KING, KINGSHIP. The Heb. word for “king” is מֶ֫לֶכְ֒, H4889. It appears over two thousand times in the OT. The Gr. equivalent, βασιλεύς, G995, occurs for melek in the LXX and some fifty times in the NT.

Outline

1. Kingship and the gods. In the system of the ancient religious-state patriotism and religious piety were synonymous. To oust or overthrow the legitimate king was to commit iconoclasm and treason against the state cult. Unless a new administration could gain the ritual approval of the hierarchy of the cult and the necessary legitimization of the city gods it would be the victim of a counter revolution which often degenerated into fratricidal feuds and harem intrigues. Throughout the long centuries of Egypt’s history, and sporadically in Mesopotamia, the gods were considered royalty and the rulers as divine. In Syria-Pal. and other border areas of the great river valley civilizations the kings served as the high priests of the cult. Even in imperial Rome, the grandest of the Caesar’s honorific titles was Pontifex Maximus. The approval of the town deities was of such importance that conquerors often listed the gods of captive regions in mock reverence in the place of geographic names. In fact it was the obeisance of the conqueror to these deities that could establish his right to the local authority even though the gods along with their towns had been captured. The supercilious prayers of these rulers contain their imprecations against their enemies and their implorations for victory, addressed to a vertiable menagerie of deities. Undoubtedly this common kingly practice furthered the collection of elaborate pantheons containing deities of diverse origins. Such pantheons like the king’s courts which they served consisted of regular ordered hierarchies of superhuman beings, in effect they were divine prisoners of war. On the other hand, the Pharaoh of Egypt was the mundane and fleshly embodiment of the deity Horus, and every Pharaoh possessed a long title or throne name including some mention of the deity. Just as an earthly monarch would have his circle and entourage of courtiers and servants, so the myths and epics picture the gods as bound to a feudal if not manorial scale of importance. In this divine state each is waited on by his heavenly vassals and company of retainers. The epithets of many of the Mesopotamian deities are synonymous with those of human sovereigns. Some gods are characterized by this great feat of arms, or that sublime innovation while the names of others indicate their vocation in the supernal palaces. Some are addressed as “shepherds,” others as “cup or throne bearers,” others as “gardeners,” “porters” and even “canal inspectors.” From such myths and the popular folktales many insights can be gained concerning the inner workings of an ancient oriental palace and its inhabitants. The life of the kingly gods was viewed monistically as a rectilinear extension of endless time. The life unending sought by both Akkad. and Egyp. alike was a quantitative continuation of the life known on earth. In the Ugaritic Legend of Aqht, the goddess Anath promises immortality to Aqht and says, “Ask for life and I shall give it to you, I shall cause you to count years like Ba’al, and you shall number months with the son of El” (I D vi). It was prob. this end to which the Pharaoh designed in building the Pyramid or the Lú-gal of Ur, in constructing the great “death pit.” However, although the people of Egypt may have considered the Pharaoh divine, worshiping and reverencing him, his contemporaries who ruled the neighboring kingdoms certainly did not. They were addressed by their vassals in anything but reverential terms. As Egypt’s asiatic empire began to dissolve the rulers of the petty states beyond its control treated the divine Pharaoh with common contempt. Perhaps it was the aloofness of the Pharaohs or perhaps the insularity of Egyp. culture and the enigma of their script but the Pharaonic institutions seem to have little influenced the developme nt of the idea of kingship outside of Egypt and its vassals.

In some cultures of the ancient Near E annual agricultural festivals were held which were intended to insure the continuation of the regime and the bounty of the harvest for the ensuing year. The best evidence for such celebrations comes from Babylon, and it is possible that a similar ritual was enacted in Ugarit. Both traditions can be traced back to the old zag-mukku festivals of early Sumeria. Part of the action consisted of a symbolic humiliation and reenthronement of the king as well as the presentation of offerings and sacrifices. In Babylon this involved also a long procession of the idols, their priests and devotees up from the festive boats on the river and into the temple of Marduk, the magnificent E-sag-ila.

The layout and architecture of the city was arranged in accord with the needs of the cultic calendar. The high holiday was the rēsh shatti, New Year’s Festival, and had as its center the activity the akîtu(m) ceremony. In the ritual of the akîtu(m) the epic of cosmogeny Enūma elish was chanted as an accompaniment to an elaborate ritual of sympathetic magic. A ritual combat with chaos was produced followed by a sacred marriage ceremony, in which the parts of the god and his consort were taken by the king and a temple prostitute. However, there were great divergencies in the style, actions and interpretation of the ritual drama over the centuries.

