David and Solomon: In Search of the Bible's Sacred Kings and the Roots of the Western Tradition (16 page)

In any case, the evidence seems to converge on the southern part of the northern kingdom and the vicinity of Bethel as the source of many of the refugees who swelled the population of Judah and Jerusalem at the end of the eighth century
BCE
. This is precisely the area where there is evidence for a tenth century
BCE
highland polity related to the biblical traditions of Saul. Those traditions, like the tales about David, would have been orally transmitted for centuries, and as local memories and expressions of regional identity, would hardly have vanished from the consciousness of the people of the region, even if they were to leave their ancestral lands and become refugees in Judah.

Thus two traditions—of Saul and Israel, of David and Judah—would have been thrust together in the midst of the far-reaching social and economic changes that transformed the kingdom of Judah after the fall of Israel. Not only did Judah develop from an isolated highland society into a fully developed state integrated into the Assyrian economy; its population dramatically changed from purely Judahite into a mix of Judahite and ex-Israelite. Perhaps as much as half of the Judahite population in the late eighth to early seventh century
BCE
was of north Israelite origin. And as we will see, the composition of an official dynastic history, in which the concept of a
united
monarchy was central, was only one of the ways that the rulers of Judah attempted to bind together the new society that had been created within the span of just a few decades.

ONE PEOPLE, ONE TEMPLE

The biblical story of David and Solomon places great emphasis on their role in centralizing the Israelite cult in their capital city and on the special sanctity of that place. David orders the holy Ark of the Covenant to be brought to Jerusalem in a joyful procession (2 Samuel 6) and Solomon is credited with constructing the great Temple as the center point of united Israel’s worship. The insistence on the centrality of Jerusalem was a theological process that would continue to develop for several centuries, but there is some suggestive archaeological evidence for the beginnings of cultic centralization at the end of the eighth century
BCE
. It is noteworthy in that respect that King Hezekiah, son of Ahaz, is remembered in the Bible as one of the most righteous kings of Judah, who “did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that David his father had done” (2 Kings 18:3). From the Bible’s perspective, his achievement was primarily religious:

Scholars have debated the historicity of this description, some accepting it as reliable, others raising doubts or rejecting it altogether on purely textual grounds. We have no archaeological information about the possible changes made to the Jerusalem Temple in this period, as it lies inaccessible to excavation beneath the Muslim shrines on the Temple Mount. Yet there is suggestive evidence in some of the outlying fortresses and administrative centers of the kingdom that dramatic changes in the nature of public worship in Judah were under way at the end of the eighth century
BCE
.

At the eastern end of the Beer-sheba Valley, the fortress of Arad was maintained, as we have suggested, in an effort by the rulers of Judah to extend their control over the passing caravan trade. It contained an elaborate sanctuary, with an altar for sacrifices in the outer courtyard and internal chambers for rituals. In the course of subsequent research, a member of the Arad excavation team, Zeev Herzog, suggested that the sanctuary had functioned during the eighth century
BCE
. Its end came not in violent destruction, but in intentional replanning: the shrine and its altar were dismantled and the area they formerly occupied was covered with a layer of soil, over which new structures were built. The ritual significance of the objects from the dismantled shrine was nevertheless respected; small altars used for burning incense within the sanctuary were laid on their sides and carefully buried in the place where the sanctuary once stood. These alterations were undertaken just before the end of the eighth century
BCE
.
*

Farther to the west at Tel Beer-sheba, a similar alteration in ritual practice seems to have taken place. Although no sanctuary was identified in the excavations, the building blocks of a large horned altar were found, suggesting that a sanctuary or a freestanding place for sacrifices had once stood in this royal citadel. Some dismantled pieces of this altar were found discarded in the earthen ramparts of the city’s fortifications and some were reused as building material in storehouses. Significantly, both the ramparts and the storehouses were constructed at the end of the eighth century
BCE—
suggesting that the shrine had been dismantled by that time.

Finally, at Lachish, the most important regional center of the Shephelah, a parallel development took place. A pit containing cult objects was uncovered in the excavations immediately beneath the level of the palace courtyard, which was expanded and paved in the late eighth century
BCE
. The cult objects are difficult to date and it is impossible to know precisely
when
in the late eighth century the courtyard was resurfaced, but it fits the general context of activities we have been describing. The finds at Arad, Beer-sheba, and Lachish seem to point to a similar picture: all three present evidence for the existence of sanctuaries in the eighth century
BCE
, but in all three, the sanctuaries fell into disuse before the end of the eighth century. It is noteworthy that none of the many seventh-and early-sixth-century
BCE
sites excavated in Judah produced evidence for the existence of a sanctuary.

Archaeology cannot provide an exact date within this general time frame for the removal of the countryside shrines, but a look at the broader events—and the tradition preserved in 1 Kings 18:4–5—points to the days of Hezekiah as a likely context. It seems plausible that during this time, Judah experienced a sweeping reform of cultic practices, in the course of which countryside sanctuaries were abolished, destroyed, and buried, probably as part of an effort to centralize the state cult in Jerusalem. Yet this process should be seen from socioeconomic and political—rather than strictly religious—perspectives. It probably aimed at strengthening the unifying elements of the state—the central authority of the king and the elite in the capital—and at weakening the old, regional, clan-based leadership in the countryside.

