very day. ¹ 

But there were not enough priests to skin all the animals, ¹  so their brothers, the Levites, helped them until the work was finished and the priests could consecrate themselves. (The Levites had been more conscientious about consecrating themselves than the priests.) ² 

King Rehoboam sent Hadoram, ¹  the supervisor of the work crews, out after them, but the Israelites stoned him to death. King Rehoboam managed to jump into his chariot and escape to Jerusalem. ² 

The young advisers with whom Rehoboam ¹  had grown up said to him, “Say this to these people who have said to you, ‘Your father made us work hard, but now lighten our burden’ ²  – say this to them: ‘I am a lot harsher than my father! ³ 

When Baasha heard the news, he stopped fortifying ¹  Ramah and abandoned the project. ² 

They worked hard and made the repairs. ¹  They followed the measurements specified for God’s temple and restored it. ² 

They talked about the God of Jerusalem as if he were one of the man-made gods of the nations of the earth.

The men worked faithfully. Their supervisors were Jahath and Obadiah (Levites descended from Merari), as well as Zechariah and Meshullam (descendants of Kohath). The Levites, all of whom were skilled musicians,

supervised the laborers and all the foremen on their various jobs. ¹  Some of the Levites were scribes, officials, and guards.