These
also perhaps go back to the "Annals." The )Z is found 1Kings iii.
16, viii. 1, 12, ix. 11, xi. 7, xvi. 21, xxii. 50; 2Kings
viii. 22, xii. 18, xiv. 8, xv. 16, xvi. 5.
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and with these the characteristic then might be thought to be
connected, which frequently introduces the short sentences, and
as it now stands is generally meaningless. In what circles these
records were made, we can scarcely even surmise. Could we be
certain that the reference to the royal temple of Judah, which is
a prevailing feature of them, is due not to selection at a later
time but to the interest of the first hands, we should be led to
think of the priesthood at Jerusalem. The loyalist, perfectly
official tone would agree very well with this theory, for the
sons of Zadok were, down to Josiah's time, nothing else than the
obedient servants of the successors of David, and regarded the
unconditional authority claimed by these kings over their
sanctuary as a matter of course (2Kings xvi. TO seq., xii. 18).
These notices, however, as we have them, are not drawn from the
documents themselves, but from a secondary compilation, perhaps
from the two sets of chronicles cited at the end of each reign of the
kings of Israel and those of Judah, from which at all events the
succession of the rulers appears to the drawn.
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