The King's Table: A Study Guide

If you’re short on time, the starred questions (★) make a good core path.

Before you begin, read 2 Samuel 8:1–9:13. Chapter 8 is a war report and it reads like one. Skim it the first time, then come back.

Opening the Story — The Name on Things

Walk into any hospital, university or concert hall and look at the walls. Somebody’s name is on them. Sometimes it’s on a brick. Sometimes a wing. Sometimes the whole building. A donor wall. A plaque. People want their name on things.

Some of us do it with a chair in the sanctuary. Lord help the person who sits in your spot.

The Bible knows all about this. Early in Genesis a group of people on a plain say, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth” (Genesis 11:4). Did you catch the lest? The name isn’t just about pride. It’s about fear. The fear of being scattered. Forgotten. Erased.

Then God says to Abram: “I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing” (Genesis 12:2). And about a thousand years later, God says something very like it to David (2 Samuel 7:9).

So this story asks two questions. Not whether you’ll have a name. Two harder ones. WHY do we want one? And if you actually get one, WHAT do you do with it?

Here’s the whole study in one sentence. Keep it in front of you the whole way through: God gives a great name that we might join Him in the work He has created us for.

Reflect before you go further: Think of a place you’ve seen someone’s name on a building, a plaque or a brick. What do you think that name is doing for the person it belongs to?

Movement One — The Name (2 Samuel 7:9; 8:1–14)

⁹“And I have been with you wherever you went and have cut off all your enemies from before you. And I will make for you a great name, like the name of the great ones of the earth.” (2 Samuel 7:9)

That’s what God said to David in the chapter right before this one. Three things. I have been with you. I have cut off your enemies. And I will make you a great name.

Now look at chapter 8. It’s not many people’s favorite. Philistia, Moab, Zobah, Damascus, Hamath, Edom. Battles, cities, garrisons. It reads like the fine print on a contract: you skim it and nod. But read it with 7:9 in your hand and you’ll see all three pieces at work. “The LORD gave victory to David wherever he went” (8:6, and again in 8:14). There’s “wherever you went” again, coming true. The long list of defeated enemies keeps the cutting-off going. And right in the middle of it, the third piece:

¹³And David made a name for himself when he returned from striking down 18,000 Edomites in the Valley of Salt. (2 Samuel 8:13)

Name — שֵׁם — šēm — name; reputation, fame, renown (BDB; HALOT). It means more than a label. It’s your reputation, your standing. Your name and your honor are tangled together.

Here’s a detail worth knowing. The “for himself” in your English Bible isn’t in the Hebrew. The translators added it. The Hebrew just says David “made a name.” That matters, because readers have taken the verse two ways. Some hear God’s promise arriving right on schedule: God said “I will make you a name,” and here it is. Others hear an echo of Babel, the same phrase, “make a name,” now with David as the one doing the making. This guide doesn’t need to settle that, and the commentators don’t either. But look at the frame the writer puts around it: it’s the LORD who “gave victory.” Twice.

And look at what David does with what he wins. “These also King David dedicated to the LORD, together with the silver and gold that he dedicated from all the nations he subdued” (8:11). The gold and the silver go to God. Robert Vannoy and others see this as the chapter’s center of gravity. The name that gets made is made by a king who keeps handing the spoils back to God.

This is where one of our four core values here at EMC gets practical: Identity. We believe every person is made in the image of God. And that means we’re not self-made. You have a Maker, and He had something in mind. Your intelligence, your energy, your creativity, the reason you were able to do anything you’ve ever done: all of it was given. That doesn’t cancel your effort. David fought every one of those battles, blood, sweat and tears, and the text still says the LORD gave the victory. Did we build it, or did God? The biblical answer is YES. It’s “both,” not “either/or.”

Questions

1. ★ The ESV says David “made a name for himself,” but the Hebrew has no “for himself.” David holds the verb, and the frame around him says God gave the victory. When you look at what you’ve built (a career, a reputation, a family), how much of it do you think of as yours? What would change if you counted the “both” honestly?
2. David fought every battle, and the text still credits the LORD. What does it look like to work hard and still give credit accurately? Where is that hard for you?
3. David takes the spoils and dedicates them to the LORD (8:11). Whatever comes to you through your work, whether income, influence or reputation, what would it mean to “dedicate” some of it in a way that’s real and not just a gesture?

