The Historical David: The Real Life of an Invented Hero

by Joel S. Baden

  Equally unverifiable is the story of Samuel anointing David in Bethlehem in 1 Samuel 16:1–13. A central part of this narrative is its secrecy: only Samuel, Jesse, and David’s brothers witness the anointing. What’s more, this anointing is never again mentioned in the David narrative. Not only does no one outside of David’s immediate family see it happen, but no one is ever told that it happened. No historical event can be extracted from this episode; it exists only for the reader’s benefit, as a means of legitimating David as the future king even before he has proved himself worthy of kingship.

  Just as the “spirit of Yahweh” serves to elevate David at Saul’s expense, so too the story of David’s anointing is intentionally counterposed with the selection of Saul as king in 1 Samuel 10. In that story, Samuel gathers all of Israel and, using lots, narrows the search down to the tribe of Benjamin, to the Matrite clan, and finally to Saul; Saul, however, is not present but is with the baggage. When he is finally brought forward, he is the tallest man there, and both Samuel and the people acclaim him as king (10:17–24). The similarities between this and the story of David’s anointing are evident. Both feature Samuel; in both, possible candidates are winnowed until the true king is identified; and in both, the future king is elsewhere and must be retrieved to receive the kingship. The selection of David replicates the selection of Saul, though with one important difference. Saul is acclaimed as king because of his impressive stature: “When he stood among the people, he rose a head taller than all the people. Samuel said to all the people, ‘Do you see the one whom Yahweh has chosen? There is none like him among all the people’ ” (10:23–24).

  When it comes time to anoint David, however, the very characteristic that signified Saul’s kingship is explicitly rejected, and rejected by Yahweh himself. For when David’s eldest brother Eliab stands before Samuel, Yahweh says: “Do not take note of his appearance or his stature, for I have rejected him. For not as man sees does Yahweh see; man sees only what is visible, but Yahweh sees into the heart” (1 Sam. 16:7). Although Eliab is under discussion here, it is hard not to hear in this a clear rejection of Saul as well. As one biblical scholar has put it, “Eliab is something of a ‘new Saul,’ so that in his rejection Saul is denounced in effigy.”19 Again, Saul is a literary foil for David; Saul was selected on illegitimate grounds, but David was chosen for all the right reasons.

  It is immensely difficult to extract any historical information from the beginning of the David story. We are faced with a combination of unverifiable elements, such as the “spirit of Yahweh” and the secret anointing ceremony, and manifestly polemical passages, in which David is positioned as the positive counterpoint to Saul. So it is not just the traditional attribution of the psalms to David that is in doubt. As we try to get beneath the biblical story, at every stage we find a narrative that has been constructed with the goal of glorifying David, not with the aim of presenting a historical account of what really happened. At the most we can say that David probably entered the military under Saul. And this is the essential result of the David and Goliath story as well.

  Slayer of Goliath?

  WHEN WE TURN TO the story of David slaying Goliath, we confront a different sort of problem. It is not that the biblical story itself is in any way empirically unbelievable. Admittedly, the height given for Goliath, “six cubits and a span tall” (1 Sam. 17:4), works out to a fairly incredible nine and a half feet—though the Septuagint here says four cubits rather than six, a more likely measurement (around six and a half feet, still unusually tall for that time and place), thus suggesting that the Hebrew version has been altered to make the giant even more mythically imposing. But there is nothing impossible about David facing and defeating Goliath the way the text says—remarkable, even unlikely perhaps, but not impossible.20

