from PART II - THE MIDDLE EAST
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 March 2008
SOURCES OF KNOWLEDGE
The primary sources of knowledge for the period of the divided monarchy in Judah and Israel, and of the succeeding periods of Exile and Restoration, are the books of the Bible, complemented by contemporary inscriptions and by the results of excavation. The book of Kings covers in considerable, though varying, detail the period from the last days of David, c. 960 B.C., to the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 B.C., with a brief closing reference to the release of Jehoiachin from captivity in Babylon in 561 B.C. Much the same ground is again covered, with the main emphasis on the kingdom of Judah, in Chronicles, and the account is taken up again with the accession of Cyrus and carried on into the fifth century by the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. It is commonly assumed that Chronicles and Ezra–Nehemiah originally formed a single work but there are substantial arguments against this view, and it seems more probable that Chronicles was written by a distinct author, and that the two closing verses which appear to form a link with Ezra, where they are repeated, were a later addition. Other historical material, sometimes duplicating that in Kings, is found in the prophetic books, notably in Isaiah 36–9 and Jeremiah 36–43, 52, but also in many other, briefer, passages.
Both Kings and Chronicles name sources from which they derived their data. In Kings reference is frequently made to the ‘Book of the history of the days of the kings of Judah’ and the ‘Book of the history of the days of the kings of Israel’, which were presumably official compilations of annalistic material.
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