An Atheist Explores the Bible Part 70: The Israelite Tribe of Hufflepuff. Plus; Chicken Guy. (1 Chronicles 6-10)

1 Chronicles 6-10
The Israelite Tribe of Hufflepuff. Plus; Chicken Guy.

Welcome to another instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Bible version).

In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the King James Bible, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.

For more detail, see the introductory post http://bit.ly/2F8f9JT

For the online KJV I use, see here http://bit.ly/2m0zVUP

And now:

1 Chronicles 6

“And these are they whom David set over the service of song in the house of the LORD, after that the ark had rest.”

This chapter covers the lineage of the Levites, from Levi downwards, via Aaron. I have an issue already: V1 “The sons of Levi; Gershon, Kohath, and Merari”, later V16 “The sons of Levi; Gershom, Kohath, and Merari.” The first follows the line of Kohath, then it goes back and follows the line of Gershom. Or is it GershoN. Come one! I realise that there are translation issues, but at least decide on one form and be consistent. This is even in the same chapter, not like the differences between Chronicles and Genesis. Very poor.

Otherwise, what else of interest happens here? The list of names is anchored in time in two places – when Solomon’s temple is built and later the captivity. Another point that I have issue with – V16 mentions an Azariah  who was priest in Solomon’s temple, but another Azariah crops up later, and he comes after Zadok who was priest early in Solomon’s reign, so I think it was probably the second Azariah who was Solomon’s priest.

The chapter ends with a list of all the sanctuary cities.

1 Chronicles 7

“(And his daughter was Sherah, who built Bethhoron the nether, and the upper, and Uzzensherah.)”

Lineages of Issachar, Manasseh and Asher are given here in fairly brief format; these tribes are the Hufflepuff House of Israel – oh yeah, and these guys were here too. Not a lot happens with them, but the quoted verse was quite interesting, I thought; a little subnote about a woman responsible for building settlements.

1 Chronicles 8

“And the sons of Ulam were mighty men of valour, archers, and had many sons, and sons' sons, an hundred and fifty. All these are of the sons of Benjamin.

Mainly the lineage of the Benjaminites, and the formation of the Moabites. This lineage also goes via Saul and Jonathon and beyond. Once again, though, mainly a list of names.

1 Chronicles 9

“So all Israel were reckoned by genealogies; and, behold, they were written in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah, who were carried away to Babylon for their transgression.”

The genealogies haven’t finished yet, although this chapter is more concerned with the various offices involved in maintaining the tabernacle and/or the temple, and so mainly concerns the Levites. Verse 2 delineates the groups into Israelites, Levites and Nethinims – who this last group are I haven’t a clue and so will hie me to the internet. Also a character named “Bakbakkar”, who is maybe an anthropomorphic chicken?

1 Chronicles 10

“And the Philistines followed hard after Saul, and after his sons; and the Philistines slew Jonathan, and Abinadab, and Malchishua, the sons of Saul.”

Finally the book turns to a narrative framework, and starts with the defeat of Saul by the Philistines. Saul commits suicide rather than be killed by the “uncircumcised”, and the Philistines despoil the bodies of Saul and his sons, displaying them in their temple of Dagon. The people of Jabesh-Gilead retrieve the bodies and give them a proper burial; but all this happened to Saul, apparently, because he dealt with magicians who used familiar spirits.