Movement Two — One Verb, Three Objects (2 Samuel 8:13, 15; 9:1)

There’s a structure in these two chapters that’s hard to see in English and easy to see in Hebrew. And I love this. One ordinary word carries the whole thing.

Make, do — עָשָׂה — ʿāśâ — to do, make, fashion, produce, accomplish (BDB; HALOT). It’s about as ordinary as Hebrew verbs get, and English needs more than one verb to carry it. Watch it three times:

¹³And David made a name for himself… ¹⁵So David reigned over all Israel. And David administered justice and equity to all his people. (2 Samuel 8:13, 15) ¹And David said, “Is there still anyone left of the house of Saul, that I may show him kindness for Jonathan’s sake?” (2 Samuel 9:1)

Same verb every time. David made a name. David was doing justice and equity. David asks who’s left so he can do kindness. A name. Justice and equity. Kindness. One verb, three objects. And the order is worth noticing. First the name. Then justice for everybody. Then a specific act of kindness for one particular man.

Look at the middle one. Justice — מִשְׁפָּט — mišpāṭ — judgment, justice, right decision (BDB), paired with righteousness — צְדָקָה — ṣĕdāqâ — righteousness, right conduct toward others (BDB). That’s the word the ESV renders “equity.” The two together are a standard phrase, and Harry Hoffner reads them as one idea, “equitable justice.” Now look at who it’s for: “all his people.” Not the well-connected. Not just the tribe he came from. Hoffner puts it this way: “no Israelite—no matter how low-ranking or poor—could be neglected.”

That pair becomes the measure of a king all through the Old Testament. The prophet Jeremiah turns it on a king who built himself an impressive house: “Do you think you are a king because you compete in cedar? Did not your father eat and drink and do justice and righteousness?… He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well. Is not this to know me? declares the LORD” (Jeremiah 22:15–16). And it’s how Jeremiah describes the king who’s coming: “he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land” (Jeremiah 23:5).

Inside David’s own story, that standard gets tested. Years later his son Absalom stands at the city gate and tells every petitioner, “See, your claims are good and right, but there is no man designated by the king to hear you” (2 Samuel 15:3). So 8:15 isn’t just a nice report. It’s a standard the narrator expects us to hold up against the rest of the story.

Now think about who “all his people” covers. Low-ranking. Poor. From the wrong family. That’s a pretty good description of the man we’re about to meet in chapter 9. Before Mephibosheth ever gets a seat at the table, he’s already inside the circle of 8:15. Justice for “all his people” includes the grandson of the old king.

Questions

4. ★ The writer uses one verb for making a name and for doing justice. What does that suggest about what a name is for?
5. “All his people” includes the people nobody is designated to hear. Have you ever been on that side, with no one whose job it was to listen to you? Who heard you anyway, and what did that do?

Movement Three — The Oath Comes Due (1 Samuel 20:13–17; 24:14–22; 2 Samuel 9:1–3)

¹And David said, “Is there still anyone left of the house of Saul, that I may show him kindness for Jonathan’s sake?” (2 Samuel 9:1)

It’d be easy to read this as David deciding to be nice. Virtue signaling. Paying it forward. It isn’t. David is keeping an oath. Actually, two.

The first was to Jonathan, Saul’s son and David’s closest friend. Jonathan could see the writing on the wall. His father was hunting David, and Jonathan knew David would be king. So he asks for something:

¹⁴“If I am still alive, show me the steadfast love of the LORD, that I may not die; ¹⁵and do not cut off your steadfast love from my house forever, when the LORD cuts off every one of the enemies of David from the face of the earth.” (1 Samuel 20:14–15)

Steadfast love — חֶסֶד — ḥesed — covenant loyalty, steadfast lovingkindness (HALOT). It’s a covenant word. A promise-keeping word. It’s the faithfulness you owe someone you’re bound to. And in the ancient world, what Jonathan asked for was no small thing. When a dynasty fell, the new king normally wiped out the old king’s heirs. The books of Kings record it again and again: “he killed all the house of Jeroboam” (1 Kings 15:29); “she arose and destroyed all the royal family” (2 Kings 11:1). You can almost hear Jonathan: Please don’t do the math, David. Let my children live. He’s asking David not to do what kings do.

