Scholar’s Comments
Philip R. Davies:
“[T]here are no literary criteria for believing David to be more historical than Joshua, Joshua more historical than Abraham, and Abraham more historical than Adam.”
Thomas L. Thompson:
“The existence of the Bible’s ‘United Monarchy’ during the tenth-century is…impossible.”
GöSta Ahlström:
“[W]ithout the corroboration of external source material, the picture that can be presented from an examination of Judges, Samuel and 1 Kings…will be no more than a discussion of what could have been possible.”
John Van Seters:
“Important to virtually all previous discussion of Israelite historiography has been the conviction that the books of Samuel contain a number of early historiographic works, such as the Story of Saul, the Story of David’s Rise, and above all, the Court History or Succession Story…[My] study has shown that the Court History was not contemporary historical reporting.”