Although kings are often central to the extant literary (and other textual) evidence from Mesopotamia, the wider Near East and the eastern Mediterranean, the texts themselves were usually authored by others, such as poets, priests, prophets or scholars. If mortal kings typically claimed to rule thanks to divine support, these latter characters similarly tended to base their authority on their ability to articulate and enact the divine will. Inevitably perhaps, the stage was set for narratives of conflict between kings and other intermediaries of the divine. This chapter shows that the ancient sources again exhibit a consistent pattern: it is always the king who initiates the conflict, often in a military context. The king is not necessarily impious, but shows casual disregard for the divine will, despite the information offered by a reliable intermediary. This is invariably depicted as an act of folly. The negative consequences soon become apparent, but they are usually borne primarily by the people whom the king was supposed to lead. The first attestations are found in Sumerian sources from early Mesopotamia. The other main bodies of evidence are the Hebrew Bible and the early Greek epics of Homer and Hesiod.

This chapter proposes an assessment of the biblical figure of David as presented by Theodore Prodromos in some of his Historical Poems. David was often considered in Byzantine culture as the first and most important example of a Christian poet. The poet of the Psalms is depicted by Prodromos both as a source of inspiration for the persona loquens and as a role model for the emperor. This twofold representation is crucial to shed light on some of the poetic strategies used by Prodromos when dealing with Psalmic material in poems addressed to emperors. The chapter includes a close-reading of Prodromos’ Historical Poem 17, where a military victory of John II Komnenos is celebrated. In this long text, Prodromos systematically borrows verses from the text of the Psalms and adapts them in order to fit the occasional character of the poem. The analysis of the biblical hypotext as a literary source presented in the chapter provides new insight into the role that the biblical heritage could play within Byzantine authors’ canonical reference system.

Chapter 5 moves the focus to David and the tension and conflict between Saul and David, an aspect of which is Saul’s failure to apprehend and kill David, and David’s declining to capture and kill Saul. The chapter closes with Saul’s consulting a medium and then dying in battle.

Chapter 7 covers David’s moral downfall and the disastrous implications for his family, including the rape of Tamar and the rebellion of Absalom. The closing pages of 2 Samuel look back and raise further questions about who David was and the kind of God who was involved with him.

Chapter 6 relates how David establishes his position as Saul’s successor and has considerable achievements as king, acquiring a capital, planning a temple, and receiving God’s promise of a dynasty to succeed him.

Chapter 4 focuses on the dynamics whereby God rejects Saul as king, including the pressures on Saul, the mistakes he makes, the way David emerges on the scene as Saul’s potential replacement, and the relationships and dynamics in the royal family.

The commentary on 2 Samuel 5:4–24:25/1 Kings 2:11 focuses on the reign of King David ben Jesse over Israel, including his choice of Jerusalem as his capital; the eternal Davidic covenant; his affair with Bath Sheba; and the revolt of his son Abshalom.

The commentary on 1 Samuel 13–31 focuses on the rule of King Saul ben Kish, his failures of leadership, and his rivalry with David ben Jesse.

While the image of David’s military prowess was ubiquitous, the figure of David as penitent also provided a model for Louis’s kingship. This chapter explores a number of musical settings of centonized psalm texts composed for the singers of the chambre in the difficult circumstances surrounding his early reign that engage with the idea of a penitent king, a king responding to adversity through an intensification of personal devotion. As part of this process, Psalm 19, Exaudiat te Dominus came into particular focus, being appended to the celebration of Mass at the chapelle royale from the 1580s, and gradually becoming part of the wider liturgy of the French church. But although this psalm would later become associated with the chapelle royale of Louis XIV, it is clear that from the very earliest times it was heard as a prayer for the king in times of adversity or when he was under military threat.