  What makes the biblical story of David’s defeat of Goliath impossible to accept as historical fact is that elsewhere in the Bible an entirely different person is said to have killed Goliath. In 2 Samuel 21:19 we read: “Again there was a battle with the Philistines at Gob; and Elhanan son of Yaare-Oregim the Bethlehemite killed Goliath the Gittite; the shaft of his spear was like a weaver’s bar.” This can hardly be a different Goliath: both are Philistines, both are from the Philistine city of Gath, and, most remarkably, both have the same impressive spear: the words “the shaft of his spear was like a weaver’s bar” are found verbatim in both 2 Samuel 21:19 and 1 Samuel 17:7. How is it possible that two different people could have slain the same giant at two different times and places? This is not a problem of modern readership, as if we are simply too far removed from the conventions of ancient literature to understand these texts. The ancient author of Chronicles saw precisely this same problem. His rendering of the note about Elhanan reveals a transparent, even desperate, attempt to overcome it. In 1 Chronicles 20:5 we learn that “Elhanan son of Jair killed Lahmi, the brother of Goliath the Gittite; the shaft of his spear was like a weaver’s bar.” Elhanan has been stripped of his victory over Goliath, which is replaced with a victory over, of all people, Goliath’s brother—though note that the description of the giant’s spear remains the same. The earliest readers of Samuel, biblical authors themselves, grappled with the fact that two different people are said to have killed the same Philistine.

  Surely one of the two accounts is a duplicate of the other. The question then becomes: which story is the original and which the duplicate? It hardly seems likely that anyone would think to take a story originally about David and retell it with a different protagonist—especially a protagonist who is otherwise a nonentity in the Hebrew Bible.21 It is equally unlikely that anyone would take the very full narrative of David’s victory and reduce it to a single verse. This notice about Elhanan’s defeat of Goliath is very similar to other such brief notices about the valor of David’s warriors. It is stuck unremarkably in the midst of one such little collection, in 2 Samuel 22:15–22, in which we hear about the exploits of some of David’s men as they fought a series of Philistine giants; Abishai son of Zeruiah, Sibbecai the Hushathite, and Jonathan son of Shimei are all said to have won battles of single combat against Philistines who had huge weapons (a heavy spear and a new suit of armor) or physical abnormalities (twelve fingers and twelve toes). The story of Elhanan defeating Goliath is simply part of this list—that is, it is an organic part of the material in which it is found, and it is not given any special prominence there.

  Other stories about David’s warriors are preserved in the biblical text as well: Adino the Eznite, who killed eight hundred men single-handedly (2 Sam. 23:8); Eleazar son of Dodo, who alone fought off an entire Philistine army (23:9–10); Shammah son of Age, who did the same (23:11–12); Abishai son of Zeruiah, who defeated three hundred men by himself (23:18); and Benaiah son of Jehoiada, who killed a lion—just as David claims to have done in the Goliath story—and a giant Egyptian (23:20–21).

  These brief accounts are obviously legendary, mythical triumphs that attached themselves to heroes. They are the sorts of stories we find in Homer about the heroes of the Trojan War. Although clearly invented, these warrior legends have their own internal logic. They explain why David’s handpicked soldiers were chosen, and why their names are worthy of preservation for posterity. Elhanan has no reason to exist in the Bible except as a result of his heroic defeat of the Philistine giant Goliath. And so it is increasingly difficult to believe that he would have been invented merely for the purposes of giving him glory that was rightfully and originally due to David, the ultimate biblical hero.

  It is, however, entirely plausible that David’s legend could have been embellished by appropriating the glory of a relative nobody. This sort of transferal from the unknown to the known is a well-attested feature of heroic tales. The legends of Robin Hood are borrowed from a wide range of real-life, but otherwise virtually unknown, outlaws. Some traditions about King Arthur have their basis in actual events, but these events have been linked only secondarily with the mythical king. Stories accrete to famous figures
, just as quotations accrete to famous speakers (proverbs to Confucius, or folksy humor to Mark Twain). When one wants to say more about a character than one knows to be true, there is an infinite amount of material to choose from. A story can be invented out of whole cloth, or it can be borrowed from the life of someone otherwise unknown.

