Introduction

First Chronicles FIRST CHRONICLES Introduction: It is a challenge for twenty-first modern man to settle down for a study of the book of First Chronicles and struggle through the first nine chapters of genealogy. The question can present itself whether Paul overlooked this book when he wrote to Timothy: “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”1 J. Sidlow Baxter, in Explore the Book, writes about those genealogies: “Nine chapters of genealogical tables! What waste of space! Nay, rather, what blindness to think so! No part of the Chronicles is more important. Such lines of descent were of sacred importance to all godly Jews, and rightly so, for they knew that their nation, besides being the repository of a special Divine revelation, was the possessor of wonderful Divine promises reaching on to unborn generations. The chronicler himself knew well enough that these genealogies reveal the selective process of Divine election right from Adam downwards, and that the covenant line of redemptive purpose was to culminate in the Messiah. Especially did the preservation of the trunk and the main branches of Israel’s family tree become vital after the Babylonian exile (when the Chronicles were written). Families had been uprooted by the thousands. Connections had been broken. Many records had been lost (see for instance Ezra ii. 59), and Judah’s archives must have become largely disintegrated even where not actually destroyed. Our chronicler’s list links the pre-Exile with the post-Exile period; for (as should be clearly grasped) chapter ix. 2-34 concerns the resettlement in Judea after the Exile. The break is marked by the first verse of that chapter, which should really be the last verse of the preceding chapter. The Angus Bible Handbook remarks: ‘These tables give the sacred line through which the promise was transmitted for nearly 3,500 years, a fact unexampled in the history of the human race.’” Title of the Book: The Tyndale Commentary states about the title of Chronicles: “The English title of the books of 1 and 2 Chronicles has an unusual history. It originates neither from the original Hebrew, nor (despite the fact that ‘chronicle’ comes from a Greek word chronikon) from the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Old Testament. It was not in fact until the fourth century AD that Jerome, the famous Bible translator, first applied the term ‘Chronicle’ to these books. He suggested in the prologue to his Latin translation of Samuel and Kings that in place of the Greek title Paraleipomena … usually given to the work, ‘we might more plainly call it the chronicle (chronikon) of the whole of sacred history.’ Though Jerome wrote no commentary on Chronicles and retained the traditional Greek title, his proposal eventually became the basis of the title now used in the English Bible. The mediating influence came from Luther, whose German title, Die Chronika, passed into English when Bible translations proliferated during the Reformation period. Despite its comparatively late appearance, ‘chronicle’ is a good idiomatic translation of the expression dibĕré hayyāmîm, the accepted Hebrew title of the work. The phrase means literally ‘the events of the days,’ i.e. ‘annal, chronicle,’ and though it appears only once in the body of Chronicles (1 Chr. 27:24), it became associated with the work through its frequent appearance in Kings (cf. 1 Kgs. 14:19, 29; 15:7, 23, 31). It may well have been used as a title for Chronicles from quite early on, judging by the similar usage of the phrase in other Old Testament books of the same general period (cf. Neh. 1 II Tim. 3:16, 17 © 2014 John Schultz. All rights reserved. www.Bible-commentaries.com First Chronicles 12:23; Esth. 2:23; 6:1; 10:2). The Greek translators of the Old Testament, however, produced a quite different title, viz., Paraleipomena, ‘the things omitted,’ i.e. omitted from Samuel and Kings. This reflected a rather different understanding of the book from that implied by the Hebrew title, and it is the Greek approach which has had much the greater influence on the church’s view of Chronicles down the centuries. Unfortunately it also contributed to the book’s widespread neglect, since the Greek title implied that Chronicles was a kind of supplement or appendix and was therefore of only marginal value in the Old Testament. The division of Chronicles into two parts, viz. 1 and 2 Chronicles, goes back to the Septuagint, though it is attested no earlier than the third century AD. In the Hebrew tradition, it is no older than the