Bible Difficulties (50 page)

So far as 1 Samuel 1:1 is concerned, this simply states that Elkanah was "from" (
min
) Ramathaim-zophim on Mount Ephraim. All Levites were assigned to certain "Levitical cities" or towns throughout the Twelve Tribes, according to the regulation laid down in 221

Numbers 35:6. We do not have a list of these forty-eight towns, but quite possibly Ramathaim-zophim was one of them. By ancestry, then Elkanah was a Levite; by location he was an Ephraimite. Hence there is no contradiction whatever between these two passages.

Why does Chronicles consistently give a higher numerical figure than Samuel or
Kings, wherever there is a discrepancy?

Some eighteen or twenty examples may be found of discrepancy in numbers between Chronicles and Samuel-Kings in reporting the same transaction. This has been interpreted by some critics as evidence of a consistent policy to glorify the past as the Chronicler resorts to deliberate exaggerations. It should be pointed out, however, that in the vast number of instances Chronicles does agree perfectly with Samuel and Kings in the matter of numbers and statistics; and so the alleged desire to embellish the record and exaggerate the glory of the past must have been a very modest one on the Chronicler's part.

A careful examination of the eighteen or twenty examples of true discrepancy (for most of the apparent discrepancies turn out to be referring to a different group of people or things not occurring at precisely the same time or belonging to exactly the same category) yields the interesting result that fully a third of them display a
smaller
number in Chronicles than in Samuel-Kings. For example, see 1 Chronicles 11:11 as compared with 2 Samuel 23:8; 1 Chronicles 21:5 b as compared with 2 Samuel 24:9 b; 2 Chronicles 3:16

b as compared with 1 Kings 7:20 b (cf. v.42); 2 Chronicles 8:10 as compared with 1

Kings 9:23; 2 Chronicles 36:9 as compared with 2 Kings 24:8. A good example of a more modest (and credible) figure is 2 Chronicles 9:25, which gives four thousand as the number of stalls Solomon built for his cavalry, whereas 1 Kings 4:26 puts the figure at forty thousand. Or again, 1 Chronicles 11:11 gives the number of enemies slain by Jashobeam in a single battle as reaching three hundred; 2 Samuel 23:8 gives it as eight hundred--according to the Masoretic text.

One interesting example of a suspiciously high figure appears in 1 Samuel 6:19

(unfortunately there is no parallel in Chronicles). The number of persons slain by a divine plague at Bethshemesh, where the inhabitants had opened up the scared ark of the covenant and looked inside it, is reported as 50,070--a figure probably exceeding the total population of Bethshemesh (though we cannot be sure of that).

In explanation of these transmissional errors (as we believe them to be), let it be understood that numerals and proper names are always more liable to copyist errors than almost any other type of subject matter (especially when we are dealing with non-Hebraic foreign names). Almost all suspiciously high numbers are round numbers expressed in thousands. In the later stage of transmission particularly (but prior to the imposing of a system of spelling out in full, as prescribed by the guild of
so-perim
, or professional scribes), alphabetic letters were often used. Thousand were indicated by supralinear dots appearing over the digit letter. (Thus an aleph with two dots over it indicated one thousand.) As a manuscript became worn, brittle, or moth-eaten, it would be difficult to tell whether the multiplying dots were over the letter or not. But even the earlier types of 222

notation, such as that employed in the fifth-century B.C. Elephantine Papyri, were also subject to garbling in the attempt to copy from a faded or smudged document. In line with the Egyptian hieratic style, the Jewish authors would use superimposed horizontal fish hooks in order to indicate decades. A serious consequence of this may be instanced in the case of 2 Kings 18:13, where an original "twenty-four" was copied out as

"fourteen," apparently because the upper fishhook was smudged in the manuscript copied from. (This case is discussed in a separate article. Compared also the discussion of Ezra 2

and Nehemiah 7 in regard to the numbers who returned from Babylon.) To revert to the original question about the Chronicler who has been unjustly accused of propagandist tendencies, the elimination of seven instances described above (which actually show smaller statistics than Samuel-Kings) leaves us only a dozen well-accredited numerical discrepancies in which Chronicles shows a higher number.

Considering the large amount of text involved, it is almost incredible that so few numerical discrepancies do occur, out of hundreds of instances where numbers are cited by both sources. In other cases the unit of measurement reflects a later, lighter standard of weight than that specified in the earlier source. See, for example, the discussion of 1

Chronicles 22:14 and the halving of the weight of the shekel by the fifth century B.C.

