The first reading is a reading from the first book of kings.

The elders of Israel and all the leaders of the tribes, the princes of the ancestral houses of the children of Israel,

came to King Solomon in Jerusalem to bring up the ark of the Lord's covenant from the city of David,

which is Zion.

All the people of Israel assembled before King Solomon during the festival in the month of Anthem,

the seventh month.

When all the outers of Israel had arrived, the priests took up the ark.

They carried the ark of the Lord and the

meaning tent with all the sacred vessels that were in the tent. The priests and the Levites carried them.

King Solomon and the entire community of Israel present for the occasion sacrificed before the ark,

sheep and oxen, too many of number to count. The priest brought the

ark of the covenant of the Lord to its place beneath the wings of the cherubim, to the sanctuary,

the holy of holies of the temple. The cherubim had their wings spread out over the place of the ark,

sheltering the ark and its poles from

above. There was nothing in the ark but the two stone tablets which Moses had put in there at

Horib when the Lord made a covenant with the children of Israel at their departure from the land of

Egypt. When the priests left the holy temple, the cloud

filled the temple of the Lord so that the priest could no longer minister because of the cloud,

since the Lord's glory had filled the temple of the Lord. Then Solomon said, the Lord intends to dwell

in the dark cloud. I have truly built you a princely house, a dwelling where you may

abide forever. The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Lord, go to the place of your rest. Lord, go up to the

place of your rest. Behold, we heard of it in Ephraim.

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