Portraits of a King Favored by God

The study of the 'King David Phenomenon' is far from over. When pressed, the careful scholar must admit to how very little we actually know about this statecrafter and venerator of the god YHWH. At present, archaeologists, epigraphers, literary historians, historians of religion, and military historians are engaged in interpretive battles in an attempt to provide a much clearer outline of this person and his life and times than ever heretofore. Professors Caspi and Greene have assembled a number of scholars who focus on studies concerning King David and during their Annual ISBL Seminar have had these scholars share their most recent scholarship. What is contained within the present anthology are the honed and furbished essays invited from the best works presented during the seminar. These in turn have been edited by the editors and sequenced in such a way that the combined information contained in the essays tell a most recent and chronological or thematic story of the David saga. Scholarship has thus been advanced greatly by the efforts of those who contributed to this volume. To those essays, the editors added a Prolegomenon which framed the entire work, as well as contributed learned essays of their own. Thus, all of the major lines of scholarly inquiry, biblical, historical, archaeological, have been given voice in a work that approaches King David from viewpoints expressed in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

Cover: King David, Stained Glass, Strasbourg Cathedral, North Transept.