Introduction:
A monarchy is a system in which a country has
a monarch where Old Testament tells the life and faith about the people who
lived at that time. Let us look into the
models proposed by socio-scientific studies based on anthropological theories
and people of god under Saul , David and Solomon and briefly look into that.
Max Weber:-
Max
Weber gave enormous thoughts towards the field of anthropological theories. The
application of models form the social sciences to the early Israelite began
with max Weber (1864-1920). He is one of
the prominent scholars of that time.
Weber’s contribution to modern decryption and analysis of types of
authority. In the decades after Weber’s
work became well known Albrecht alt, martin north and other historians adopted Weber’s
idea. Hence Weber became role model of
them.
Frank. S. Frick:-
Frank.
S. Frick is a very renowned scholar contributed a lot whereas the theories
position he discusses do not represent all anthropological approaches to social
organization analysis and state emergence,
He rather focuses his modela towards cultural/ ecological / cultural
materialistic traditions and he heave been continuously contributed towards
anthropologists and antheropologically oriented archaeologists.
Frank coined three basic types of
state formation theories and they are
1. The conflict approach
2. The integrative approach
3. The synthetic approach
And Frick indicates that he finds
the last of these most useful.
Coote and whitelam:-
According
to coote and whitelam’s model. They never explain why people would have moved
to the highlands after the collapse of society in the plain even after a major
urban collapse of society in the plain. Even
after a major urban collapse the plain would be still more eligible for
settlement and agriculture than the highlands unless important reasons to avoid
it. According to coote and whitelam the
plain “vulnerable” but they do not explain what causes this “vulnerability”.
Finkelstein’s synthesis model:-
According
to finkelstein the layout of the settlements generally conforms to the layout
of nomadic pastoralist composites. The
typical four room house developed from the nomadic tent and silos are seen as
typical for people, the essence of number of isolated sanctuaries in the hill
country and the large number of isolated burial sites can be seen as an
indication of a strong pastoral population in those regions.
Processual and chieftancy models:-
James
W. Flanagan was the first biblical scholar to make a detailed argument of the
presence of chieftly leadership during the tenth century. In this text study he analyzed the biblical
texts in relation to anthropological theories on state formation and the process
involved in succession to high office as a means of reconstructing this
traditional period in Israel’s history.
All the scholars mainly discussed about the period which Saul, David and
Solomon lived let us discuss about Saul, David and Solomon briefly.
Saul:-
Saul
was Israel’s first king. He was
ultimately rejected (1 Samuel 15:10).
His personality suffered fewer than two great people (i.e.) Prophet
Samuel and David, Saul’s successor. It
has been saying Saul ruled from 1030-1009 B.C.E.
Saul
characterized as a great warrior. He
killed thousand by David killed sixteen thousand. Saul seems to be having been generally
successful as long as he fought in the hills and Saul’s kingdom was not very
large saul’stragic death ended his reign as a total failure.
David:-
David
is the successor of Saul and so bible clearly says that David reigned over
Israel for forty years. Seven in Hebron and thirty three in Jerusalem
(7+33). So it’s probably around
(1001-969 BC). So David’s reign was a
successful one where he had a vast area for himself. David is very clever in military techniques
where he killed goliath cleverly. Se he
fought with many and succeeded many.
This gives him economic power.
Solomon:-
Solomon
thought himself strong enough to override any objection to his policy and so he
was, as long as the excitement of success the people were willing to tolerate
great deal. But the objections were
still there; as soon as Solomon died they broke to the surface. The cry that was then raised is significant:”to
your tents, o Israel; what have we to do with the house of David?” What was not merely the matter f taxation or
even the more general question of social justice what lay behind this was a
deeper grievance. The tradition
antagonism of the north against the south.
And the result this time was succession and the formation of a separate
state.
Solomon
as per the bible considered to be “wise” (hakam) form this we can say he was
both a clever politician and good administrator. Archaeology also sheds some light on the
activities of Solomon as a builder and on his transformation of Israelite
society.
The role of woman:-
Mera,
mega, thikoba city’s lady, Bathsheba, etc.
All these characters of female come across the time of David, Saul and
Solomon. There was a trend which is
clearly visible throughout all those passages.
All of them were treated very low and they are treated like slaves and men
are like their maters. They totally ill
treated and degraded them. This clearly
shows that women doesn’t have any role to play but they play with women
life. So the role of women in monarch is
pathetic unrespectable.
Conclusion:-
Scholars gave us a vast idea about
the anthropological theories and also about the iron ages whereas bible gives
us vast information about Saul, David and Solomon. It is our purpose to connect the archaeological
and biblical thoughts together and to present new ideas to our future
generation.
Bibliography
Hinson, David F. History of Israel. Old testament Introduction I. Delhi: SPCK, 1976.
Pritchard, J.B. The ancient near east in pictures.
Princeton university press, 1955.
North, Martin. The old testament world. London:
Adam & Charles black, 1964.
Thompson, J. A. Archaeology and old testament. USA:
Eerdams publishing, 1957.
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