Tag Archives: 1 Chronicles 12

May 12, 2024 Bible Study — Mighty Men Loyally Followed David

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.

May 12, 2023 Bible Study — Great Men Chose To Follow David, And He Inspired Them To Be Even Greater

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.

May 12, 2022 Bible Study — Details About How David Built His Influence To Become King

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.

May 12, 2021 Bible Study King David Saw Himself As A Member Of The Nation Of Israel, Not Just As A Member Of The Tribe Of Judah

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

The passage starts with an account of the death of King Saul.  This account echoes that given at the end of 1 Samuel.  It goes on to describe David becoming king over all Israel and the warriors who followed him.  This account shows us that David had a significant number of followers from tribes other than Judah even while Saul was king.  In fact, this passage suggests that warriors from the tribe of Benjamin formed a larger part of David’s war band than those from the tribe of Judah.  The fact that significant numbers of the tribe of Benjamin, which was King Saul’s tribe, defected to David tells us quite a bit about both King Saul and David.  I wonder if perhaps the fact that David had as much loyalty to all of Israel as he did to the tribe of Judah played a role in his animosity towards Joab and his brothers.  I have not previously noticed that Joab and his brothers put more emphasis on the interests of the tribe of Judah than other tribes, but I have not thought to look for it previously.

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

May 12, 2020 Bible Study

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.

 

 

May 12, 2018 Bible Study — King David Begins To Reign

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.

The writer takes up his historical account with the death of King Saul. The writer clearly expects that his reader is familiar with King Saul and his rule. The description of King Saul’s final battle and death is basically a setup for the writer to begin telling the story of David. However, he makes sure to make the point that God turned the Kingdom over to David because Saul had failed to faithfully obey God and seek His guidance. While this is an oversimplification of Saul’s career, it is not inaccurate.

As I have already noted, this book was compiled after the Exile. It seems to me that it was based on documents which the Exiles brought back with them and documents which they found as they rebuilt Jerusalem. I reach the conclusion that the writer was compiling information from other documents from the disjointed timeline in today’s passage. The writer tells us that all of Israel came to David at Hebron to ask him to be their king after Saul’s death. Then he goes on to write about David’s Mighty Men, The Three and The Thirty. From there he goes on to write about the men who came to support David while Saul was still king. However, he does not put them in any particular order. The first group he talks about are men from the same clan as Saul (or perhaps just from Saul’s tribe of Benjamin, the wording is not clear to me). This group joined David while he was in Ziklag under the protection of the Philistine king of Gath. The next group the writer talks about joined David before this when he was in the wilderness of Judah. In addition to a warband from Gad who joined David at this time, there were men from Benjamin and Judah who joined David while he was hiding in the wilderness of Judah. Then the writer skips ahead and writes about a group of warriors who defected from Sail’s army to join David when David and his men were marching with the Philistine army to fight against Saul. The writer points out that these men did not end up fighting against Saul because the Philistines were afraid to have them in their battle lines. Finally, the author lists some warriors who joined David after the death of King Saul. We see from all of this that the writer based what he wrote in this book on documents he had from other sources. It seems likely that he had access to 1 & 2 Kings as well as other historical records. Or perhaps, this was compiled at about the same time as 1 & 2 Kings and was based on some of the same records.

May 12, 2018 Bible Study — Another Perspective On What We Just Finished 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.

    From here to the end of 2 Chronicles this book (the evidence is that 1 and 2 Chronicles were written as one book and later divided, probably to facilitate making copies) mirrors the accounts recorded in 1 and 2 Kings. While there is overlap between these stories and those stories, the Chronicles tell some different stories, or information about the same stories not contained in the Books of Kings. As an example, of that the Books of Kings contained stories about the fighting men who followed David before and after he took the throne, but today’s passage contains some information not in those stories.

    Yesterday, I mentioned that it was curious that so many members of Saul’s clan lived in Jerusalem and suggested a couple of ideas about how that happened. In today’s passage, we are told that while David was in Ziklag under the protection of the King Achish of Gath (a Philistine), a group of warriors related to King Saul joined him there. So, while King Saul was pursuing David to kill him members of Saul’s clan went over to David’s side. In addition to these relatives of Saul, other members of Saul’s army deserted him and went to serve under David. Some even did so while David was preparing to march with the Philistine army against King Saul. Further it tells us that after Saul’s death, when David set up his capital in Hebron many warriors joined him desiring for him to become king over Israel. This suggests that one of the reasons that Abner, the commander of Saul’s army, and that of Saul’s son Ishbosheth, negotiated with David was because David’s forces were becoming progressively stronger. Basically, we are told that David did not become king over Israel by conquest. Rather he became king because the fighting men of Israel supported him as king.