Reconciling Violence and Kingship

A Study of Judges and 1 Samuel

Marty Alan Michelson

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN:
  9781608993383
  9781498255738
• eBook ISBN:
  9781630876449
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

The Hebrew Bible preeminently hails King David in narratives of kingship. Israel's first king, Saul, is interpreted as a weak king whose failings contrast with David's success. Reading the stories at the end of Judges and early in 1 Samuel, Reconciling Violence and Kingship demonstrates the significance of Saul and the inauguration of monarchy independent of and preceding David's kingship. Attuned to issues of mimetic rivalry and sacrifice extending from Abimelech in Judges, Michelson argues that Saul's kingship is uniquely important in establishing the person of the king, inaugurated in order to minimize violence through sacrifice. Read in this way, Saul is not a failed king, but is truly Israel's predominant king. Israelite monarchy emerges with Saul alongside emerging practices of the sacrificial cult.

1

Thesis and Scope of Study

Acts of violence culminating in human death pepper the stories found in the Deuteronomistic History. Particularly gruesome outbreaks of violence mar the book of Judges. The violence includes warfare between tribal groups, nations on the battlefield, regicide within the king’s inner chamber, child sacrifice, arson, rape, fratricide, and dismemberment. The violence in Judges and early in 1 Samuel set the stage for configuring the monarchy within ancient Israel. In this study I will argue that these outbreaks of violence are not arbitrarily narrated events. These stories of violence connect with one another to establish sanctioned violence in kingship. That this violence is “sanctioned” does not make it any less violent. That is, there is a means by which a “permitted” violence curbs chaotic outbreaks of violence. Girardian theory will help us to see the function of this violence which, stemming from mimetic rivalry, culminates in the scapegoating mechanism. Girardian theory will also help us to see how one form of this institutionalized scapegoating mechanism might result in “sacral kingship.”1 In the local King Abimelech, in the Levite stories associated with the dismemberment of a concubine, and in the first act of Saul as king, monarchy is more than a political institution to be “like all the nations” (1 Sam 8:20); monarchy is a form of sacred violence, perpetuated for the sake of dissipating outbreaks of violence. The violence associated with monarchy that dissipates violence is the crucial hermeneutic this study will attempt to demonstrate. George Pattison writes about this in relation to warfare texts in Joshua; “maleficent violence is replaced by beneficent violence, violence drives out violence, and the victim who was initially blamed for the violence is now hailed as the one who delivers the community from its own self-destructive tendencies.”2

The escalating violence in the book of Judges sets the foundation for a new societal organization established through the monarchy in 1 and 2 Samuel. This story of emergent societal identity, integral to the “sacred” story of the Bible, operates in what appears to be categorically profane ways.3 Why do “sacred” narratives tell such a story? In this study we will demonstrate that in the storied movement toward monarchy, the chaotic violence becomes controlled violence that prevents its further escalation. Through the monarch, violence is transformed into an event that, while violent, reconciles conflict that might otherwise lead to chaos, dissolution, or anarchy. This transformation of violence and conflict into an event of resolution and unification makes it sacred, because violence that does not dissolve communities and instead unites them is sacred. The full scope of this study will explicate this process. “The sacred is the sum of human assumptions resulting from collective transferences focused on a reconciliatory victim at the conclusion of a mimetic crisis.”4

Methodological Approach

Using a close reading of the literary construction of this text as my primary methodology, I will argue in this study that there is a literary connection between Judg 8:29—9:56; Judg 17:1—21:25; and 1 Sam 9:1—11:15. This literary reading will be informed by the work of René Girard and his unique understanding of the textual interplay of desire, mimesis, rivalry, and scapegoating.

Girardian theory emerged out of literature studies that moved towards anthropological understanding. Girard himself was first a scholar of history, then literature, and finally of culture/anthropology. These three passages are part of a larger textual story referred to by scholars as the Deuteronomistic History. This history tells the story of the development of Israel from the end of her wilderness wandering to the Exile in Babylon. The Deuteronomistic History, according to Martin Noth, was believed to be the work of one author who redacted stories into a composite whole, from Joshua to the end of 2 Kings. Scholarly opinion of Noth’s analysis has led to different conceptions and interpretations of Joshua through 2 Kings, but the idea of a coherent literary work across these now separate books remains.5

