Week 18 1 Chronicles
Starting from chapter eleven the chronicler spends more than five hundred verses talking about David (out of all the thousands of people named no one is more important than king David).
The chapter begins this way: then all Israel went to David at Hebron and told him “We are all members of your family. For a long time, even when Saul was our king, you were the one who really led Israel…”
One thing I notice is that the writer uses the phrase All Israel. The name Israel means different things. The Lord named Jacob Israel. It also meant all twelve tribes – people of Israel, tribes of Israel, Israelites, and like that. And it was the name used by Jeroboam’s ten breakaway tribes – Israel came to mean the rebellious northern kingdom.
The chronicler was writing to the exiles in Babylon – Judah-South – but I get the sense that for him the Golden Age was David’s undivided Israel. I don’t know if he’s angling for an inclusive Israel. I do remember that last year I saw a similar thing when he mentioned the other tribes in chapters 5-6-7-8. Not just Judah-Benjamin. Sure…the north is an alien and an enemy now. But remember when we were All Israel under the great king.
In spite of the bad blood I wonder if the chronicler is holding the door open for wayward northerners.
Note: quote from 1 Chronicles 11:1-2 (NLT). Disclosure: Dan & Zebulun weren’t included in chapters 5-6-7-8. Don’t ask me why.