The sum and substance of the festival in all ages was the recoronation of the king for another year. It is not clear whether the king actually was considered a deity during the rites or whether he only took the part of the god. He must have taken and answered to the divine titles during and after the ceremony, and so gained legitimacy to continue his reign.

Some scholars, such as I. Engnell and S. Mowinckel, have attempted to interpret certain passages in the OT as evidence of an Israelite enthronement festival or “thronbest-eigungfest.” Their contention is that an annual “Enthronement Festival of Yahweh” was held and in time became the motive for OT eschatology. Initially this type of construction of the Biblical data is highly speculative and many necessary components of it are simply undemonstrable from the text. At heart there is the fact that no Jewish monarch at any time ever received the titles or reverence which belonged to Jehovah. Nor did any Jewish ruler act as lawgiver or legislator. All, whether good or bad, were subject to the Mosaic law and claimed to be nothing more than men. There is the added difficulty that the divine pronouncements of the OT come neither through the king or the priests but through a special non-ritualistic office, the prophet. It is this spokesman of Jehovah who introduces and explains the OT eschatology and draws the prefigurement of the Messiah. The Scandinavian hypothesis of the enthronement ritual character of much of the OT is based on assumptions concerning the composition of the text and speculations on its humanistic development, all of which are suspect.

2. Kingship in Israel. The historic establishment of kingship in Israel was a contradiction of the principle that the nation was peculiarly under Jehovah’s providence. The judge Samuel acting in the prophetic office clearly declared the extent of the liability that such an earthly monarch would prove to be. After listing the avaricious requirements of a royal establishment Samuel adds (1 Sam 8:18), “And in that day you will cry out because of your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves, but the Lord will not answer you in that day.” The kingship of Jehovah was expressly stated in Moses’ first discourse from Sinai (Exod 19:5, 6), “Now therefore, if ye will hearken unto My voice indeed, and keep My covenant, then ye shall be Mine own treasure from among all peoples; for all the earth is Mine; and ye shall be unto Me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation” (JPS). It was this aspect of God’s sovereignty over Israel which was rejected as stated in 1 Samuel 8:7: “Hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee; for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected Me, that I should not be king over them” (JPS). This statement has in view the revealed precepts of God in regard to the Mosaic law and its authority, it does not denote the decrees of God’s sovereign providence in and over history. For this reason even the perverse desire for kingship in Israel was constructed in terms of the law of God, although it manifested itself as a rejection of His law. The period of the Judges was one of conflict between the migrant and tribal people of Israel and the loose knit confederacy of Canaanite citystates. In the period preceeding the Exodus from Egypt the Israelite patriarchite had confronted the monolithic façade of the Egypt. religious state. As Egypt lost its Asiatic provinces, the Philistines pushed southw ard and Israel settled the land. In time the small states and trading villages of Syria-Pal. coalesced into petty monarchies and ultimately into dynasties. The achievement of Saul, David and Solomon was not de novo nor in vacuuo, but was paralleled by centralization of authority elsewhere at that time and in that area of the Near E. The problem of synthesizing the archeological material from the period of the conquest of Canaan is difficult and tedious but it is clear that the first king, Saul, came to the newly established throne at about 1030-1020 b.c.

3. Kingship in the OT. Kings and kingship are first mentioned in the OT in the narrative of the battle fought by Abram with a number of rulers (Gen 14). Even the pharaohs of Egypt during the time of Israel’s sojourn are called by the West Sem. term, melek. After the conquest, settlement and solidification of the tribal organization of Israel in Canaan the judges became the legal and executive authorities of the twelve tribes. Even though a number of judges were also prophets the judgeship was not an anointed office (1 Sam 15:10), it served no direct Messianic function in the Israelite theocracy. Samuel acted as a prophet in selecting and anointing Saul as the first king of Israel (11:15). It is basic to the OT concept of kingship to recognize the necessity of the prophetic office. The prophet as spokesman for Jehovah assented to the people’s request for a king, determined who should be king, and then marked the pretender to the throne as a person of Messianic character by anointing him. Therefore no king could claim legitimacy without the prophetic approval and its divine investiture. The impossibility of the royal line being infiltrated by foreigners or compromised from outside the community of Israel was assured. The later history of the Heb. monarchy demonstrates the frequency with which the prophets rejected the iniquitous infatuation of the kings with Gentile and pagan royalty. For this reason both Persia and Greece found it necessary to unseat the monarchy totally, and to replace it with an authority based on their own culture, whereas in other civilizations they conquered they were able to gain the legitimization of the ancient cult.