One of the core issues involved in the early dispute over Noth’s theory had to do with the reason for writing this history. That is, was it composed from a “pessimistic” or “optimistic” perspective, and what was the view of the monarchy that was so central to this entire history? A close reading of texts within the Deuteronomistic History suggests that there might be sources that favored monarchy (pro-monarchial texts) and others that denounced monarchy (anti-monarchial texts).6 The fact that, since Noth, opinion has not settled on this issue of pro-monarchial set against anti-monarchial texts is important for this study. I will argue that textual ambivalence with regard to monarchy is decisive in the final form of the literary text. These texts remain ambivalent to kingship regardless of its social acceptance or practice in the history of Israel. A literary reading of these texts will demonstrate that the specific texts under review function within the larger Deuteronomistic History to make the reader uneasy and unsettled about the positive or negative import of monarchy. The story is unsettled about the monarchy because monarchy participates in the same enactment of violence that could lead to dissolution of the community.7

It should be obvious that it is not only in these biblical texts that we encounter the idea of monarchy in Israel. Canonically speaking, the biblical texts are aware of the idea of kingship as a system of government in the texts of Genesis. Again, canonically speaking, it is clear that the ways of monarchy are introduced in Deuteronomy. And, certainly the texts that extend into 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings deal explicitly with issues of kingship. The rationale for the reading of the texts proposed in this study apart from other texts that deal with the idea or institution of monarchy is twofold.

This study will demonstrate that these particular texts connect with issues of kingship in several unique ways. First, the presentation of Abimelech, whose name uses the idea of kingship in a story that immediately follows his father’s refusal to become a king, will narrate explicit monarchial themes in the book of Judges. Second, because the texts found between Judges 17 and Judges 21 have the explicit references to kingship in the biblical text that “there was no king in Israel,” we are dealing with explicit monarchial themes. Third, while the focus of our reading will proceed as a close literary reading, it is also within the frame of the uniquely Girardian reading of this literature that the aim of this study will make proposals regarding the historical reality of the start of kingship in Israel. Of importance to us, then, is the opinion of some scholars that within these chapters on the start of kingship in Israel we have the oldest strata of historical record.8 Fourth, since the time of Martin Noth it has become characteristic of scholarship to note the editorial insertions and speeches of the Deuteronomist.9 Therefore, 1 Samuel 9–11 form part of the corpus of material about the start of kingship in Israel specifically with Israel’s first king, Saul. Additionally, 1 Samuel 9–11 are framed by two chapters, 1 Samuel 8 and 1 Samuel 12, that have been recognized as being the work of the Deuteronomist’s anti-monarchial hand in both chapters,10 And finally, this study will narrow the focus on kinship to the 1 Samuel 9–11 that are part of a section broadly accepted to narrate the start of kingship. That is, a review of the literature of 1 Samuel demonstrates that since the time of Wellhausen scholars have understood the narrative section between 1 Samuel 7 and 1 Samuel 15 to form a cohesive unit about the beginning of kingship in the person of Saul.11 As has been recently noted by David Howard, “The usual starting point for studies on biblical attitudes toward Israelite kingship is in 1 Samuel 7–12.”12 About these texts in 1 Samuel, Bruce Birch stated, “Scholars have long recognized that the Book of 1 Samuel is crucial for our understanding of the development of the Israelite kingship. It is virtually our only written source for the transition period from tribal league to monarchy . . . This is especially true of those chapters dealing directly with the establishment of Saul as the first king of Israel (7–15). It is here that the greatest historical and theological interest has focused, and it is here that scholars have most often searched for the key to the composition of the book.”13

It is granted that scholars have varied opinions on these chapters, and the focus and the work of these scholars will be incorporated throughout this study.14 The principal reason for narrowing the focus of this study to 1 Samuel chapters 9–11 within the larger narrative unit dealing with the start of kingship in Israel has to do with the fact that chapters 9–11 exclusively and uniquely treat the introduction and acclamation and inauguration of Saul as king principally apart from the activity of Samuel.15 Further, in the three chapters—9, 10, and 11—scholars have characterized a threefold pattern of introducing us to Saul in private (principally in chapter 9), in public (principally in chapter 10), and in a public re-affirmation or renewal (principally in chapter 11).16 The argument of this study will demonstrate that the first two private and public acknowledgements of Saul’s kingship only point to his status as “prince” and set the stage for but not the reality of inauguration of kingship, which only occurs in chapter 11.

It has been stated that the rationale for the reading of the texts proposed in this study, separate from other texts that deal with the idea or inst...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Abbreviations
• Chapter 1: Thesis and Scope of Study
• Chapter 2: Composition and Kingship in the Deuteronomistic History
• Chapter 3: Abimelech
• Chapter 4: Micah, the Levite, and the Concubine
• Chapter 5: Saul and Kingship
• Chapter 6: Assessing a Girardian Hermeneutic within this Study
• Chapter 7: Summary and Conclusions
• Bibliography