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First Book of Samuel chapter From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
1 Samuel 16 is the sixteenth chapter of the First Book of Samuel in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible or the first part of the Books of Samuel in the Hebrew Bible.[1] According to Jewish tradition the book was attributed to the prophet Samuel, with additions by the prophets Gad and Nathan,[2] but modern scholars view it as a composition of a number of independent texts of various ages from c. 630–540 BCE.[3][4] This chapter contains the anointing of David by Samuel and David's early service for Saul.[5] This is within a section comprising 1 Samuel 16 to 2 Samuel 5 which records the rise of David as the king of Israel.[5]
| 1 Samuel 16 | |
|---|---|
"Samuel Anoints David" from a synagogue interior wood panel at Dura-Europos, Syria (from second/third century CE). | |
| Book | First book of Samuel |
| Hebrew Bible part | Nevi'im |
| Order in the Hebrew part | 3 |
| Category | Former Prophets |
| Christian Bible part | Old Testament |
| Order in the Christian part | 9 |
This chapter was originally written in the Hebrew language. It is divided into 23 verses.
Some early manuscripts containing the text of this chapter in Hebrew are of the Masoretic Text tradition, which includes the Codex Cairensis (895), Aleppo Codex (10th century), and Codex Leningradensis (1008).[6] Fragments containing parts of this chapter in Hebrew were found among the Dead Sea Scrolls including 4Q52 (4QSamb; 250 BCE) with extant verses 1–11.[7][8][9][10]
Extant ancient manuscripts of a translation into Koine Greek known as the Septuagint (originally was made in the last few centuries BCE) include Codex Vaticanus (B; B; 4th century) and Codex Alexandrinus (A; A; 5th century).[11][a]
The section comprising 1 Samuel 16 to 2 Samuel 5 is known as the "History of David's Rise", with David as the central character, within which 1 Samuel 16:1 to 2 Samuel 1:27 form an independent unit with a central theme of "the decline of Saul and the rise of David".[5] The part emphasizes that David is God's chosen king (1 Samuel 16:1–13; 'the LORD was with him' 1 Samuel 16:18; 18:14), but Saul was still king and David was careful not to take over the kingdom from God's anointed (1 Samuel 24:6; 26:9), even it is shown throughout that David was under blessing, while Saul was under curse.[5] The narrative stresses that David did not come to power by killing Saul's family, and that Saul and his son Jonathan knew that David was the chosen successor; Jonathan even assisted David by his own virtual abdication, while Saul tried to oppress David due to jealousy.[5]
The narrative of David's anointing bears some similarities to Saul's own election to the kingship:[13]
Despite the similarities, this narrative the major difference introduced by is that Saul was rejected but David chosen, explicitly shown in verse 13 with the 'transfer of YHWH's spirit from Saul to David and the abandonment of Saul to a malevolent spirit'.[14]
After Saul's rejection (verse 1), Samuel was fear of Saul's reprisal, so he had to have a pretence of going to Bethlehem to anoint Saul's replacement.[5]
Although David was handsome (verse 12), it is emphasized that God does not look on the 'outward appearance', as it was precisely for that reason that Eliab, who was as tall as Saul, was rejected.[5]
Not long after David was anointed and endowed with YHWH's spirit, Saul became unwell (verse 14), which turned out to be an opportunity for David to enter the court. David was brought in because of his skill in playing music (verse 18), but inside the court he had palace training that would be useful for his future. Apparently David's military prowess also attracted the attention of Saul, whose policy was to enlist all capable men in his fight against the Philistines (1 Samuel 14:52), so David additionally was appointed as Saul's armor-bearer. Furthermore, David was said to have good intellectual judgement, was a man of presence (verse 18), and on top of those, 'YHWH is with him'.[14] Verse 21 even states that 'Saul loved him' ('Saul' was explicitly mentioned in the Greek Septuagint, instead of ambiguous subject in Masoretic Text), which later turned to a love-hate relationship between the two.[14] An important statement in verse 23: Saul was entirely in David's hands, and David took that responsibility seriously.[14]
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