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King David: The Real Life of the Man Who Ruled Israel (Ballantine Reader's Circle), by Jonathan Kirsch
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David, King of the Jews, possessed every flaw and failing of which a mortal is capable, yet men and women adored him, and God showered him with many blessings. A charismatic leader, exalted as “a man after God’s own heart,” he was also capable of deep cunning and bloodthirsty violence. Weaving together biblical texts with centuries of interpretation and commentary, as well as the startling discoveries of modern biblical archaeology and scholarship, bestselling author Jonathan Kirsch brings King David to life with extraordinary freshness, intimacy, and vividness of detail, revealing him in all his glory and fallibility. At the center of this taut, dramatic narrative stands a hero of flesh and blood–a man as vibrant and compelling today as he has been for millennia.
- Sales Rank: #787208 in Books
- Published on: 2001-08-28
- Released on: 2001-08-28
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.25" h x .83" w x 5.51" l, .77 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 402 pages
Amazon.com Review
The difficulty of bringing into perspective figures that are larger than life is well known to Jonathan Kirsch, the author of a life of Moses and of the provocative biblical study The Harlot by the Side of the Road. In this well-researched narrative he attempts the same for King David, arguably the most important figure in the entire Jewish Bible. By searching for the real King David, Kirsch does not claim to bring new information to this study. He is more journalist than biblical scholar, and clearly acknowledges when he is speculating (as, for example, in his reconstruction of the scene when David first glimpses the beautiful Bathsheba). Rather, he wants to remind his readers that David is not myth but flesh and blood and is, astonishingly, presented this way in the biblical texts themselves. He is real, human, both heroic and flawed.
Following much of modern scholarship in calling the Bible "a patchwork of ancient texts that were composed and compiled by countless authors and editors," this study is clearly not going to appeal to most fundamentalist readers. Neither is it intended for scholars. It should, however, satisfy many readers who wish to explore more deeply the fascinating and pivotal life of a very real man, a charismatic leader who, as one historian puts it, "played exquisitely, fought heroically, and loved titanically." --Doug Thorpe
From Publishers Weekly
In this biography/commentary hybrid, Kirsch sheds light on biblical characters and gives readers a refresher course on Israel's monarchic period, from 1025 to 925 BCE. Arguing that the Old Testament may have originated as David's royal biography, Kirsch cites dozens of Bible scholars in his attempt to separate history from myth. The two myths he examines most closely are those cultivated by a "Court Historian" who embellished David's exploits to make him seem more kingly than he was, and those written by the "Deuteronomistic Historian," who revised the ancient texts about David to downplay his bad behavior and emphasize the sovereignty of Yahweh. Kirsch's citation of experts is dutiful but frustrating; only rarely does he mention the schools of thought to which his sources belong, which excludes readers from a crucial dimension of any intellectual debate. Kirsch's agenda is murky as well; it is never entirely clear whether he wishes to find the truth about David and extrapolate didactic messages or simply make a sport of listing the various and contradictory readings of his life. It may be that Kirsch eschews these complicated questions in the service of accessibility, and for that he can be forgiven, since secular books about the Bible are often inaccessible to all but a handful of scholars. This book, on the other hand, welcomes a wide audience to a scandalous, violent and surprisingly familiar ancient Israel, and both educates and entertains. (Sept.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Kirsch (The Harlot by the Side of the Road) adds to his sensational books on biblical personalities with this expos? of the life of King David and his God. He fully accepts the historicity of David and the United Kingdom but argues that the record we have is the product of court propagandists followed by other court editors and then "spin doctors" who attempted to sanitize David. This is an old approach followed by many critical scholars; however, the only characteristics that Kirsch adopts from the text for David are thoroughly Machiavellian. He portrays David as a "bloodthirsty fiend of hell" who combined a strong political savvy with a ruthless suppression of all opposition. One must recognize that, even if we do not judge him by modern mores, as Kirsch does, David's life and reign was full of actions that provided abundant opportunities for his famous readiness to repent. Kirsch is a master of the storyteller's art, but his propensity to be disparaging is unsettling if quite skillful. In fact, his tone is much like that a lawyer might use in a summation to a jury (with appropriate facial expressions and tone of voice not available to print). Much more reliable assessments of David can be found in such major series as Abingdon's Interpreter's Bible, Doubleday's Anchor Bible, and Word's Biblical Commentary. Nonetheless, this muckraking account in the modern style will no doubt receive circulation in public libraries.
-AEugene O. Bowser, Univ. of Northern Colorado, Greeley
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Most helpful customer reviews
34 of 41 people found the following review helpful.
Newsweek Covers David
By R. T.