In most of the nations thriving in the first millennium b.c., the rulers were chosen from a large group of pretenders, either by the officials of the state cult or by some settlement among the aristocratic families. In Israel it was the choice and direction of Jehovah which determined the successor to the throne, though a process of drawing by lots may have been involved (1 Sam 10:21). In this text the words tr. “was taken” literally mean, “to draw by lot,” and this accords with the suggestion of several other texts. The prophetic anointing of the king not only indicated the Messianic character of the Heb. ruler, but imparted to him divine authority demanding the obedience of the people (1 Sam 11:7). “And the dread of the Lord fell on the people, and they came out as one man” (JPS). The king like the prophet and the priest was sacrosanct but never sacerdotal (1 Sam 24:6). Even the members of the royal house and potential future kings were accorded reverence as in the case of the boy Joash (2 Kings 11:2, 3). The families of former and subsequently rejected rulers were shown certain honor as the benefits which King David bestowed upon Mephibosheth, the grandson of Saul (2 Sam 9:6-10). This respect reached even to the pagan relations of a slain ruler as in the case of the murdered Jezebel concerning whose body Jehu commanded (2 Kings 9:34), “Look now after this cursed woman, and bury her, for she is a king’s daughter” (JPS). On the other hand, the divine approval of either king or royalty could be removed and this too would be indicated to the king by the prophet (1 Sam 16:14). Unlike other monarchs of antiquity, the Jewish king was not an absolute autocrat. Like the humblest commoner he was subject to the Mosaic legislation (Deut 17:18-20). Kingship in Israel was not instituted by divine innovation as were prophetism and the priesthood, so that from the beginning it was a reconstituted instrument and its character and prerogatives were determined by non-revelatory, non-Biblical and non-Jewish influences. Ideally the kingship and commonwealth of Israel were to have been a theocracy. For this reason the kingdom of God and the monarchy of Israel are neither parallel nor congruent at all points in the anrrative of the OT. Often they were cojoined at the point that the redemptive sovereignty of God was worked through the historical events of the mundane monarchy of Israel. The Israelite kingship was in fact a paradigm or example of Jehovah’s government of all human history. And in the same fashion that the nation of Israel was chosen to be the vehicle of divine revelation and the commissioners of the oracles of God so the kingly office in the monarchy was to be the Messianic prefigurement. The kingdom of God is seen in the OT as operating in two separate domains. The first is the sovereignty of Jehovah over creation by virtue of His creative acts (Pss 93; 103:19). The second is God’s kingship by virtue of His redemption, the ransom of His covenant people. The messianic character of all three anointed offices—prophet, priest and king—is directed toward the completion of this redemption and the fulfillment of the promise given to Abraham (Gen 17:7, 8). The three aspects of this blessing were the preservation of the children of Israel, the seed of Abraham; the inheritance of the land of Canaan, and the appearance of the Messiah from the people and in the land. All these were bound up in the Israelite kingship. In a sense all were brought about and accomplished by means of the royal house of David and his heirs. The history of Israel cannot be understood apart from a realization that the monarchy was not only historical, but also supernatural. Although the kings did upon rare occasions prophesy (1 Sam 10:10) they were forbidden to take the place of the priests in the ceremonies of the Temple. The combination of the three sacrosanct offices in one historic personage was to await Messiah’s coming. Hebraic poetry as found in Job, Psalms, etc., is so constructed that the rhythm and euphony is carried not by rhyme but by the duplication, replication and contrast of ideas. Similar, complementary and contrasting concepts are set in parallel pairs of phrases. These pairs of terms not only yield synonyms between parallel lines, but also indicate the subtle nuances of words. The word “king” and its extensions “kingship” and “dominion” appear frequently in OT poetic passages. By far the major number of citations, the term melek is in the initial half of the pair or the first line and may be considered the “A” term. The corresponding term in the second phrase which may be called the “B” word, frequently adds depth of meaning to the structure of the whole. The following are various “A”/“B” word pairs occurring in parallel in the OT poetry: king/chief (Job 29:25); king/nobles (34:18); king/rulers (Ps 2:2); king/judges (2:10); king/mighty men (33:16); king/king’s son (72:1); king/princes (Prov 8:15); king/preëminent one (Ps 105:20); king/anointed (18:50); king/David (144:10); and certain possesive construct chains as: king’s daughters/queen (45:9); in all such occurrences the term melek appears as the “A” word. In the few number of citations when the situation is reversed there is some clear semantic indication of why it was done. In one set it indicates a rising gradation of social importance: princes/kings (76:12) and in another the contrast is between the collective and one of its representative parts in a stylistic synecdoche: nations/kings (102:15; 135:10). Of primary importance is the point that whenever the divine kingdom or the godly reign are mentioned the order is strictly such that the divine name and not melek appears as “A” while melek which is normally initial serves as the “B” term, as: Jehovah/king (47:2); God/king (47:6); and in simple predicate nominative constructions such as: “The Lord is King” (10:16). In all such syntactical relationships the name of Jehovah or His titles precedes all other parallels and ascriptions. In recent scholarly opinion, the assumption that these poetic passages were hymns for the rituals of the annual enthronement of Yahweh, must deal with the basic semantics of such passages. It is necessary to relate the usage of such terms with the careful preservation of the transcendent quality of the divine name. The OT declares the pressent and eternal kingship of Jehovah unequivocally, and conforms to the “A” word “B” word sequence. The present and future temporal aspect of the divine kingship is stated definitively and uniquely in such Biblical expressions as Psalm 10:16, which says literally, “Jehovah is King forever.” The overt transcendence of God is so strictly maintained that He is declared to be superior over even all deities (95:3) “For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods.” Such expressions suppose the real existence of hierarchies of deities; they are used in the text for literary projection only. In light of the usage quoted above, it is not accidental that Psalm 149:2 declares the joy of Israel before Jehovah as both creator and king in a precise and beautiful parallelism, “Let Israel rejoice in his Maker; let the children of Zion be joyful in their King” (JPS).

