Now Hiram, king of Tyre, hearing that Solomon had been made king in place of his father, sent his servants to him; for Hiram had ever been a friend to David.
Solomon's builders and Hiram's builders did the work of cutting them, and put edges on them, and got the wood and the stone ready for the building of the house.
So now, will you have cedar-trees from Lebanon cut down for me, and my servants will be with your servants; and I will give you payment for your servants at whatever rate you say; for it is common knowledge that we have no such wood-cutters among us as the men of Zidon.
Now when David was living in his house, he said to Nathan the prophet, See, I am living in a house of cedar-wood, but the ark of the Lord's agreement is under the curtains of a tent.
And David gave orders to get together all the men from strange lands who were in the land of Israel; and he put stone-cutters to work, cutting stones for building the house of God.
And Solomon had seventy thousand men numbered for transport, and eighty thousand for cutting stone in the mountains, and three thousand, six hundred as overseers.
And they gave money to the stoneworkers and woodworkers; and meat and drink and oil to the people of Zidon and of Tyre, for the transport of cedar-trees from Lebanon to the sea, to Joppa, as Cyrus, king of Persia, had given them authority to do.