There’s a timer in that oath. “When the LORD cuts off every one of the enemies of David.” Not if. When. Cut off — כָּרַת — kārat — to cut, cut off, cut down; to cut (make) a covenant (BDB; HALOT). So when does that happen? God says it already has. In 7:9: “I… have cut off all your enemies from before you.” Chapter 8 shows it. And then chapter 9 opens, and the oath comes due. That’s why the war report is there. The wars of chapter 8 aren’t scenery. They set the stage for chapter 9.

The second oath was to Saul himself, at the cave, after David spared his life. Saul said, “Swear to me therefore by the LORD that you will not cut off my offspring after me, and that you will not destroy my name out of my father’s house” (1 Samuel 24:21). Name. There’s that word again. Saul is begging to be remembered. And David swore.

Think about when David made those promises. He was hiding in caves, running for his life. He had nothing. Now Saul and Jonathan are both dead, and nobody is checking up on him. Nobody could make the king keep a promise he made when he was weak. He keeps it anyway.

One more detail. In 9:3 David says he wants to show “the kindness of God.” Readers take that phrase three ways: as a superlative, “the utmost kindness” (Anderson); as kindness like God’s, or the kindness God requires (Youngblood, Hoffner); or as an oath sworn with God as witness (Vannoy). Whichever you pick, listen for the echo of Jonathan’s own words: “the steadfast love of the LORD” (20:14).

Questions

6. ★ David made these promises when he was weak and kept them when no one could make him. Think of a promise you made in a hard season, to a person, to yourself, or to God. What did keeping it cost? If the person is gone now, what would honoring it look like?
7. Jonathan’s request is really “don’t do what kings do.” Has anyone ever refused to treat you the way “everybody” treats someone in your position, after a failure, a loss, a family falling apart? What did that refusal make possible for you?
8. Readers disagree about what “the kindness of God” means in 9:3. Which reading do you find most compelling, and why?

Movement Four — Lo-debar and the Name Said First (2 Samuel 4:4; 9:4–8)

⁴The king said to him, “Where is he?” And Ziba said to the king, “He is in the house of Machir the son of Ammiel, at Lo-debar.” (2 Samuel 9:4)

Remember who Mephibosheth is. He was five years old when his father and grandfather died in battle on the same day. His nurse grabbed him and ran, and in the rush he fell and became lame (4:4). It’s a tragedy he didn’t cause. And his whole life he’s lived in the shadow of what happens to heirs like him.

Where does he live? Lo-debar. The name may mean “no thing” or “no pasture”; scholars aren’t sure. How bad does a place in the wilderness have to be to get called no pasture? It’s on the far side of the Jordan, a long way from Jerusalem. It’s the kind of place you go when you don’t want to be found.

⁵Then King David sent and brought him from the house of Machir the son of Ammiel, at Lo-debar. ⁶And Mephibosheth the son of Jonathan, son of Saul, came to David and fell on his face and paid homage. And David said, “Mephibosheth!” And he answered, “Behold, I am your servant.” ⁷And David said to him, “Do not fear, for I will show you kindness for the sake of your father Jonathan…” (2 Samuel 9:5–7)

Imagine that day from his side. The day he’s feared for fifteen, twenty years. Soldiers’ boots outside. A knock at the door. A summons from the king.

Now look at the order. David’s first word isn’t a promise. It’s his name. “Mephibosheth!” Let that sink in. In a story all about names, made and kept and destroyed, the first thing the king does is say the name of the one man whose name was a liability. Only then does he say, “Do not fear.” And notice that the comfort comes with a for. David doesn’t say, “Don’t be silly.” Mephibosheth’s fear was realistic. David gives him a reason.