4. The royal establishment in Israel and the OT. Since the character of Israelite kingship was defined largely by the customs of the nations round about Canaan, in the same manner the duties and privileges of the Jewish rulers followed the ancient traditions. The customary Near Eastern monarch possessed a palace, was installed upon a throne and had access to a harem of wives and concubines. In time all these aspects became a part of the Jewish monarchical establishment. Interestingly enough even the terms for some of these fixtures were assumed with the practices. The ancient Sumer. term E-gal; Akkad. ekallu; Ugaritic h k l appears in the Heb. Bible only after the founding of the monarchy. In its Heb. form the word is הֵיכָל, H2121, and it indicates the magnificence and luxury of the royal apartments as in Psalms 48:5; 144:12. The other term commonly used for “palace” is the Heb. בִּירָה, H1072, as used in David’s declaration concerning the building of Solomon’s Temple (1 Chron 29:1), “For the palace is not for man but for the Lord God” (JPS). The word is never used of the abode of any Jewish king. It occurs mostly in the later books of the OT esp. Esther, Nehemiah, Ezra, and Daniel, and its frequent use with Pers. geographical names has suggested a possible Indo-Iranian origin. However, it is more probable that it is to be connected with Akkad. birtu, bishtu meaning a citadel or castle. The OT word for throne is also derived ultimately from the earliest monarchical foundation in the Near E. In the Sumer. orthography it is preceded by the determinative sign which designates an object made of wood. In later times the kussu was prob. still made of wood, but overlaid with beaten gold and silver filigree. Although the ultimate symbol among most of the ancients was the scepter, no such instrument is ever described or associated with a Jewish king. In an age when livery was considered of great importance the royal garments of Israel are described as an outer robe or vestment befitting rank (1 Kings 22:10, 30) and the usual cloak or under mantle (1 Sam 24:4, 11) of the highest quality (1 Chron 15:27; 2 Sam 13:18). Two types of metalic ornaments are mentioned, the chaplets or fillets (2 Sam 1:10) and the crown or diadem which in Zechariah’s time was made of silver and gold, possibly electrum (Zech 6:11). The maintainence of more than one wife must have been a feature of the monarchy, and in the later times the oriental harem appeared in Israel. In time the custom of political marriage, whereby a king would certify a treaty by marriage into the allied nation’s royal family became common in Israel. Solomon and his followers adhered to this tradition, and it was this contradiction of the divine commandment which led to the situation of Ahab and Jezebel where a pagan princess became queen. The kings were accompanied by groups of retainers who acted as a body guard. Chief among these were the family detachments known as the: Cherethites, Pelethites and Gittites (2 Sam 15:18). In the eighth ch. of 2 Samuel are listed the officers of David’s court. They are: Joab the general of the army; Jehoshaphat the remembrancer, a sort of chief advisor; Zadok and Ahimelech the priests; Seraiah the scribe; Benaiah the chief of the body guard and the princes of the palace who served as David’s ministers. It is safe to assume that this list gives only the names of the king’s cabinet and that there were armor-bearers (1 Sam 16:21) and other military officials as well as a large group of cooks, wine stewards, butlers, tailors and other such official craftsmen. The relationship of the various classes one to another is not clear and the evidence is further complicated by the recurrent changes of rulers and outside penetrations of the last one hundred years of the monarchy. An extra-Biblical source yields some data on social classes among the West Sem. In the Royal Inscription of Azitawadda from Karatepe there is a prohibition to all classes of mankind and the line states, “If ever any king among kings, viceroy among viceroys, man among men (literally), citizen among citizens.” This follows the Mesopotamian system of kings, lords and freemen. All the terms which appear in the Karatepe text also appear in the histories of the Israelite monarchy so the social structure was undoubtedly similar. Like other regents, the kings of Israel had the authority to levy taxes and collect tribute from their subjects (1 Kings 4:6-21). Subject kingdoms and peoples under Israel’s sovereignty paid their annual tribute in the same way that Israel itself was a suzerain of Assyria under Hezekiah (2 Kings 18:15, 16). Wealth was counted in material stores of gems, garments, precious metals and livestock (2 Chron 32:27-29). Opulence and magnificence were determined by the number of servants and retainers a king could command and support and the style as to dress, food and appointments in which he kept them (2 Chron 31:16-19). Taxation was mostly in kind and the royal flocks, herds and vineyards were tended by work corvees made up of the citizenry. The international trade was also in terms of goods and produce most of which came from the royal forests and mines (1 Kings 5:10, 11). However, because of the Mosaic law which bound even the kings of Israel, the right of commandeering except for military necessity was forbidden. The royal establishment had to pay its debts. The case of Ahab is quite clear (21:1-16). The same was true of the women of the land who were not to be taken by the king and placed at his whim in the roy al harem. The story of David and Bathsheba (2 Sam 11) bears out the king’s responsibility to the moral commandments.

5. The later history of the Jewish kingdom. In the full perspective of the thousands of years of Jewish history, the monarchy actually involved a brief duration. Under the early rulers, Saul, David and Solomon, the conquesting spirit was still lively enough to advance the kingdom territorially and materially to its greatest extent. Even this period of ascendency above the neighboring petty states of the Eastern Mediterranean coast lasted a scant cent. After the division of the kingdom under Rehoboam and Jeroboam the political power of the Jewish monarchy declined until in about two hundred years time Israel, the northern regency, had not the resources to forestall its destruction before Assyria in 722 b.c. Judah, the more stable principality, lingered on until 587 b.c. when Jerusalem fell to Assyria. Without ever being freed the Jewish people passed under the domination of Persia and finally into the kingdom of Seleucus in the Age of Hellenism. At last a respite came during the revolution of the Maccabees and the leadership of Judah Maccabee and his brothers, 165-142 b.c. The dynasty of rulers they established ruled as the Hasmoneans until the last of their number was made a puppet of Pompey. The Idumean chieftain Antipater was now actually ruling the country in the name of his Rom. masters. His dynasty, the Herodian, brought about some of the blackest moments in the history of the Jewish people. The final collapse came after generations of alien puppet rule when a series of abortive revolutions brought the invasion of Titus and the destruction of Jerusaem in a.d. 70. The last remnants of the free and sovereign dominion of David fled to the fortress of Masada in the Dead Sea region where they were exterminated after a long siege by the Tenth Legion under Flavius Silva in a.d. 73. The immediate results of this final and irremediable disaster was the dispersion of the Jewish people throughout the Mediterranean world. This process of dispossession which had been started by the Assyrian empire was now complete (1 Pet 1).

6. Kingship in the DSS. Many of the Hebraic documents written by the Jews of the Diaspora have apocalyptic subjects and indeed these points of view are found in both the Apoc. and the Pseudep. In the DSS, the image of a restored kingship to Judaism is a recurrent theme. In the scroll 1QM the deeds of the past hero kings of Israel are quite prominent, but there is little said about the restoration of the monarchy.

7. The Messianic kingdom of Christ. In the light of the prophecies of the coming of the King-Messiah of the OT, it is clear what is meant by the ascription of this fulfillment to the life of Christ. The kingship of Christ over His spiritual people of Israel was initiated with His accomplishment of Atonement. By the one great act of redemption, the death on the cross and the resurrection, the theocratic kingdom was forever established, and the centuries of OT prefigurement were fulfilled and completed. However, in the NT one further as yet unforseen aspect is still maintained, the final culmination of history and the establishment of the kingdom of heaven wherein Jehovah will be absolutely and ideally represented before His subjects by the Messianic King Jesus Christ.

Bibliography I. Engnell, Studies in Divine Kingship in the Ancient Near East (1943); H. Frankfort, Kingship and the Gods (1948); G. Vos, Biblical Theology (1954); W. Hallo, Early Mesopotamian Royal Titles (1957); G. E. Wright, The Bible and the Ancient Near East (1961).