  In fact, it seems as if the story of David and Goliath was borrowed not only from the exploits of Elhanan, but also from those of Elhanan’s brother Eleazar—who is also, naturally enough, from Bethlehem, also one of David’s warriors, and also unmentioned anywhere else in the narrative. While Elhanan’s story specifically mentions the figure of Goliath, he of the mighty spear, Eleazar’s story is the origin for the narrative framework of the battle: the Philistines challenge the Israelites to fight, and all the Israelites but Eleazar fall back, afraid, while Eleazar wins a great victory. Not only is this the same situation we find in the David story, but the location of the battle is even the same: Epes-dammim (1 Chron. 11:13; 1 Sam. 17:1). With two stories paralleling the David narrative, it becomes even more unlikely that the David story is original; we would have to believe that someone took the glory away from David, split it in two, and gave it to relative nobodies. It is far easier to see David as the borrower.22

  And who better to borrow from than two soldiers from Bethlehem, David’s own hometown? Minor legends about minor characters have been taken up and dramatically expanded, complete with mythical descriptions of Goliath’s size and grand declarations of faith by the young David. (Somewhat ironically, the legends explaining why Elhanan and Eleazar deserved to be part of David’s military retinue are reused to explain how David acquired his position in Saul’s army.) As we have seen, this greatly expanded narrative of the Goliath story serves its purpose well, presenting us with a David who is faithful and fearless, unique among his peers, and eminently worthy of the kingship that will soon be his. The original legends of Elhanan and Eleazar were but two among many such tales; the embellished story makes David out to be a man like no other. At its heart, however, it is not truly David’s story. The Goliath of 1 Samuel 17 is a secondhand creation, and the entire narrative is a literary exercise in Davidic glorification.

  WHEN WE FIRST ENCOUNTER David, in 1 Samuel 16–17, we find a young man destined to be king, anointed by God’s true prophet, the antithesis of all that is wrong with Saul. He is not only destined, but, more important, he is worthy—gripped by the spirit of Yahweh, a musician who will one day give lyrical voice to the faith of his people, a warrior for God among timid men. The most famous images of David, the most important ideals associated with him, are laid out right at the start of his story. And this is precisely what the biblical authors intended. Everything that David does from this point forward, and everything that we think about him, is colored by these first stories and the theological weight that they bear.

  As we have seen, however, these stories of David’s youth have no basis in reality. The only minimal facts that we might be able to extract are David’s origins—his hometown and his father’s name—and the fact that he entered Saul’s military service. Everything else is invented for the purpose of glorifying David, even in advance of his kingship. The David of popular imagination, the insightful author of the psalms and the valiant warrior for God, is a construction of the biblical authors and the traditions that subsequently grew about this greatest of all Israelites.

  David did not write the psalms. David did not kill Goliath. The defining features of David in the modern imagination are merely that: imaginary. They are what the biblical authors, and we too, want David to be, not what he was. These, then, are the questions we have to reckon with: if David did not do what we imagine him to have done, what did he really do? If David was not who we think he was, then who was he?

  Chapter 2

  David in Saul’s Service

  REVEALING A BIBLICAL COVER-UP

  WHEN WE TRY TO RECONSTRUCT the life of the historical David, we are at a significant disadvantage. Everything we know about David comes exclusively from the Bible. Yet we have already seen that the biblical authors are not above inventing episodes for the sake of portraying him in a particularly positive light. The fundamental question the historian must ask is whether any material in the Bible can be judged to be historically accurate; or, to put it another way, why shouldn’t we assume that it is all invention? What clues are there to suggest that David really existed, and even may have done some of the things described in the Bible?

  As it turns out, the first two chapters of the David story are rather unlike the rest of the narrative of his life. After those chapters, there are no more mythical battle scenes and only a very few explicitly theological passages (which are easy enough to spot) like the secret anointing in 1 Samuel 16. The majority of the story is an ostensibly chronological recounting of the significant events in David’s life, with special concentration on his relationships with others: with Saul, with Jonathan, with the inhabitants of Judah, with the Philistines, with Saul’s descendants, with his opponents, and with his children. In virtually every part of the text, however, the program is identical to that of the first two chapters: to demonstrate that David is righteous, innocent of any wrongdoing, and fit to be the king who inaugurates a glorious dynasty—despite the fact that he, born to a shepherd in Bethlehem, had no obvious right to the throne. In this, the David narrative belongs to a well-established ancient literary genre: the apology.