Then comes the line that’s hardest to read:

⁸And he paid homage and said, “What is your servant, that you should show regard for a dead dog such as I?” (2 Samuel 9:8)

Dogs in that world weren’t pets. They were scavengers. “Dead dog” was a stock phrase for contempt, or for shrinking yourself in front of someone more powerful. David used it himself, in front of Saul, at the cave: “After a dead dog! After a flea!” (1 Samuel 24:14). Now the grandson of that king says it to David.

And how does David respond? He doesn’t. That might be my favorite detail in the whole story. He doesn’t say, “Oh, you’re not a dead dog.” He doesn’t say, “Yes, you are.” He just turns to Ziba and starts giving orders about land and bread.

There are two different sentences worth pulling apart here. One is I have nothing to bring. The other is I am nothing. Mephibosheth can honestly say the first. He has nothing to offer the king that the king doesn’t already have. But the text never asks him, or you, to say the second.

That’s the doorway to Humility, another of our four core values at EMC. Humility isn’t thinking less of yourself. It’s being honest about what you can’t supply, and being willing to be taught and given to by someone who can.

Questions

9. ★ David says Mephibosheth’s name before anything else. When has someone said your name in a way that changed how you felt, in a room, in a hard season? What did it do?
10. “Do not fear, for…” The comfort comes with a reason. What’s the reason you most need to hear right now?
11. ★ What’s the difference between “I have nothing to bring” and “I am nothing”? Which do you tend to say about yourself? How could you tell the difference?

Movement Five — The Table (2 Samuel 9:7–13; Exodus 34:6–7)

⁷“…and I will restore to you all the land of Saul your father, and you shall eat at my table always.” (2 Samuel 9:7)

Count what David gives. First, Mephibosheth’s life, and with it the survival of Saul’s name. That’s what the oaths asked for. Then the family land, which the commentators debate: was it a legal right, or a royal favor? And then something no oath ever mentioned: a seat at the king’s own table. Always. Hoffner puts the structure plainly: the oath set a floor, and the land and the table went beyond it. Nobody swore that table. On any reading, it was more than he was owed.

That word “always” keeps coming back. It’s in David’s promise (9:7), in his orders to Ziba (9:10), and in the last verse of the chapter. In between, Mephibosheth eats at the king’s table “like one of the king’s sons” (9:11). And then the chapter closes: “So Mephibosheth lived in Jerusalem, for he ate always at the king’s table. Now he was lame in both his feet” (9:13).

Take that last line slowly. He wasn’t healed. He came to the table lame. He sat at the table lame. And he was welcomed at the table just as he was. The chapter ends with the feet. I want to say two things about that, and I don’t want you to hear either one without the other. Belonging didn’t wait for a cure. And nothing in the text says the cure never comes. If you’re praying for healing, for yourself or for someone you love, this chapter doesn’t tell you to stop. The Bible’s picture of the end is full of it: “then shall the lame man leap like a deer” (Isaiah 35:6). It just doesn’t make healing the entrance fee.

Now here’s what I want you to see. Look at the same table from two seats.

From David’s side, it’s an oath kept. He swore, he waited for the condition, and he honored it when nobody could make him. From Mephibosheth’s side, it’s something he never saw coming. The text never says he knew about the oath. He walked into that palace listening for the soldiers’ boots. So here’s the sentence that holds both sides: unearned, but not unpromised.

Same table. Covenant on one side. Grace on the other.

And that’s how Scripture describes God.

⁶The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, “The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, ⁷keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.” (Exodus 34:6–7)

Did you hear both halves? I’m not going to pretend the second half is comfortable. But look at the two numbers. The damage reaches “to the third and the fourth generation.” The steadfast love is kept “for thousands.” And “steadfast love” there is ḥesed, the same word as David’s “kindness.” Mephibosheth is living in the wreckage of somebody else’s choices. The ruin ran down Saul’s family line. So did the promise. And in one room in Jerusalem, they met. At David’s table, you get to watch the bigger number win.

The New Testament brings us to a table like this one. “But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). And then Paul puts both sides of the table into one sentence: “Christ became a servant to the circumcised to show God’s truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises given to the patriarchs, and in order that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy” (Romans 15:8–9). God’s faithfulness to the fathers on one side. God’s mercy to the outsider on the other. Mephibosheth isn’t a Gentile, so the match is in the shape, not the identity. But it’s the same table, seen from both sides.

