Yahweh’s reply to Solomon’s prayer

9 After Solomon’s workers had finished building the temple and his palace and everything else that Solomon wanted them to build, 2 Yahweh appeared to him in a dream a second time, like he had appeared to him at the city of Gibeon. 3 Yahweh said to him,

“I heard what you prayed and what you pleaded for me to do. I have set apart/dedicated this temple which your workers have built to be the place where people will worship me forever. I will always watch over it and protect it.

4 “And as for you, if you conduct your life as I want you to, like your father David did, and if you very sincerely obey all the statutes and laws that I have commanded you to obey, 5 I will do what I promised your father that I would do: I promised him that Israel would always be ruled by his descendants.

6 “But if you or your descendants turn away from me and disobey the commands and decrees that I have given to you, and if you start to worship other gods, 7 I will remove my Israeli people from the land that I have given to them. I will also abandon this temple that I have set apart/dedicated to be the place where people should worship me. Then people everywhere will despise the people of Israel and make fun of them. 8 This temple will become a heap of ruins. Everyone who passes by will be astonished when they see it, and they will be shocked and say, ‘Why has Yahweh done this to this land and to this temple?’ 9 And other people will reply, ‘It happened because the Israeli people abandoned Yahweh their God, the one who brought their ancestors out of Egypt. They started to accept and worship other gods. And that is why Yahweh has caused them to experience all these disasters.’ ”