Greetings Rabbi Daniel and Susan,
I was reading in the Book of 2 Kings, and it continually refers to: The book of the history of the Kings of Israel. Is this book still available to read? Can the original be purchased?
Thank you for your time and help with this. You are both such a Blessing.
Respectfully,
Pastor James
Dear Pastor James,
We can answer your question in one word: no. But we’d like to answer in a more helpful manner than that.
Nobody knows exactly when the writings about the history of the kings of Israel disappeared, but we do know that it isn’t a great loss. Here’s why: The books comprising the TaNaCh, the Hebrew Bible, do include some historical data, but they are definitely not history books. The TaNaCH consists of the Torah – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy; the Nevi’im or Prophets starting with Joshua and ending with Malachi; and the Ketuvim (in Hebrew, that K with which we opened the word Ketuvim, can also be a CH sound, hence TaNaCH) which includes Psalms, Proverbs, scrolls such as Esther, and ends with Chronicles.
Yes, there are extant writings such as the Book of Maccabees that detail the history of the 2nd century BCE when the holiday of Chanukah was established. Why was that never canonized into becoming part of the TaNaCH? The answer is because it is merely a history, or a historian might say a dramatized history, but it was not touched by Divine input. In that sense, it is no different from the writings of the 2nd century Roman-Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus, “The Wars of the Jews.” As such, it is interesting but not holy because it does not contain lessons that are true for all places and all times. All the volumes that are in the TaNaCH do just that. They may even depict events out of order (the final chapters of the Book of Judges occurred before the chapters that precede them) because the point is the moral and instructive message being conveyed, not the historical details.
This is not to say that Moses, or David, or Jeremiah did not exist. They did. Modern archeologists regularly find artifacts and structures that integrate with the TaNaCH. It does mean that those finds are of minor significance. They are without question, interesting footnotes to history. However, the oral transmission that explains each word of the TaNaCH in depth for its timeless truths is not only interesting, but life changing. If you have participated in any of our Scrolling through Scripture courses, such as on Genesis or the Book of Ruth, you will fully understand this.
Perhaps one day in the far-off future, deep in a cave in Israel a young lad will come upon scrolls depicting the history of one of the kings of Israel. That will draw great and deserved attention. However, it will not make a difference in how we conduct our daily lives. Studying any of the books of the TaNaCH does just that.
Thank you for your question,
Rabbi Daniel and Susan Lapin
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The “the Book of the chronicles of the Kings of Israel” in NAS95 [1] is the English for the Hebrew:
סֵ֛פֶר דִּבְרֵ֥י הַיָּמִ֖ים לְמַלְכֵ֥י יִשְׂרָאֵֽל
The key part here is the “דִּבְרֵ֥י הַיָּמִ֖ים” means “words/matters of the days/times” and its used not only in 1/2 Kings, but also else where, e.g. Ester 6:1 where NASB95 translates this as “… the book of records, the chronicles, and they were read before the king.”
Interestingly, what Christian English Bible translations call the “1 Chronicles” and “2 Chronicles” is called in Hebrew “דברי הימים א” and “דברי הימים ב” and could be literally translated as “words/matters of the days/times A” and “words/matters of the days/times B” respectively [2][3].
Personally, I am not clear on where these names come from (i.e. I don’t remember any internal reference to these names from within these books). Could it be that what we have today as the books 1/2 Chronicles are a compilation of the “chronicles of the Kings of Israel” referenced in 1/2 Kings plus possibly other “chronicles” (e.g. of King David in 1 Chronicles 27:24 or Nathan, Gad in 1 Chronicles 29:29)?
Rabbi Lapin: Can we tell with certainty whether the 1/2 Chronicles we have today are not the “chronicles” referenced in 1/2 Kings and elsewhere? Please, open my eyes and help me see. Thank you.
Blessings on you and yours.
— /\/\arian
Marian, I will pass this to my husband as well, but even through Chronicles reads a bit like a history book, it is not one. Careful reading will even reveal that there are times that it contradicts earlier books of the Bible. Each of those times is an opportunity to pursue ancient Jewish wisdom on the verse.
The history books referenced that we no longer have are just that, accounts of actual events.