2 Chronicles 2 · a question people ask
Were the workers foreigners, or Israelites?
This chapter counts foreigners: Solomon "counted all the foreigners who were in the land of Israel" (2:17) and "set seventy thousand of them to bear burdens" (2:18). Chapter 8 says of the peoples left in the land, "of them Solomon conscripted forced labor to this day" (8:8), and "But of the children of Israel, Solomon made no servants for his work" (8:9). 1 Kings 5 tells of another group as well: "King Solomon raised a levy out of all Israel; and the levy was thirty thousand men" (1 Kings 5:13), who went to Lebanon "ten thousand a month by courses" (1 Kings 5:14). 2 Chronicles 2 doesn't tell of that levy. And after Solomon's death the people say to his son, "Your father made our yoke grievous" (10:4). The Bible doesn't say how these verses fit together, and these notes quote each one and leave them side by side.
The verses
“Solomon counted all the foreigners who were in the land of Israel, after the census with which David his father had counted them; and they found one hundred fifty-three thousand six hundred. He set seventy thousand of them to bear burdens, eighty thousand who were stone cutters in the mountains, and three thousand six hundred overseers to assign the people their work.”
“As for all the people who were left of the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, who were not of Israel— of their children who were left after them in the land, whom the children of Israel didn’t consume—of them Solomon conscripted forced labor to this day. But of the children of Israel, Solomon made no servants for his work, but they were men of war, chief of his captains, and rulers of his chariots and of his horsemen.”
“King Solomon raised a levy out of all Israel; and the levy was thirty thousand men. He sent them to Lebanon, ten thousand a month by courses: for a month they were in Lebanon, and two months at home; and Adoniram was over the men subject to forced labor.”
““Your father made our yoke grievous. Now therefore make the grievous service of your father and his heavy yoke which he put on us, lighter, and we will serve you.””