I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on 1 Chronicles 10-12.

I find a few portions of today’s passage interesting.  First, it appears to me that David conquered Jerusalem so as to set it up as his capital.  This would have been important because Hebron was very much a town of the tribe of Judah.  One might almost consider it to be the capital of the tribe of Judah.  By moving his capital from Hebron to Jerusalem David made it less like he was the king of Judah who had come to rule over all of Israel.  It made David equally king of all of the tribes.  The compiler of this passage makes the same point in another way at the end of his discussion of David’s mighty men.  After listing the Three and the Thirty, he gives us a list of warriors from each of the tribes who came to follow David while he was at Hebron, and before.  David became king because warriors from all of the tribes chose to follow him and support his claim to kingship.

Going back to look at what this passage says about the Three and the Thirty we see some things which interest me.  As I am reading this it seems like these men were leaders of David’s army.  Unlike some other men who are mentioned from time to time, they had no specific unit which followed their orders.  Instead, they would be given charge of units, or take charge of units in ways that changed from battle to battle and war to war.  More interesting to me is the fact that there were more than thirty members of the Thirty.  Further, according to the translators’ notes and other translations, there was more than one leader of the Three.  The original Hebrew mentions that Joab’s brother was the leader of the Three, even though he was not one of them.  But before that it named one of the Three as the leader of the Three.