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

In yesterday’s passage, at the beginning of chapter nine, it tells us that all Israel was taken captive to Babylon because of their unfaithfulness.  Today’s passage begins with an account of Saul’s final battle, where he died.  It tells us that he died because he was unfaithful to the Lord.  Then it begins its account of David’s kingship.  It gives a short summary of how he became king and conquered Jerusalem in order to put his capital there.  Then it lists out the many mighty warriors who fought under his banner.  It starts by listing the Three and the Thirty, which appear to have been elite fighting units, but also appear to have been among his earliest supporters.  Then it lists men who came to follow him while he was in Ziklag, in Philistine country.  For whatever reason, the writer then gives a list of warriors who joined David’s warband while he was in the fortress in the wilderness, before he went to Ziklag.  It then goes back to mention some men who joined David when he marched with the Philistines to fight against Saul (and makes a note that David and his men did not join the fight against Saul because the Philistine leaders were afraid to have him and his men in their order of battle against Saul).  Finally, the writer lists the number of warriors sent from the various tribes to support making David king over all of Israel in place of King Saul.  I think the writer is making two points with this list of warriors who came to support David.  First, he tells us that David had a core group of men whose loyalty to David pre-dated him having any power, who began loyally following David when he was on the run from King Saul.  Second, the writer tells us that, from the beginning David had a larger army than Saul had for most of his reign.

I use 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.

As I understand the intentions of those who compiled this book, everything up until this point was to set the stage for the history they now begin telling.  Even their account of the death of King Saul and his sons was intended more to set the stage for David’s kingship than to relate events.  That does not mean that the account of Saul’s death is inaccurate, just that the writer glossed over details in order to get to the “important stuff”.  Even when describing the warriors who followed David, the writer counts on the reader being familiar with the story of David’s life from other sources.  I mentioned yesterday how the compiler of this account intended to show how a particular ethnic group was entitled to rule over the land of Israel.  Well, today’s passage suggests that to be a somewhat oversimplified explanation of their motives.  I find it interesting that, in today’s passage, they make it clear that David only came to rule over Israel because he had successfully inspired men from many backgrounds and nations to follow his leadership.  The account tells us how the men who followed David were extraordinary warriors who were willing to take great risks to serve David.  So, the first part of David’s success came from his ability to gain the loyalty of many great men.  The second part, which is not as clearly spelled out, came from his ability to inspire them to do even greater things in service to him.

I use 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.

A couple of things which become clear from this passage which are otherwise somewhat murky.  Here it explains how Joab became commander of the army for David.  Elsewhere we see various lists of David’s mighty men and, aside from being commander of the army, Joab does not otherwise rank particularly high among them.  Even his brother Abishai comes out in those lists as a more major figure.  However, here we learn that Joab became commander of the army for David by leading the attack to conquer Jerusalem.  Further, Joab played a major role in building Jerusalem as the capital of Israel (here it says that David built up part of the city and Joab restored the rest).  Another thing we learn here, although there is some reference to it elsewhere, is that while David was on the run from King Saul warriors from many different tribes defected from Saul’s army and joined David.  Perhaps the most significant of these were the warriors of the tribe of Benjamin, which was Saul’s tribe.  These defections show us that David developed a following among all of the tribes, even while Saul was still king.  They became the basis for David becoming king over all of Israel.

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

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.