Saul at Hachilah ; he goes with six hundred men to Achish, king of Gath, who gives him Ziklag to dwell in ; the Philistines encamp against Israel ; Saul in vain seeks counsel from (Jod, and then has recourse to the witch of Endor; the princes of the Philistines refuse David's aid in battle (ch. xxvi-xxix) ; David returns to Ziklag and fluds it desolated; he pursues the Amal- ekites and recovers the spoil (ch. xxx) ; the battle of Gilboa; Saul and his three sons die (ch. xxxi); the news of Saul's death reaches David at Ziklag, and calls forth his touching dirge or lamentation over Saul and Jonathan (2 Sam. i).
3. T/ie Unsettled Succession. — Ishbosheth king of Is- rael, David of Judah (2 Sam. ii-v, 3; B.C. 1053-1046). — David is anointed king of Judah at Hebron; Ishbo- sheth is made king of Israel ; the fight between the fol- lowers of David and of Ishbosheth by the pool of Gib- eon (ch. ii) ; David's power increases in Hebron ; six sons born to him there ; Abner forsakes Ishbosheth, and makes terras with David to transfer the kingdom of Is- rael to him ; is slain by Joab ; David's lamentation over him (ch. iii) ; the head of Ishbosheth is brought by Ee- chab and Baanah to David, who punishes them for the deed (ch. iv) ; the tribes of Israel make David their king (V, 1-3).
4. Israel under Kinr/ David (2 Sam. v, 4-xxiv; B.C. 1046-1013). — David, after being king of Judah for seven years and a half, reigns thirty-three years in Jerusa- lem over all Israel; he captures the fortress of Zion from the Jebusite, forms a friendship with Hiram king of T\'re, defeats the Philistines at Baal-perazim, and again from Geba unto Gazer (ch. v) ; David brings up the ark of the Lord; the breach of Uzzah; the house of Obed-edom is blessed ; the ark brought to Jerusalem ; Michal derides David for dancing before the ark (ch. vi) ; David is forbidden to build a house for the Lord in a message brought to him by Nathan the prophet, who announces the establishment of his dynasty ; David's prayer (ch. vii) ; his victories over the Philistines, Mo- abites, Edomites, etc., recited (ch. viii) ; his kindness to Mephibosheth (ch. ix) ; his victory over Bene-ammon (ch. x) ; his sin with Bathsheba and Uriah ; Nathan's parable ; punishment denounced ; David's penitence ; the child dies; Solomon is born; David captures Kab- bah of Bene-ammon (ch. xi, xii) ; the affiiir of Amnon and Tamar; Absalom's revenge and flight to Geshur; Joab artfully procures his return after three years' ab- sence (ch. xiii, xiv) ; the rebellion of Absalom and the flight of David; the ark, the priests, and Hushai sent back to Jerusalem ; the treachery of Ziba ; the reviling of Shimei ; conflicting advice given by Hushai and Ahitophel to Absalom, and Ahitophel's suicide (ch. xv- xvii); the battle in the forest of Ephraim; Absalom's death ; David's great grief (ch. xviii) ; David's return to Jerusalem ; the conduct of Shimei, Mephibosheth, and Barzillai; the rivalry between Judah and Israel in bringing back the king (ch. xix) ; the rebellion of She- ba; Joab slays Araasa ; Sheba's head given to Joab at Abel (ch. xx) ; the three years' famine, and the ap- peasement of the Gibeonites; the burial of the bones of Saul and his sons; the giants of the Philistines slain by David's servants (ch. xxi); David's song (Psa.. xviii) (ch. xxii); the last words of David; the names and exploits of his heroes (ch. xxiii) ; the numbering of the people and the psstilence (ch. xxiv).
III. Oriffin and Structure. — It is evident that Samuel could not be the author of the whole of these books, since his death is recorded in the 25th chapter of the first book, and the history continues after his death down to nearly the end of the reign of David, a period of perhaps forty-five years. There is a somewhat com- mon opinion that the first twenty -four chapters were written by Samuel and the rest by Gad and Nathan — an opinion founded on 1 Chron. xxix, 29 : " Now the acts of David the king, first and last, are they not writ- ten iu the book of Samuel the seer, and in the book of Nathan the prophet, and in the book of Gad the seer?"'
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There is much in the general structure of the books, and in the relation of the several parts to each other, to render it probable that different writers, living at differ- ent times, were concerned in their production, notwith- standing the degree of uniformity which the style and language cxliibit. The most reasonable supposition is that they were the work of one compiler, who used his- torical records of various sources. This opinion, though held by nearly all modern critics, as Thenius, and even by Hiivernick and Keil, is not new, as Diodorus of Tar- sus, Theodoret, St. Athanasius, and St. Gregory ob- served that the four books of Kings were historical abridgments of several books or memoirs of the proph- ets which are cited in them. The grounds on which this view of the origin of these books is based have, however, only in very recent times been fully expounded. Warning the reader against attaching undue importance to the evidence which has been adduced in proof of this position, his attention may nevertheless be directed to the following points :