Your servant is here among the people You have chosen, a people too numerous to count or number.
Parallel translations
- WEB Your servant is among your people which you have chosen, a great people, that can’t be numbered or counted for multitude.
- KJV And thy servant is in the midst of thy people which thou hast chosen, a great people, that cannot be numbered nor counted for multitude.
- NKJV And Your servant is in the midst of Your people whom You have chosen, a great people, too numerous to be numbered or counted.
- NASB And Your servant is in the midst of Your people whom You have chosen, a great people who are too many to be numbered or counted.
- NLT And here I am in the midst of your own chosen people, a nation so great and numerous they cannot be counted!
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Solomon recognizes he rules God's own chosen people, too numerous to count. The greatness of the task deepens his sense of dependence.
Overview
Solomon sees the people not as his possession but as God's chosen nation, recalling the promises to Abraham of innumerable descendants. The vast responsibility of judging such a people drives him to seek what no man can supply on his own. His awareness that the kingdom belongs to God reframes leadership as stewardship before the true King.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 10
- Gen 15:5And the LORD took him outside and said, “Now look to the heavens and count the stars, if you are able.” Then He told him, “So shall your offspring be.”
- Gen 22:17I will surely bless you, and I will multiply your descendants like the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will possess the gates of their enemies.
- Gen 13:16I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if one could count the dust of the earth, then your offspring could be counted.
- 1 Chr 21:2So David said to Joab and the commanders of the troops, “Go and count the Israelites from Beersheba to Dan and bring me a report, so that I may know their number.”
- 1 Chr 27:23–24David did not count the men aged twenty or under, because the LORD had said that He would make Israel as numerous as the stars of the sky.
- 1 Sam 12:22Indeed, for the sake of His great name, the LORD will not abandon His people, because He was pleased to make you His own.
- Ps 78:71from tending the ewes He brought him to be shepherd of His people Jacob, of Israel His inheritance.
- Deut 7:6–8For you are a people holy to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for His prized possession out of all peoples on the face of the earth.
- 1 Chr 21:5–6And Joab reported to David the total number of the troops. In all Israel there were 1,100,000 men who drew the sword, including 470,000 in Judah.
- Exod 19:5–6Now if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, you will be My treasured possession out of all the nations—for the whole earth is Mine.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
Resources, by level
Commentaries & study tools
Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.
Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.
Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.
Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.
The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).
Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
Christ at the center
Solomon's glory, wisdom, and temple where God's presence dwells are a shadow of the greater Son of David — 'one greater than Solomon is here' — and of the true Temple, Christ himself.
How 1 Kings 3:8 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.