David in Medieval Jewish Thought: Judah Halevi’s Book of the Kuzari as a Reconciliation Project (original) (raw)
Warrior, Poet, Prophet and King: The Character of David in Judaism, Christianity and Islam
One of the most complex and ambivalent characters in the Bible is King David. Traditionally considered to be the pious author of the book of Psalms, a brave warrior and a perfect ruler, he was also a vassal of the Philistine king and a sinner whose morally dubious behaviour is criticized in the Bible itself. Little wonder, therefore, that his image underwent significant interpretative changes in perception and reception in different monotheistic traditions. So far, scholarly research has mostly focused on the ways he was appropriated by some of these traditions in isolation from others. The proposed conference will question this dominant exclusive approach and attempt to scrutinize perceptions and receptions of King David and his book in different monotheistic traditions from late antiquity until the early modern period in a more inclusive fashion. Its aim is to take a new, critical look at the process of biblical creation and subsequent exegetical transformation of this figure, with particular emphasis put on the multilateral fertilization and cross-cultural interchanges among Jews, Christians and Muslims in different genres of their respective religious literatures and arts.
The article “Halevi, Judah” as it appeared in The Encyclopaedia of Islam, Third Edition, Part 2018-1, pp. 63-68.
Of kings and kin : bayit and the dynastic family of David
2016
OF KINGS AND KIN: tyI B; tyI B; tyI B; tyI B; AND THE DYNASTIC FAMILY OF DAVID This dissertation argues that 2 Sam 9-20 and 1 Kings 1-2 (traditionally known as the Succession Narrative) should be understood to be a weaving of two themes: succession and family. This thesis proposes that the narrative describes the dynastic house of David, in which the inseparable themes of politics and family are employed by the writer to reveal the complexities of paternal, maternal, fraternal, and other kinship relationships as a result of rivalry for the throne. Recognizing that we are dealing with issues pertaining to family, this study begins by presenting the role of the family in biblical Israel and how that affects the way Israel locates herself in history and her language for expressing her relationship with humanity and Yahweh. Since tyI B; is a familial term and a keyword in First and Second Samuel, chapter three presents a study of its function in the two books. Chapter four explores Yahweh's familial relationship with David's dynastic family with respect to the Davidic covenant in 2 Samuel 7:1-17 in light of covenant making and adoption in the ancient Near East. The preceding chapters form the foundation for the development of the thesis statement in chapter five, which analyzes 2 Samuel 9-20 and 1 Kings 1-2 for the dual themes of politics and family. As an implication of this study, chapter six examines the concept of the house of Yahweh in light of our understanding of the Davidic covenant, revealing the presence of the triple motifs of kingdom, family, and temple in all the major CORE Metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk
The American Historical Review, 2009
The theme of Jonathan Elukin's elegant and well-argued book is Jewish-Christian coexistence in medieval Europe-how was it possible given Christian prejudice and anti-Jewish violence? Older medieval Jewish history stressed the themes of "scholars and suffering," embodying what the late Salo Baron termed a "lachrymose" view of Jewish history. In recent years historians have stressed how medieval Europe became a "persecuting society," following the work of R. I. Moore, The Formation of a Persecuting Society (1987), and David Nirenberg, Communities of Violence (1996). Elukin argues for a different approach to medieval Jewish experience, eschewing a "one-dimensional narrative of victimization" (p. 4) for a more nuanced inquiry that explores the social and political ties that bound Jews to medieval society. While other medieval Jewish historians such as Robert Chazan and Ivan Marcus have made some of the same points in the past, Elukin is the first to write a sustained book-length argument along these lines. The book consists of six chapters. The first three are chronological, covering late antiquity to the early Middle Ages, the Carolingians to the twelfth century, and the High Middle Ages. The final three chapters are more topical, covering social integration, violence, and expulsion and continuity. In making his argument, Elukin does not introduce any texts that were previously unknown to scholarship, but rather he discusses the usual texts cited in Jewish histories, while offering new insights concerning their context. For example, when discussing royal Jewish charters, Elukin asserts that such agreements should be understood as evidence of Jewish integration into medieval society. Since every medieval person was bound to more powerful people, the terms of these charters are indicative of a group's importance. Elukin points out that the provisions of these charters parallel those of the clergy, who were, after all, a privileged order of society (p. 63). Perhaps the most novel argument that Elukin makes in the course of his book is his interpretation of medieval violence against Jews. Elukin asserts that it is critical to understand how Jews viewed generalized violence in medieval
David in History and in the Hebrew Bible
The Character of David in Judaism, Christianity and Islam Warrior, Poet, Prophet and King, eds. M. Zawanowska, M. Wilk, pp. 19–40, 2021
This is an open access chapter distributed under the terms of the CC BY-NC 4.0 license. chapter 1 David in History and in the Hebrew Bible Łukasz Niesiołowski-Spanò David, next to Moses, is one of the most studied biblical characters.1 The problem is, however, that this important figure has no clear extra-biblical reference, which makes reconstructing the historical David and his kingdom a difficult, if not an impossible, task. A short paper such as this cannot exhaustively examine scholarly literature on David, nor every mention of the son of Jesse in biblical literature. Therefore, this article's objective is solely to review extra-biblical sources, as well as selected biblical traditions related to this figure, to see whether at all, and if so, to what extent, they can be considered reliable historical sources, and on this basis to offer some general observations on the historical David.