Simultaneous with the sudden appearance of standardized weights and measures, royal seals and uniform storage jars, the institutions of state-directed administration grew more complex and more centralized. All this served the new need to unify Judah’s diverse population. The kingdom contained not only distinctive regional cultures (from desert, highlands, and foothills) but also large numbers of immigrants from the territory of the former kingdom of Israel. These people must have brought to Judah their northern cult traditions and attachments to ancient northern shrines, the most important of which was the Bethel temple, situated in the midst of their ancestral villages. Located just a few miles north of Jerusalem, it was now in Assyrian territory, but still probably reachable for ceremonies and festivals.

This must have posed a serious religious challenge to Judahite authority. It seems that the solution was a ban on all sanctuaries—countryside shrines in Judah and the Bethel temple alike—except for the royal Temple in Jerusalem. In short, the cult “reform” in the days of Hezekiah, rather then representing puritan religious fervor, was actually a domestic political endeavor. It was an important step in the remaking of Judah in a time of a demographic upheaval and economic reorganization. In the new conditions of the late eighth century
BCE
, Judah gained a growing sense of authority and responsibility over all the people of the central highlands—as the last kingdom left with even nominal autonomy. Jerusalem was its capital city and the Davidic dynasty was its ruling family. Jerusalem may have always been a small town in comparison to the great cities of the northern kingdom, but its newfound destiny was to become the center of all the people of Israel.

This sudden realization of Jerusalem’s historical centrality now seemed to demonstrate God’s favor. It was an essential precondition to compiling an authoritative history of the Davidic dynasty—in which divine will, rather than happenstance or realpolitik—played the central role in the elevation of Jerusalem and its Davidic kings to leadership over all Israel.

THE FIRST AUTHORIZED VERSION

Uniformity of ritual at a central Temple was one way to encourage the integration of the population, and it is possible that an early version of the construction of the Temple by Solomon may have been written as early as the days of Hezekiah. Yet the writing of a national history was another important tool. Assyrian kings had popularized and dignified the compiling of official chronicles—developing from terse building inscriptions into elaborate texts of thanksgiving for military victories or civil achievements, to bombastic and totally self-serving dynastic histories. It is likely that the spread of Assyrian military and political power encouraged the adoption of Assyrian cultural characteristics throughout the region, including chronicle writing as the high-status accessory of every respectable Assyrian vassal king. But Judah’s dynastic history was to be something different—and it would survive and be remembered long after even the greatest kings of Assyria had faded into obscurity.

The biblical story of David and Solomon is not just a standard work of self-serving royal propaganda. It was—and is—a passionate and sophisticated defense of Davidic legitimacy, powerful enough to be argued in the public squares or meeting places to still the voices of criticism with the skill of its argument and its considerable narrative art.

What was the reason to put the oral traditions about David into writing? Why was it necessary for the southerners to deal with accusations from the north regarding the founder of their ruling dynasty? Why was it necessary to state that David was not a traitor and a collaborator with the Philistines; that he was not a simple thug; that he bore no responsibility for the death of the first northern king in the battle of Gilboa; that he did not participate in the killing of Ish-bosheth the son of Saul; that he was not responsible for the death of Abner; that he did not unjustly order the liquidation of all of Saul’s immediate descendants? Why the need to explain that Solomon, who was not first in line to the throne of his father, came to be his successor? More important,
when
was it necessary to insist that David and his descendants were the only legitimate rulers over all the people of Israel?

At the time of Hezekiah, when half if not more of the Judahite population was in fact Israelite, Judah could not ignore, or eradicate, the historical traditions of the north. In order to unify the kingdom, it had to take all of them into consideration, to incorporate them in a single official story that would defuse the impact of the traditions that were hostile to the expansion of royal Judahite rule.

That was done first and foremost with popular culture: with the legends and memories that were cherished in the villages of Judah, in the traditions of the northerners, and in the Jerusalem court. As the single, national account of the beginnings of monarchy in Israel, a new narrative wrapped a northern-centered anointment of Saul around the tales of the bandit and showed how David innocently acted only in the best interests of his people. It explained how David was a great patriot and father of his country who time and again saved Israelites from the hands of the Philistines; that he was forced to run for his life because of Saul’s faults, faults that the northern king himself admitted (1 Samuel 26:21); that he was always loyal to Saul. It showed that he was in no way responsible for the death of Saul, for he was not even present at the battle of Gilboa; that it was God’s power and will that unseated Saul and anointed David; that it was Joab, not David, who carried out the bloody purge of the Saulides and their loyalists; and that regarding territory and military exploits, David was greater than any of the northern kings, including the mighty Omrides, in the extent of his legendary conquests. Most important of all was the idea of a divine promise—that the Davidic dynasty was under the protection of the God of Israel.

This unbreakable connection between the God of Israel and the house of David is expressed most succinctly in God’s words to David: