Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 21.djvu/273

Rh S A N S A N 253 in this book, as in Judges, we not seldom find two accounts of the same events which not only differ in detail but plainly are of very different date. The book as a whole may be divided into three main sections: (1) Samuel and Saul, 1 Sam. i.-xiv.; (2) The rise and kingdom of David, 1 Sam. xv.-2 Sam. viii. ; (3) The personal history of David's court at Jerusalem (mainly from a single source, which also includes 1 Kings i., ii.), 2 Sam. ix.-xx. Finally, the appendix, 2 Sam. xxi.-xxiv., must have been added after the book of Kings had been separated from the context to which 1 Kings i., ii. origin- ally belonged. As the greater part of the book of Samuel is occupied with the history of David, which has been dis- cussed at length in his article, and with that of Samuel and Saul, the chief points of which have been critically examined in the article ISRAEL, a very brief resume of the contents of each of the main sections must here suffice. I. The story of Samuel's birth, consecration to the service of the sanctuary at Shiloh, and prophetic calling (1 Sam. i.-iii. ) connects itself through the prophecy of the rejection of the house of Eli (iii. 11 sq. ) with the history of the disaster of Ebenezer and the capture and restoration of the ark (iv. 1-vii. 1). But the second of these two sections does not seem to have been originally written as the sequel to chaps, i.-iii. ; in it we lose sight of Samuel and his prophecy altogether. The song of Hannah (ii. 1-10) and the prophecy of the nameless man of God (ii. 27-36) are later insertions (see Wellhausen-Bleek, Einl., p. 207). Chap, vii., with its Deuteronomistic introduction (verses 2-4) and its account of a victory at Ebenezer (the counterpart of the defeat in chap, iv.) which delivered Israel from the Philistines during all the days of Samuel, is inconsistent with the position of the Philistine power at the accession of Saul. The chapter in its present form must be late, though hardly post-exilic, and it is the necessary introduction to the later and less authentic account of the way in which Saul came to the kingdom (chaps. viiL, x. 17- 27, xii. ). It should be noted, however, that, though Samuel is taken by the late narrator to have a widespread authority, inconsistent with the facts disclosed in the older narrative of the choice of Saul, the sphere assigned to him in vii. 16, 17 is very narrow and agrees with chap. ix. Of the beginnings of the kingship of Saul we have a twofold account, the older being that in ix. 1-x. 16, xi. The relative value of the two accounts has been already discussed in ISRAEL, vol. xiii. p. 403. The older history is continued in chaps, xiii. , xiv., but here xiii. 7&-15 a doublette of the account of the rejection of Saul in chap. xiv. is certainly foreign to the original context. The summary of Saul's exploits in xiv. 47 sq. is written by an admirer, who appears to ascribe to him some of David's victories. But this does not affect the value of the preceding more detailed narrative, s which is plainly based on a full and authentic tradition. II. The account of the campaign against Amalek (chap, xv.) does not merely supply details supplementary to xiv. 48 but puts the war with Agag in quite a different light by laying the chief weight on Saul's disobedience to Samuel and rejection by the prophet. This passage is closely allied to 1 Sam. xxviii. 3-25, which, however, is no part of the original story of Saul's defeat and death, as appears by comparing the position of the two armies in xxviii. 4 and xxix. 1. Chap, xv., in like manner, is probably no original part of the narrative of David's rise, to which it now forms the introduction, and both passages, though relatively ancient addi- tions, represent a type of religious thought and a view of prophecy which can hardly be older than the epoch of Elisha (comp. PROPHET, vol. xix. p. 816). The anointing of David (xvi. 1-13) presupposes chap, xv., and is consistent with what follows only if we suppose that the meaning of Samuel's act was not understood at the time. The older history repeatedly indicates that David's kingship was predicted by a divine oracle, but would hardly lead us to place the prediction so early (1 Sam. xxv. 30, 2 Sam. iii. 9, v. 2 compared with 1 Sam. xvii. 28, xviii. 23). The story of David's introduction to Saul is told in two forms (xvi. 14-23 ; xvii. 1-xviii. 5). In the former David is already a man of approved courage and parts when he is attracted to the court ; in the latter he is an obscure and untried shepherd lad (as in chap, xvi. ) when he volunteers to meet Goliath. In the Hebrew text the contradiction between the two accounts is absolute, but the Septuagint omits xvii. 12-31, xvii. 55-xviii. 5, which greatly lessens if it does not entirely remove the difficulty. l The rise of Saul's jealousy against David (xviii. 