Chapter 5 describes the rhetorical and theological relationship between the Elijah/Elisha narratives and the greater book of Kings, both the Solomon stories on one hand (1 Kings 1–11) and the episodes dealing with Israel’s and Judah’s political demise on the other (2 Kings 9–25). It argues that Elijah and Elisha become the “hereditary carriers” of two theological concepts introduced through Solomon: the hope that children might surpass their ancestors in life-giving wisdom and that the temple might provide a durable paradigm through which to imagine Yhwh’s ongoing care for Israel’s land and people together. In this sense, Elijah and Elisha “prophetize” the Davidic promise of 2 Samuel 7, showing that Yhwh responds to sin with a power capable of reversing death. The chapter likewise maintains that a series of Davidic kings – Joash, Hezekiah, and Josiah – “re-royalize” the two prophets’ characteristic acts of resurrection and other forms of life preservation as depicted in 1 Kings 17–2 Kings 8. Because Elijah functions as their typological ancestor, these prophet-kings become the seeds through which Israel’s redemption after catastrophe might be imagined.

The conclusion summarizes this volume’s primary scholarly contributions according to three, key subjects: a canonical approach to Kings and the application of an agrarian hermeneutic (Chapters 1 and 2), exegetical examination of the Elijah narratives (Chapters 2, 3, and 4), and the relationship between the Elijah narratives and the book of Kings as a whole (Chapters 4 and 5). The author concludes by pointing readers toward new insights that the study may generate with respect to the New Testament’s typological extension of concepts central to the book of Kings.

This volume begins by introducing the reader to a leading question at the heart of contemporary Kings research: does hope characterize the biblical book in question, or only despair? Within this frame of reference, the introduction serves as an entry point to the scholarly debates surrounding Kings’ compositional history and genre, as well as the canonical approach and agrarian hermeneutic by which the exegetical portions of the present study proceed. Such an approach provides readers with a fresh perspective on the kerygmatic contribution that the Elijah narratives (1 Kings 17–2 Kings 2) make to the overall text. Placed in the Northern Kingdom of Israel, these prophetic stories portray Yhwh’s life-restoring power under circumstances that pre-enact the removal of the Davidic monarchy and Solomonic temple – precisely the situation in which the book of Kings resolves (2 Kings 25). The Elijah narratives therefore declare that Yhwh maintains his interest in Israel’s life and land even under such conditions; in so doing, they contribute to a “life typology” in Kings that signals hope for David’s (and thus Israel’s) future in the open-ended aftermath of destruction.

Chapter 2 focuses on the depiction of Israel’s first kings in the Books of Samuel and 1 Kings 1–2. This chapter deals with narratives about the early days of kingship and the portrayal of kings and members of the royal court who are affected by various ailments and disabilities. The kings and members of the royal court discussed include Saul, who descends into madness; the unnamed son of David and Bathsheba; and David himself, who suffers the effects of old age later in his life. It is shown how royal illness frames David’s and Solomon’s succession to the throne and how royal illness can be framed by sinful behavior. When read against the backdrop of Israel’s and Judah’s monarchic past, the imagery of illness surrounding Saul and David engage in a larger debate about the correct form of leadership and problems inherent to kingship.

This first chapter of Part I examines a series of texts in the Pentateuch that present the fledgling nation of Israel requesting permission to pass through foreign lands on its way to the Promised Land. These earliest encounters with the nation’s future neighbors provide occasions for the biblical scribes to negotiate relations with surrounding peoples. The chapter discusses how these memories are taken up in other biblical texts.

This third chapter of Part III examines the case of another population in the book of Joshua. The preceding chapter established that Rahab’s story grew to its present proportions as later writers expanded it both to teach the nation lessons of courage and to address issues posed by contested populations. The Gibeonites were one such contested population. Instead of defending this population by commemorating their loyalty and bravery in wartime, the biblical scribes challenged their belonging and privileges by creating a memory of unheroic conduct. The chapter looks at a number of texts, as well as archeological evidence, to reveal what was at stake in their polemics against this group.

Together, the three biblical books Judges, Samuel, and Kings tell the larger part of the story of Israel and Judah as more-or-less independent nations on their own land. Their principal focus is on “rule,” good rule and bad rule: mostly royal rule (by kings), but also “rule” by judges and deliverers, and even by prophets. David is the key human ruler. God too “rules” in these books, but as “judge” rather than as “king.” Together with the book of Joshua, they constitute the sub-set of the Hebrew Bible called Former Prophets and the start of the historical books in an English Bible.