(For a more thorough discussion of the numbers included in the text of Chronicles, see J. B. Payne, "The Validity of Numbers in Chronicles,"
Bulletin of the Near East
Archeological Society
, n.s. 11 [1978]: 5-58.)

In 1 Chronicles 21 David is said to have yielded to Satan's temptation to number
Israel. As a result of this God destroyed seventy thousand people through pestilence.

Was it just of God to punish the people for David's sin?

From the human standpoint, it would certainly seem far more ideal for the evil consequences of sin to be limited to the wrongdoer alone. But because of the interrelated involvements of family and society, no such limitation is possible. There is a sense in which the millions who perished during the Nazi era suffered death because of one man, Adolf Hitler. In David's case, of course, there was no malicious or cruel intent behind his stubborn purpose to have a census taken of all the citizens in his kingdom. His motive was more likely to have been a self-congratulatory pride in his achievements as a military genius and in the prosperity that the entire kingdom had attained under his leadership.

It is a mistake, however, to assume that David's countrymen were not also involved in this same attitude of pride. 2 Samuel 24:1 tells us, "Now again the anger of the LORD

burned against Israel, and it incited David against them to say, `Go, number Israel and Judah.'" (NASB). It may very well have been that the advisability of conducting a census had been suggested by David's advisers, both on the grounds of military expediency and for the sake of a more accurate basis for taxation. There must have been a high level of nationalistic pride that tended to minimize God's sovereign grace and power rather than to acknowledge Him as the author of all their astonishing victories on the battlefield and the extension of their hegemony from the borders of Egypt to the banks of the Euphrates and the northernmost reaches of Syria. As a nation they must have been ripe for a 223

judgment of warning, or else it would never have been said that the "anger of the LORD

burned against Israel."

From 1 Chronicles 21:1 we are apprised of how Satan capitalized on this situation:

"Then Satan stood up against Israel and moved David to number Israel." As is his custom, when Satan found the situation ripe for exploitation, he moved in to encourage the desire on David's part and in the hearts of his leaders to carry through this egotistical undertaking, even though General Joab strongly advised against it (cf. v.3). It should not be a matter of surprise, therefore, that the totalling up of all the manpower of the Twelve Tribes at the height of their power constrained God to remind them that it was not by their great numbers they would prevail but only by His great grace.

How could David say in 1 Chronicles 22:14 that he had provided for 100,000 talents
of gold for the future temple and then say in 1 Chronicles 29:4 that he had donated
only 3000 talents?

The answer to this is very simple. In 1 Chronicles 22 David makes his principal donation to the work of building and equipping the future temple of Yahweh so that Solomon will have everything needful when he sets about its construction. But in 1

Chronicles 29 David holds another building fund rally in which he appeals to his well-to-do supporters to make a supplemental donation beyond that which they have already given in chapter 22. The language of 29:3-4 is quite explicit on this: "And moreover, in my delight in the house of my God, the treasure I have of gold and silver, I give to the house of my God, over and above all that I have already provided [i.e., the 100,000

talents of 22:14--concerning which consult the article following] for the holy temple, namely, 3000 talents of gold....and 7000 talents of refined silver, to overlay the walls of the buildings" (NASB). In other words, he sees a need for a supplemental contribution even beyond the large sum he had already devoted to the project. The nobles and wealthy businessmen follow their king's example and gave an additional 5000 talents, plus 10,000

darics, of gold--along with 10,000 talents of silver, 18,000 talents of brass, and 100,000

talents of iron. There is no contradiction whatsoever between these two chapters; 29

records a later donation supplemental to that of 22.

1 Chronicles 22:14 lists "100,000 talents of gold" as donated by David to the future
temple in Jerusalem. Is this a credible figure, or is it a transmissional error?

Both in the Masoretic text and in the Septuagint this remarkably large figure of

"100,000 talents of gold and 1,000,000 talents of silver" is given. Such a sum as this might have been beyond the resources of the Caesars themselves. It would be quite possible to commit an error in textual transmission in the act of copying out large numbers of this sort. We have a probable example of this as we compare 2 Chronicles 9:25 (which gives four thousand as the number of stalls built for Solomon's chariot horse) and 1 Kings 4:26 (which gives the figure as forty thousand). The latter citation has undoubtedly undergone multiplication by ten because of an obscurity in or misunderstanding of the
Vorlage
. It may be that here also, in 1 Chronicles 22:14, there has been the error of one decimal point. Perhaps the original figure was "10,000 talents of 224

gold"; perhaps the silver total of 1,000,000 was miscopied from an original 100,000.

