David, Saul, and God

Abstract

AbstractThe original audience heard a story shaped to their listening capacities, which for a print‐oriented audience presents special difficulties. In highlighting the reliance of David's story on ancient techniques of repetition, this book brings into focus a narrative most often approached as a collection of parts rather than as a compelling whole. David's story (Samuel and early Kings) took final shape from within an oral culture whose techniques of repetition demanded from the audience not only a grasp of the story's forward progress, but also a circling backward—a tracing of those “hearing clues” constituting broad formal patterns. From eleven major patterns emerge narrative shape and meaning, and an answer to the mystery of who David is. Some examples: (1) the mystery of David's character is finally less so in a triad of sparings: twice, David spares the life of enemy Saul, accounts that “sandwich” a third sparing—of an enemy David has set out to kill; (2) Saul is anointed and/or proclaimed king three times, and (3) commits wrongdoing in parallel fashion; (4) David is introduced to the story's audience four times, paving the narrative way for aspects of his character lying ahead; (5) David's three‐time failure as a father mirrors Eli's earlier failure, and spells out the king's great fall, setting up the story's glorious resolve, the triumph of a father finally saying no to a spoiled son and yes to interests of the kingdom. Biblical scholar Walter Brueggemann, who has written extensively on the David story, responds with skepticism to Robert Alter's suggestion that David's story evidences architectural cohesion: “Alter may be correct on this point,” Brueggemann cautions, “but he has only asserted the matter and has not given it any careful analysis.” This study demonstrates the aptness of Alter's assessment regarding the story's unity, answering Bruggemann's challenge with a singular analysis adequate to the demands of this sophisticated ancient masterpiece.