first printed edition of the Hebrew Bible in 1448 AD. This division was probably made for practical reasons, and has no other significance. On the contrary, the textual history of the Hebrew Bible as well as the contents and ideology of 1 and 2 Chronicles show that the two books are really a single unit. Once this is recognized, the length and scope of the work make clear that it is an extremely important part of the Old Testament. Its subject matter covers the whole of Israelite history from creation (1 Chr. 1:1) to near the author’s own time (1 Chr. 9:2-34), and in terms of number of chapters it is the third largest compilation in the Old Testament, after Psalms and Isaiah.” The Tyndale Commentary gives a lengthy explanation of the message of Chronicles, of which we copy the following: (a) Covenant According to Chronicles, the Davidic covenant is that element which most clearly expresses the meaning of Israel’s continuing life as the people of God. Though this form of covenant is explicitly mentioned in only three passages (2 Chr. 7:18; 13:5; 21:7), it is frequently referred to, especially in relation to God’s promises to David (e.g. 1 Chr. 17:18, 23, 26; 2 Chr. 1:9; 6:10, 15, 42; 21:7; 23:3). It is also the headstream out of which flow two of the major tributaries running through the books of Chronicles, namely the Davidic dynasty (1 Chr. 28:5; 29:23; 2 Chr. 6:10, 16; 2 Chr. 13:8; 23:3), and the Solomonic temple (1 Chr. 17:12; 22:6-11; 28:2-10; 2 Chr. 6:7-11). In its foundations and visible expression, therefore, the Davidic covenant is clearly central to the thought of Chronicles. … The idea of God as the inspirer and maintainer of the covenant is strengthened by an interest in divine election which is unparalleled outside Deuteronomy in the Old Testament. God’s choice of people and places occurs directly in nine passages, only three of which have any kind of parallel in the earlier sources. In addition to this, the election concept clearly undergirds the theology of the genealogies (1 Chr. 1 – 9), even though the verb ‘to choose’ does not appear. … Election in Chronicles is very closely associated with the covenant, as in Deuteronomy and to a lesser extent elsewhere in the Old Testament. … God’s guaranteed commitment to Israel is also expressed through a strengthened emphasis on the permanence and inviolability of the covenant. The well-known refrain from the Psalms, ‘For his love endures for ever,’ often occurs, for example though none of the quotations is paralleled in the books of Kings (e.g. 1 Chr. 16:41; 2 Chr. 5:13; 7:3, 6; 20:21). Its frequent appearance is an indication that the covenant’s continuation depended on God’s love rather than on Israel’s achievements. … In the Chronicler’s own material, mention is often made of either the eternal nature of the covenant or the unchangeableness of God’s purposes. God intends to dwell permanently in the Jerusalem temple (1 Chr. 23:25; 2 Chr. 30:8), where the priests and Levites are to minister to him for ever (1 Chr. 15:2; 23:13). The land has been promised for ever to Israel (2 Chr. 20:7), as long as they are obedient to his commands (1 Chr. 28:8). The kingship granted to David’s family is an irrevocable gift, a promise that God personally guarantees (1 Chr. 22:10; 28:4, 7; 2 Chr. 13:5). Abijah’s quotation of the phrase © 2014 John Schultz. All rights reserved. www.Bible-commentaries.com First Chronicles ‘covenant of salt’ (2 Chr. 13:5; cf. Num. 18:19) is a particularly striking way of indicating that God always preserves and protects his relationship with Israel. Abijah also mentions another very important and distinctive aspect of God’s involvement in the covenant concept in Chronicles, namely, the kingdom of God. Apart from the Psalms and Daniel, Chronicles is the only book in the Old Testament which deals with the notion of the kingdom of God in any detail. Since this kingdom is revealed in Chronicles through the Davidic monarchy and the Jerusalem temple, it is clearly a covenant concept. … The Chronicler also sees the positive value of covenant law as something which was continually relevant and effective rather than a relic left over from the past. The law, which is variously described as ‘the law of the LORD (1 Chr. 16:40; 2 Chr. 31:3), ‘the law of Moses’ (2 Chr. 23:18; 30:16) or ‘the word of the LORD through Moses’ (2 Chr. 35:6; cf. 1 Chr. 15:15; etc.), often occurs in passages which have no parallel and is consistently regarded as God’s ultimate expression of his authority in Israel.

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