1 Chronicles Introduction

First Chronicles starts with nine chapters of genealogies that trace Adam’s line down to the sons of Jacob. The rest of 1 Chronicles (chaps. 10–29) narrate the life of David. The first nine chapters of 2 Chronicles detail the reign of David’s son, Solomon. The stories of David and Solomon should be treated as one unit for the Chronicler presented both of them as models for Israel’s kings. Chapters 10–36 record the history of the southern kingdom of the divided monarchy, Judah.

Genealogies were very important to the Chronicler, and thus the modern reader cannot gloss over them and still expect to understand the message of the book. Some were used to show the kinship between Israel and neighboring tribes, while others established the legitimacy for persons of rank and authority. The genealogies reflect a teleological view of history, that is, a view in which humankind is moving toward a goal set by the Creator. More importantly, they provide a framework for the Chronicler’s concept of “all Israel.”

The Chronicler used this important phrase forty-five times. For the Chronicler, there was no more north and south, Israel and Judah, but just “all Israel.” His genealogies emphasized the unity of the sons of Jacob, whom the Chronicler always called “Israel.” “All Israel” accepted David as king at Hebron (1Ch 11:1). The lists of 1 Chronicles 11–12 are apparently motivated by the “all Israel” concept. “All Israel” was at the dedication of the temple (2Ch 7:8). Hezekiah invited “all Israel” to come to Jerusalem for worship (2Ch 30:1), and although most mocked the invitation, some “humbled themselves” before the Lord and came to worship at Jerusalem (2Ch 30:11). Although Israel had been divided, the damage was never irreparable, and repentance was always available to the people.

In Chronicles the northern kingdom is essentially ignored, except insofar as it interacted with Judah. This is an important clue to the Chronicler’s purpose for writing the book. He sought to prove that the newly restored nation was the true successor to the Davidic covenant. It is no surprise, then, that most of the text of Chronicles is devoted to David and Solomon, representing the ideals of kingship laid out in Deuteronomy. The author assumed his readers knew the contents of the books of Samuel and Kings, and so he gave only enough detail to establish the historical context. Also omitted were the personal failings of David and Solomon as well as the stories of Absalom, Amnon, and Adonijah. They were not relevant to temple worship and other institutions of the theocracy (God-ruled government).

Some have suggested that the Chronicler was attempting to whitewash David and Solomon’s sins and failures, but it is clear that the Chronicler expected his readers to be familiar with the books of Samuel and Kings. These negative elements in the lives of the kings were public and well-known; they were simply not pertinent to the issues pressing upon the Chronicler. He focused upon the consequences of idolatry and God’s desire for the sinner to repent and return to a life of obedience to the law of Moses. This obedience is the basic characteristic of anyone who had a covenant relationship with the Lord, since God’s moral character had to be reflected by the nation he had chosen.

In his grand survey of Israelite history, the Chronicler made liberal use of sources within the Scriptures: the Pentateuch (first five books of the Bible), Joshua, Samuel, and especially Kings, which he explicitly cited (2Ch 27:7; 35:27; 36:8). For the genealogies, the Chronicler must have drawn upon other sources than just the biblical ones. The difference in arrangement and balance is great enough to suggest there were other sources that survived the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BC.

While it is certain that the Chronicler knew of and consulted with the book of Kings, a careful comparison of the parallel passages show Chronicles giving details not found in Kings, and, at the same time, omitting details that Kings includes. This suggests that the Chronicler used a source other than Kings, but that this source or sources was also used by the author of Kings. Second Chronicles 24:27 cites “Writing of the Book of the Kings.” Other extra-canonical sources used by the Chronicler were narratives of the prophets and seers (1Ch 29:29; 2Ch 9:29; 12:15; 13:22; 24:30; 26:22; 32:32; 33:19) and official genealogies preserved in government archives, although these have been lost to us.

Some of the differences in text of the books of Chronicles arose from the Chronicler using a different Hebrew text tradition from that of the author of Kings. Textual criticism has traced the history of manuscripts by comparing sets of text variations among manuscripts. They conclude that during the time of the Chronicler there were two major “families” of Hebrew manuscripts of that book: the family that eventually became known as the “Masoretic Text” (MT) and a lesser known “Palestinian” family, represented by the (Lucianic) LXX and the Samaritan Pentateuch. Chronicles used a copy of Samuel—Kings that is closer to the Palestinian family than the MT used for our printed editions of the Hebrew Bible. But most of the differences can be accounted for by comparing and contrasting the literary purposes of Kings and Chronicles.

Are the books of 1 and 2 Chronicles historically trustworthy? Yes, but because of the clearly Judean and Levitical viewpoint from which the author wrote and selected material from his sources, critics have tended to hold Chronicles to be slanted and so not a valuable historical witness. But the Chronicler did not claim to be writing a modern, objective historical narrative. The selection of material was based upon different criteria. Chronicles was written in the context of a postexilic Jewish theocracy to present a corrective understanding of Israel’s history from its origins to the ending of Israel’s exile by Cyrus’s decree. The Chronicler synthesized a historical narrative from a specific theological stance and intended it as an antidote to contemporary spiritual apathy.