"Wanna read a bad book?" my friend asked. I wished I had had the foresight to answer "no." Unfortunately, I didn't, and I read all of Jonathan Kirsch's King David. This book is worse than bad, it's an embarrassment. If there's an original idea in the book, Kirsch does an incredible job of hiding it among his numerous quotations or, I should say, "adaptations" from Samuel. The scholarship is paper thin; Kirsch slavishly relies upon the work of others and offers nothing new himself. Basically, Kirsch takes the magnificent KJV translation of the story in I and II Samuel and "punches it up" with Newsweek style. Kirsch appears to pride himself on reading the stories skeptically, as one would hope of any modern journalist reading Samuel, and peppers his comments with phrases such as "as the biblical authors wished to remember him [David]," "so it would seem," and "theological spin." However, except for questions raised by others, Kirsch is one of the most credulous readers of this story I've ever met. He buys almost everything the author tells us about David and the others in this story. As just one example, Kirsch dutifully reports the description in I Samuel 13:3 of Amnon's cousin, Jonadab, as "a very subtle man." And what incredibly subtle advice to Jonadab give his cousin? That Amnon should rape his half-sister Tamar in his own bedroom after setting up the meeting in such a way that all the royal family would know what was going on. If this is "subtlety," then Micky Spillane is John LeCarre! Now of course, it is subtle if Jonadab were in cahoots with someone else in order to destroy Amnon, but Kirsch hasn't the imagination to explore that possibility - or even the possibility that the rape never occurred but its report was concocted for other reasons. On the other hand, if Jonadab was actually trying to help Amnon, then to buy Samuel's description of him as "subtle" is the apex of naivete. Indeed, you'd think Kirsch would ask: is the author being ironic? But no, that would be to expect too much from Kirsch.
Rather than waste your time on this book, let me suggest two others. If you want to accompany a masterful literary scholar reading the story of David, buy Robert Alter's illuminating The David Story. If you want to examine the story of David from the perspective of a modern, secular historian at the top of his craft, buy Baruch Halpern's David's Secret Demons. These are two very different books, and many who like one of them won't like the other. But happy is the reader who can appreciate both. If you choose to read neither Alter nor Halpern, don't waste your time on Kirsch. Just go get a copy of the KJV at your local motel and read Samuel for yourself.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful.
An easy to read presentation of who King David reallt was
By Israel Drazin
Kirsch offers readers a scholarly but very readable view of the most famous biblical hero. He points out that according to many critical scholars, but not according to traditional readers of the text, that we are introduced for the first time to David’s true original role, what he did before Saul’s death, before he assumed the position as the king of Judah, before becoming king of all of Israel. The earlier stories, according to these scholars were versions of legends about the king, written to flatter him, composed either during his lifetime or during the reign of his son Solomon. But the truth, they say, is that he was a bandit chief during his early years, a kind of Robin Hood who stole from those people or tribes he disliked and who sometimes gave part of his thefts to people or towns presumably to gain their favor. The “frank depiction of David in the pages of the Bible,” Jonathan Kirsch writes, “has defined what it means to be a human being.” We read about a complex man. He “is both thrilling and unsettling; it is larger than life and at the same time an enduring example of a life lived on a human scale.” All in all, David’s name appears in the Bible over a thousand times; despite his faults, and perhaps because of them, he is the hero of Judaism, the progenitor of the messiah.
12 of 14 people found the following review helpful.
Entertaining and Educational - To a point
By Barton Breen
I listened to this book on tape as read by the author himself.
This is one of what appears to be a significantly developing genre of books in the area of theology and Biblical History, designed to be read by the general populace to put in their hands what modern scholarship is saying.
This book does this reasonably well for anyone who is unfamiliar with such terms as Modern Bibical Criticism, J theory, Court Historian etc.
What is not so clear to the average listener is that the primary sources drawn from such as Howard Bloom, Wellhausen and company are considerably from the more liberal and secular camps and that there exists a large body of more conservative material that deals with thses issues with somewhat different conclusions.
There's nothing wrong with that in and of itself. What I find distrubing in these types of Historical Overviews - turned novel is that the hybrid product, while purporting to be factual, uses the change in genre to present the material as somehow more certain or less controversial than is really the case. What's wrong with being a little more deliberate in making the source literature drawn upon a little more diverse and truly allowing the reader to enter into the dialogue and interact with the issues, rather than being led to believe that things are as neat and tidy as a reading of this book would seem to indicate to a reader otherwise unfamiliar with the field?
Those concerns expressed, I did find this to be an interesting and worthwhile listen (read). Old Testament history has been a weakness for me and this did help to fill in some gaps in terms of the what some of the modern scholarship has been giving. In addition, it did present David in terms that helped to place him historically and, as much as the author's approach could allow for with all of its provisos and doubts, somewhat personally.
Listen critically to this work. It seeks, in my opinion, to gloss over some of the ommissions in terms of conflicting material, by making the format flow like a historical novel and a reader can be carried away with that and walk away feeling they have a strong grasp on all that is available in this field. They will not.
Life of David by Arthur Pink would be a good contrast work to see some of the other camp and provide some balance.
Interesting read, but again, read criticically and ask yourself what you're not being told in the midst of it.
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