The Historical David: The Real Life of an Invented Hero Read Online Free PDF Page B

we know them relatively well, since it was precisely these three whom Samuel rejected in the previous story. It would be one thing if the second story gave us the names of the other four sons, but it doesn’t; there is not a bit of new information here. What’s more, both stories use the eldest brothers in the same way: as a foil for David. In the first story, they are explicitly rejected by Samuel; in the second, they are among those who stand by while Goliath challenges the Israelites to fight.
    Then there is the question of where David is when the second story begins. We learned in the previous chapter that Saul had taken him into his service as arms-bearer. Since Saul was now out on the battlefield, surely David should be with him, bearing his arms. But no—he is back home with Jesse, and he goes to the battlefield only to bring food to his brothers; he is even supposed to go right back home with news of how his brothers are faring (17:17–18). Admittedly, the second story seems to recognize this confusion about how David spends his time, and so we are told that “David would go back and forth from attending on Saul to shepherd his father’s flock at Bethlehem” (17:15). But even this explanation is scarcely acceptable. Are we to imagine that during peacetime David was in constant attendance on Saul as arms-bearer, but during a time of war he was there only occasionally? Furthermore, the narrative does not really match with this back-and-forth movement between Saul and Jesse: when David goes to the battlefield, it is not to attend on Saul at all, but only to check on his brothers. And it is clear that this is in fact David’s first time going to the battle, since when he sees Goliath and hears the giant’s challenge, he seems to have no idea that this has been going on for forty days already. All of which is to say that the verse stating that David went regularly between Jesse and Saul is not only illogical, but it stands as fairly clear evidence that the discrepancies between the two stories were felt even by the biblical authors, who made a half-hearted and transparent attempt to reconcile them. 8
    But from there the problems only grow. When David goes to Saul and declares his intention to fight Goliath, Saul’s response is, in light of the previous story, rather surprising: “You are only a boy, and he has been a warrior from his youth!” (17:33). This can hardly be the same David who was introduced to Saul in the previous chapter as “a man of valor, a warrior” (16:18). David then describes himself entirely in terms of his career as a shepherd—“Your servant has been tending his father’s sheep”—although surely he should have said that he had been Saul’s arms-bearer. 9
    The disconnect between the two stories comes to a head at the end of 1 Samuel 17: “When Saul saw David going out to confront the Philistine, he said to Abner, the army commander, ‘Whose son is that boy, Abner?’ ” (17:55). This question is, by any reckoning, inconceivable. Saul took David into his service in the previous chapter. David was especially pleasing to Saul. Saul appointed him his personal arms-bearer. David regularly played the lyre to soothe Saul’s spirit. Saul even communicated directly with Jesse. How could he now not know who David is? Only when we reach this unfathomable question do we realize that nowhere in the second story has Saul addressed David by name, nor has David offered it. It seems that, to Saul, David is just a youth who has volunteered to fight, and only when he is successful does it occur to the king to discover who the lad might be. But he should have known, and known well.
    The conclusion of the Goliath story is to be found in the first verses of the next chapter, 1 Samuel 18, where we read that “Saul took him [into his service] that day and would not allow him to return to his father’s house” (18:2). And with this the parallel nature of the two stories is fully revealed. Both