6-30) and the open breach between them, with David's flight from the court (xix., xx. ), are very confused in the Hebrew text. Some serious difficulties are escaped 1 A further difficulty is caused by 2 Sam. xxi. 19, which makes Elhanan the Bethlehemite slayer of Goliath. by following the Septuagint recension, but others remain, and there is a good deal of confusion also in the accounts of David's life as an outlaw (xxi.-xxvi.) and with Achish (xxvii.). For details see DAVID, vol. vi. p. 838 sq. The narrative is largely made up of detached anecdotes, and sometimes there were two divergent anecdotes based on a single incident. This is clear as regards the two stories of David's generosity to Saul (xxiv., xxvi.) and still more clear where the LXX. omits one of two parallel anecdotes (see DAVID, ut supra), while the same account may perhaps be given of the twofold narrative of David's flight from Saul and of his betaking himself to Achish. At the same time there is sufficient connexion to show that the doublettes and additions are strung on an original thread of continuous history a history of David, which becomes more free from foreign accretions at the point when the outlaw and refugee acquires, through the death of Saul, a position of com- manding importance. Saul's defeat and death (1 Sam. xxviii. 1, 2, xxx. ) are related as part of the history of David, which runs on from this point with little evidence of editorial additions to the close of 2 Sam. v. The summary account of David's war and government in 2 Sam. viii. appears to be the continuation of the same document ; chaps, vi. and vii., on the other hand, seem to have an independent source. III. The history of David's court, a vivid picture of events which must be referred in substance if not in form to a contem- porary observer, is in its origin a distinct book from the life of David that closes with 2 Sam. viii. It extends over 2 Sam. ix.- 1 Kings ii. with very little appearance of interpolation except the great appendix, 2 Sam. xxi.-xxiv., and is throughout one of the most admirable remains of ancient history. The appendix is made up of various pieces, chap. xxiv. appearing to attach itself directly to xxi. 1-14, while xxi. 15 sq. is akin in subject to xxiii. 8 sq. ; the two poems, chap. xxii. (Psalm xviii. ) and xxiii. 1-7, have no relation to the context, so that we can only say of them that they were accepted as Davidic at the time posterior to the Deuteronomistic redaction when the miscellaneous matter of the appendix was incorporated with our book. In this rapid sketch it has not been attempted to notice all the minor marks of editorial retouching found in one or both of the two great recensions of the text. For all details the reader must refer principally to Wellhausen's repeated studies of the book, first in his Text der Burher Samuelis, 1871, then in the fourth edition of Bleek's Einleitung, 1878, and finally in his Prolegomena to the History of Israel (Eng. tr., 1885). Of earlier works on the subject the relative parts of Ewald's GescMchte are the most important. The commentaries of Thenius (1st ed. 1842, 2d ed. 1864) and Keil (1864, Eng. tr. 1866) are not very satis- factory. In English Prof. Kirkpat rick's short commentary (in the Cambridge Bible for Schools) will be found useful. See also F. H. Woods in Stadia Biblica Oxford, 1885. SANAA (SAN'A), the capital of Yemen in Arabia, and seat of the Turkish governor of that province, is situated in 15 22' N. lat. and 44 31' E. long., in a well- watered upland valley, 4000 feet above the sea and six to nine miles broad, running north and south between two table- lands. The western table-land, over which lies the road to the port of Hodaida on the Red Sea, rises 1200 feet above the town, the eastern (J. Nokom) is some 300 feet higher, and crowned by the ruins of the fortress Birash, which local tradition connects with the name of Shem, son of Noah, to whom the foundation of the city is attri- buted by Hamddni, Jazirat, p. 55. Under Mount Nokom in the valley is the hill Ghomdan with the citadel, which Halevy in 1870 found in ruins. The ancient fortress of Ghomdan, which is often referred to by poets, and is described in extravagant terms by later writers, is said to have been destroyed by the caliph 'Othman. The city proper, which is walled, extends from the citadel on the east to the garden and ruined palace of the imam Motawakkil on the west. Beyond this is the quarter known as Bir al-'Azab, where the imams' had their pleasure gardens, adjoining which, to the south, is the ancient Jewish settle- ment (Ka' al-Ydhud). In Niebuhr's time (1763) the two last were open suburbs, but they have since been walled in. Though Sanaa is a very old town, the earliest buildings now standing are perhaps those which date from the Turkish occupation (1570-1630) some mosques, parts of the fortifications, the aqueduct. In last century, under the independent imams of Yemen, as the capital of the coffee country and the most fertile region of Arabia, it was, with its palaces and gardens, its mosques, caravanserais, and good private houses, by much the first city of the peninsula. The Wahhabi movement and Turko-Egyptian intervention in the affairs of Yemen shook the power of