Wherever you die, I will die – and there I will be buried. May the Lord punish me severely if I do not keep my promise! ¹  Only death will be able to separate me from you!” ² 

Then fear overwhelmed ¹  those who were in the camp, those who were in the field, all the army in the garrison, and the raiding bands. They trembled and the ground shook. This fear was caused by God. ² 

As the temple was being built, only stones shaped at the quarry ¹  were used; the sound of hammers, pickaxes, or any other iron tool was not heard at the temple while it was being built.

Solomon plated the inside of the temple with gold. ¹  He hung golden chains in front of the inner sanctuary and plated the inner sanctuary ²  with gold.

He also made ¹  two doors out of wood from evergreens; each door had two folding leaves. ² 

“God does not really live on the earth! ¹  Look, if the sky and the highest heaven cannot contain you, how much less this temple I have built!

He ordered them, “This is what you must do. One third of the unit that is on duty during the Sabbath will guard the royal palace.

(Now the priests of the high places did not go up to the altar of the Lord in Jerusalem, but they did eat unleavened cakes among their fellow priests.) ¹ 

There was nothing in the ark except the two tablets Moses had placed there in Horeb. ¹  (It was there that ²  the Lord made an agreement with the Israelites after he brought them out of the land of Egypt.)

“God does not really live with humankind on the earth! ¹  Look, if the sky and the highest heaven cannot contain you, how much less this temple I have built!

On the eighth day they held an assembly, for they had dedicated the altar for seven days and celebrated the festival for seven more days.

But they mocked God’s messengers, despised his warnings, ¹  and ridiculed his prophets. ²  Finally the Lord got very angry at his people and there was no one who could prevent his judgment. ³ 

Malkijah son of Recab, head of the district of Beth Hakkerem, worked on the Dung Gate. He rebuilt it and positioned its doors, its bolts, and its bars.

The people from Tyre ¹  who lived there were bringing fish and all kinds of merchandise and were selling it on the Sabbath to the people of Judah – and in Jerusalem, of all places! ² 

The clouds ¹  go round in circles, wheeling about according to his plans, to carry out ²  all that he commands them over the face of the whole inhabited world.

Its underparts ¹  are the sharp points of potsherds, it leaves its mark in the mud like a threshing sledge. ² 

For ¹  they do not speak the truth; ²  their stomachs are like the place of destruction, ³  their throats like an open grave, ⁴  their tongues like a steep slope leading into it. ⁵ 

For I say, “Loyal love is permanently established; ¹  in the skies you set up your faithfulness.” ² 

Even before the mountains came into existence, ¹  or you brought the world into being, ²  you were the eternal God. ³ 

The king’s terrifying anger ¹  is like the roar of a lion; whoever provokes him ²  sins against himself. ³