Another possibility would be the misinterpreting of an abbreviation for "manehs" as

"kikkars" (there were sixty manehs or minas to the kikkar or talent).

At the same time it should be observed that the Masoretic text figure cannot be excluded from the realm of possibility. Keil (Keil and Delitzsch,
Chronicles
, pp. 246ff.) makes the following points:

1. The ordinary civil or "royal" shekel seems to have been only one-half the Mosaic

"shekel of the sanctuary." This appears from a comparison of 1 Kings 10:17 ("300 shields of beaten gold, using three minas [150 shekels] of gold on each large shield") and 2

Chronicles 9:16 ("300 shields of beaten gold, using three hundred shekels of gold on each shield"). (Three hundred shekels would equal six minas; hence the figure in 1 Kings involves a shekel twice as heavy as that of 2 Chronicles.) This means that the 100,000

talent referred to in Chronicles would be equal to only 50,000 talents back in the earlier period. The Chronicles talents would weigh about thirty-seven and a half pounds rather than the seventy-five pounds of the Solomonic age.

2. Keil also points out that Alexander the Great is reported to have plundered the Persian royal treasury of 40,000 to 50,000 talents of gold and silver bullion, plus 9000 talents in coined gold (i.e., darics). In the Persepolis alone he captured 120,000 talents, in Parsagada 6000 more, and in Ecbatana 180,000 talents. There may be some overlap in these figures, but if they are added end to end, they total about 355,000 talents of gold and silver.

3. David is recorded as conquering the Edomites, Philistines, Moabites, Ammonites, and the Syrian kingdoms of Damascus, Hamath, and Zobah--and the Amalekites as well.

These defeated nations are listed in 2 Samuel 8:7-13, and there it is stated that all their treasures taken as spoil were dedicated by David to the Lord. Over the forty years of David's reign, these must have accumulated to a very large total--especially since David did rather little in the way of expensive public works. Moreover his friendly political relations with the prosperous merchant cities of Tyre and Sidon must have resulted in considerable revenue from commerce. Thus a total accumulation of "100,000 talents of gold" (i.e., 50,000 talents by the earlier standard) and "1,000,000 talents of silver"

(equaling 500,000) can hardly be shown to be so far beyond his capacity to donate to the erection of the future temple, on which he had set his heart.

225

2 Chronicles

How can 2 Chronicles 16:1 (thirty-sixth year of Asa) be reconciled with 1 Kings 16:8

(Elah began to reign in the twenty-sixth year of Asa)?

If Asa began his reign in 911 B.C., the thirty-sixth year of his reign would have been 876 or 875. He reigned for forty-one years (1 Kings 15:10); so this would have been a possible date--except for the fact that Baasha himself reigned from 909 to 886. Therefore he could not have built a fortress at Ramah in 875, eleven years after his death. Here we have a clear discrepancy in the Received Text. There are two possible solutions.

One solution is that the phrase
male-ku-t 'Asa
in 2 Chronicles 16:1 does not refer to Asa's own reign but rather should be understood as "the kingdom of Asa," i.e., the southern kingdom of Judah as distinguished from the northern kingdom of the Ten Tribes. Since the southern kingdom began under Rehoboam in 931 or 930 B.C., the thirty-sixth year would come out to 895 for the expedition of Baasha--which is the correct year, in all probability. (Leon Wood,
Israel's History
, p. 346, dates it as occurring in the sixteenth year of Asa, or 895.) This would mean that the Chronicler copied out his information from an older official record in Judah that at first used 931 as the "era" date rather than a regnal date. Later on, however, the Chronicler's sources seem to have shifted to a regular regnal system of dating; for there are no other examples of such an era date except 2 Chronicles 15:19, which puts the war between Asa and Baasha in the thirty-fifth year of his reign. Jamieson (Jamieson-Fausset-Brown,
Commentary
, 1:274) favors this solution, saying, "The best Biblical critics are agreed in considering this date to be calculated from the separation of the kingdoms, and coincident with the sixteenth year of Asa's reign. This mode of reckoning was, in all likelihood, generally followed in the book of the kings of Judah and Israel, the public annals of the time (v.11), the source from which the inspired historian drew his account."