And John tells you what it’s like to sit there: “For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace” (John 1:16). Grace — χάρις — charis — graciousness; favor, goodwill; gift, benefit (BDAG). Received. All of it is received.

Which is exactly the hard part. Let’s be honest for a moment. Most of us would rather be the one who writes the check than the one who receives it. We don’t even take compliments well. We don’t know how to sit at a table we can’t pay for and just eat, without keeping score.

One more thing about the table itself. Mephibosheth doesn’t sit there alone. His young son Mica is named in the text (9:12), so there’s a family under that roof now, with a future. And Ziba’s whole household is put to work on their behalf. A man who’d been hiding alone in Lo-debar now has a household around him, in the king’s city, at the king’s table. At EMC we call this Community: we can’t be who God made us to be, or do what He made us to do, by ourselves. The table is the picture. Nobody eats at it alone.

Questions

12. ★ The oath required that he live. The table required nothing. Where have you received more than anyone promised you? How do you tend to respond: with gratitude, with a plan to pay it back, or with an itch to keep score?
13. Why is receiving so much harder than giving? Where do you see that in yourself?
14. ★ He came lame and sat lame. What do you think has to be fixed in you before you’re allowed to sit down at the table, with a church, a friend, or God? Does that match what David does here?
15. Who has made room for you at a table you didn’t earn? What did that make possible?

The Landing — What a Great Name Is For

Go back to the two questions we started with. Why do we want a great name? And what do we do with it?

I think we want one because we’re afraid of Lo-debar. Afraid of being forgotten. Scattered. Erased. That’s exactly what Babel said: “lest we be dispersed.” But look at what this story shows about the names we build. Saul had a name, a throne and an army. And what kept his name alive, what kept his line on the Chronicler’s page, down through Jonathan’s son and grandson and on for generations? Not Saul. Saul’s name was kept by a promise somebody else made, and somebody else kept.

Now look at what David does with his. He has one of the great names of the earth, and the first thing he does with it is say a small one out loud. “Mephibosheth!” A nobody. A man who’d spent years in a place called No Thing. Abram was told his name would be great “so that you will be a blessing.” Not so he’d be known. So he’d be a blessing. A great name isn’t a trophy. It’s given to call the small ones out of Lo-debar.

And the gospel says the same thing to us, from Mephibosheth’s side of the table. “But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God” (John 1:12). You didn’t build that name. You were given it. That’s the heart of Identity: each of us is made in the image of God, and we get to discover who He designed us to be. It’s not something you prove by what you’ve built. It’s what you started with. And the Bible ends with a God who writes names: “a white stone, with a new name written on the stone” (Revelation 2:17); “I will write on him the name of my God” (Revelation 3:12); “his name will be on their foreheads” (Revelation 22:4). You don’t have to build a name for yourself. Nobody can take away the one God writes.

Which brings us back to the sentence we started with: God gives a great name that we might join Him in the work He has created us for. Notice the order. The name comes first. The work comes from the name. It isn’t an assignment you take on to earn the seat. It’s what it looks like to have been sat down at the table. Once you know what it’s like to hear your name said kindly, you know how to say someone else’s.

But be careful with this part. It’s easy to hear “you’ve been blessed to be a blessing” as a to-do list, as if you’ve been promoted from guest to host and now your job is to be generous. That’s not the story. Mephibosheth never stops being a guest. He was brought in, he stays at the table, and he’s still lame. What changes is that he’s been named, and he knows what that’s worth.

Questions

16. ★ “We want a great name because we’re afraid of Lo-debar.” What’s underneath your own wanting? Is there anywhere you’re building a name because you’re afraid of being erased?
17. John 1:12 says the right to become children of God is given to those who receive. How does it change things to hear your name as something you were handed before you did anything?
18. ★ Think about a time someone said your name kindly and called you out of a hiding place. What did it feel like? How might that shape the way you say someone else’s name this week? If no one comes to mind, who might you ask to be that for you?
19. If someone read this story and asked you, “So what’s the point of a great name?”, what would you say?