  We are remarkably fortunate to have an example of this genre from the centuries just before the Bible began to be written. In the thirteenth century BCE, a Hittite king named Hattušili promulgated an account of how he came to rule.1 Hattušili was the younger brother of the reigning Hittite monarch, a position of significant power but one that did not lead to the throne. Hattušili’s brother had a son, and so the kingship would by rights pass to Hattušili’s nephew, thereby skipping Hattušili. Hattušili explains in this text how he had been in charge of the Hittite armies under the reign of his elder brother, and how he enjoyed success after success in battle, with the divine assistance of his patron goddess. Evidently his nephew, upon gaining the throne, saw Hattušili’s military victories, and the favor the goddess bestowed on him, and became envious, or perhaps nervous. The new king took away many of the properties that Hattušili had previously been granted, and soon enough, according to Hattušili, “He sought my destruction.” Hattušili, however, claims to have shown great restraint: “Out of regard for the love of my brother I did not react at all.” When he did eventually take over the kingship, by capturing his nephew in battle, he did so not just of his own accord, but with the blessing of the deity, who “had already early foretold kingship for me,” and of the populace at large: “All of Hatti supported me.”

  What we have here is a man who had no right to the kingship; who was a great military leader, aided by divine providence; whose successes aroused the envy of the king; who was unjustifiably pursued by the king; who proclaims his innocence; who is beloved by his deity and by the people of his land; and who, despite his station, becomes king. To anyone who knows the story of David, this should sound very familiar. What Hattušili says for himself is almost exactly what the biblical authors say on David’s behalf, as we will see in detail. This Hittite text has been called “The Apology of Hattušili.” Many scholars have seen fit to describe the narrative of David’s life as “The Apology of David,”2 for, similarity of details aside, it serves the same literary purpose: to demonstrate the greatness of the protagonist and even his God-given right to the throne despite what we would expect to happen in the normal course of events.

  When we recognize that the David story is an apology, even though it remains a literary creation rather than what we might consider a historical one, new avenues of historical inquiry open for us. For it is the nature of an apology that it must apologize for something. That is, an apology is always written as a response: either to custom or to tradition or, most often, to a counternarrative that challenges the text’s version
of things. If we understand the apology as the ancient version of political spin, this notion will be obvious: in today’s media-driven world, spin is always and only produced as a means of explaining something differently from what one might think, or from what others have said. This has significant ramifications for historical reconstruction, for with both spin and apology, there is no need to explain something that never happened. The point of an apology is that something did in fact happen, and that something requires explanation.

  Understanding the David story as an apology therefore allows us to take three major steps. First, and broadly, we can reject the notion that David never existed. There would be no need to apologize for a fictional character. If David were invented, we are safe in assuming that many of the stories we read about him would never have been told. We would have an entire narrative that looked like the first two chapters of his life. If the Bible apologizes for David, then he must have existed. This literary conclusion is borne out in dramatic fashion by the recent discovery of a late ninth-century BCE inscription in Aramaic that refers to Judah as the “House of David.”3 It is one thing to surmise that ancient Israel invented its glorious founder. It is quite another to think that a foreign people would also invent David.

  Second, recognizing the text as an apology allows us to date it to a period roughly contemporary with the times it describes. An apology needs to explain events that its audience knows happened—and an audience centuries removed would have no way of accessing the real facts. This is why the stories of David in Samuel are apologetic, whereas those in Chronicles, written some six centuries later, are not. Chronicles can tell the story however it wants and so leaves out everything that is potentially embarrassing for David, but Samuel doesn’t have that freedom. It must therefore be from a period relatively close to David’s own time.