Closing Reflection

A king has one of the great names of the earth. God gave it to him. And the first thing he does with it is go looking for a man hiding in a place called No Thing. A man with no claim he could press, no way to repay, and a name that was a danger to him. The king says his name. He says, “Do not fear.” He sets a place.

That’s where this story leaves you, too. You didn’t make your name. It was given. It’s kept by a promise somebody else made, and somebody else keeps. And you’ve been sat down at a table you didn’t earn.

End in prayer. Say your own name out loud, slowly. Then thank the God who knows it and keeps it. Ask Him whose name you’re meant to say next.

Notes

Scripture quotations are from the ESV. Hebrew definitions follow BDB (Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament) and HALOT (Koehler and Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament). The Greek definition follows BDAG (Bauer, Danker, Arndt and Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd ed.).

1. Opening and Movement One, the omission of “for himself” in 8:13 and the two readings: Harry A. Hoffner Jr., 1 & 2 Samuel, Evangelical Exegetical Commentary (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2015), on 8:13; A. A. Anderson, 2 Samuel, Word Biblical Commentary 11 (Dallas: Word, 1989), on 8:13; J. Robert Vannoy, 1–2 Samuel, Cornerstone Biblical Commentary 4a (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale, 2009), on 8:11–14 (the “center of gravity” reading of 8:7–12 is Vannoy’s, after Polzin and Fokkelman). 7:9 and 8:6, 14 share the phrase “wherever you/he went” (bĕkōl ʾăšer hālaktā / hālāk). “About a thousand years” between Abram and David is a round figure on the conventional chronology.
2. Movement Two, the ʿāśâ chain is an observation from the Hebrew (8:13 wayyaʿaś; 8:15 ʿōśeh; 9:1 wĕʾeʿĕśeh), not drawn from a commentary. “Equitable justice” (Hoffner’s translation of 8:15, reading mišpāṭ ûṣĕdāqâ as a hendiadys) and the quotation on “no Israelite”: Hoffner, EEC, on 8:15. The Jeremiah texts and Absalom at the gate are noted in Hoffner and Gary N. Knoppers, I Chronicles 10–29, Anchor Bible 12A (New York: Doubleday, 2004), on 1 Chr 18:14.
3. Movement Three, the trigger clause and the link between ch. 8 and ch. 9: Anderson, WBC 11, on 9:1–13. The practice of dynastic purges: Anderson and Vannoy, with Matthews, Chavalas and Walton, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament (Downers Grove: IVP, 2000). The three readings of “the kindness of God”: Anderson (superlative), Youngblood and Hoffner (theological), Vannoy (covenantal); Ronald F. Youngblood, “1, 2 Samuel,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary, vol. 3 (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1992), on 9:3. Jonathan’s “Please don’t do the math” is an imagined voicing, not a quotation.
4. Movement Four, Lo-debar’s location and meaning: Youngblood and Hoffner on 9:4; BDB lists the place name without a gloss. “Dead dog” as a formula of contempt or self-abasement: Anderson on 9:8, citing Jung and Gibson. The name spoken first and “Do not fear”: Hoffner and Robert D. Bergen, 1, 2 Samuel, New American Commentary 7 (Nashville: B&H, 1996), on 9:6–7. “Fifteen, twenty years” is an estimate from the narrative’s chronology.
5. Movement Five, the floor-and-ceiling reading: Hoffner, EEC, on 9:7, who also notes the debate about whether the land was a legal right or a royal favor (Ben-Barak and de Vaux, as reported there). Tāmîd (“always”) stands at 9:7, 10 and 13. “Like one of the king’s sons”: Anderson, “at least formally”; the text does not say “adopted.” The pairing of Exod 34:6 with John 1:14–17 and the shape of Rom 15:8–9: reported in the exegetical research for this unit; the match to Mephibosheth is structural, not an identity. The sense of anti in “grace upon grace” (John 1:16) is debated (accumulation or replacement), and the guide does not resolve it.
6. The Landing, the line about Saul’s name and the Chronicler’s genealogy: 1 Chr 8:34–40; 9:40–44. The reading of those lists as the fruit of David’s oaths is an observation of this study, not a commentator’s.