Daily Bible Study Tips: 1 Chronicles

Exodus 27:21 – 28:1; Numbers 1:47-53, Introduction to the Aaronic priesthood and Levitical duties.
1 Chronicles 1:1-16, 9:1, Eight chapters of genealogy.
1 Chronicles 9:10-34, Priests and porters.
1 Chronicles 15:1-29, The Ark of God comes to Jerusalem.
1 Chronicles 16:1-6, 37-43, The Ark arrives.
1 Chronicles 16:7-36, Celebrate and shout in praise!
1 Chronicles 23:1-6, 13-14, 24-32, Names and duties of the Levites.
1 Chronicles 24:1-8, 18-20, 30-31, Distributing the order of service.
1 Chronicles 25:1-8, Duties of the musicians.
1 Chronicles 26:1, 6-9, 12-32, Duties of the porters.

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Exodus 27:21 – 28:1; Numbers 1:47-53,  Introduction to the Aaronic priesthood and Levitical duties. (6/21/2010)  

I and II Chronicles are historical books covering roughly the same period of time as II Samuel and I and II Kings.  Samuel and Kings are primarily a history of the kings of Israel and Judah, with some discussion of how the kings were supported or opposed by the prophets.  The Chronicles, however, are primarily a history of the priests and Levites, with some discussion of how they were supported or opposed by the kings.  Although quite a bit of the material is overlapping or duplicated, substantial portions are unique to Chronicles, and we are going to concentrate on those parts for the next three weeks.
 
As an introduction, let's take a brief look at the origin of the priests and the original duties of the Levites.  You recall that Moses and Aaron were from the tribe of Levi.  God selected Aaron and his descendants to be priests, and the rest of the tribe, including the descendants of Moses, to take care of the tent of the tabernacle and all of its accoutrements.  If you ever saw "Raiders of the Lost Ark," you know that the Ark is dangerous to anyone who is not authorized to touch it, and this is also true of the tabernacle itself and all the stuff that goes with it.  Because the Levites had the special job of taking care of all the holy things and thus protecting all the other Israelites, they did not get a tribal allotment of land in the Promised Land.  Instead, they got 48 cities that were scattered throughout the allotments of the other tribes.

1 Chronicles 1:1-16, 9:1,  Eight chapters of genealogy. (6/22/2010)  

We have a family business.  Of six employees, four are members of our immediate family.  But how are you supposed to know what your family business is if you don't know who your family is?  Chronicles emphasizes the priesthood and the duties of the Levites, which together made up a family business.  It makes sense that they are even more interested than most of the Biblical writers in genealogy.  The writers begin with eight chapters of genealogy (which may be why Chronicles is among the lesser-read books) and then summarize a couple thousand years of the history of Israel in half a verse at the beginning of Ch. 9:  "Judah was taken into exile in Babylon because of their breach of faith."  The business of the larger Israelite family was faithfulness to God, and when they were unfaithful, they went out of business.

1 Chronicles 9:10-34,  Priests and porters. (6/23/2010)  

By now you have probably turned in your 2010 census form.  You had to enter the name, age, and ethnicity of every person in your household.  In previous censuses, the questions variously included place of birth, occupation, marital status, native language, schooling, whether you rented or owned, whether you had a telephone or an indoor toilet, and all sorts of stuff that is absolutely fascinating to historians and genealogists.  The United States by no means invented the idea of taking a census, however. 
 
The number of Jews who survived the war with the Babylonians and the siege of Jerusalem long enough to go into exile was fairly small, about 10,000 according to II Kings 24.  The Jews did reasonably well for themselves during their 40 years of captivity, and 42,360 of them returned to Judea from Babylon when Cyrus the Persian sent them back home (Ezra 1 and 2).  The population was small enough that they could easily take another census, by families, that recorded the occupation of each family.  Naturally, the writers of Chronicles are most interested in the priests and Levites who were living in Jerusalem and in what they did, which is fascinating.  Running the Temple was a huge operation, and there were many specialized jobs, some of which we read about today.

1 Chronicles 15:1-29, The Ark of God comes to Jerusalem. (6/24/2010)  

Yesterday we read in Ch. 9 about the post-Exilic numbers and duties of the priests and Levites in Jerusalem.  In a whiplash-inducing change of subject, Ch. 10 jumps back a thousand years to talk about the deaths of King Saul and his sons, and Chs. 11 - 14 give some historical information on King David that parallels the accounts in Kings.  Eventually David brought the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem, and this story sheds a brilliant light on the difference between Samuel/Kings and Chronicles.  When you read the account in II Samuel 6, it sounds like King David (and some of his guys) brought the Ark.  When you read I Chronicles 15, below, it sounds like the priests and Levites (at the direction of David) brought the Ark.  In II Samuel, David dances.  In Chronicles, the Levite musicians form a big marching band (and David dances).  Same story, different emphasis.
 

1 Chronicles 16:1-6, 36-43,  The Ark arrives. (6/25/2010)

In 2 Samuel 6, David brings in the Ark, puts it in its place, hands out party favors of bread and raisin cakes, and blesses the people.  That's that.  Chronicles gives more detail.  Guess what?  All the extra details are about the priests and Levites.
 
I have been interested, especially today, to learn so much about Asaph in our reading of Chronicles.  This name may be familiar to you if you regularly read Psalms.  Twelve psalms, Pss. 50 and 73 through 83, are labeled as a "psalm of Asaph," probably indicating that he wrote them.
 
Fellow-readers Don and Edith speculate that all the unpronounceable names in Chronicles are to blame for its being lesser-read.  I dunno; I haven't read Chronicles more than a few times, and I don't have that excuse.  The Bible I got from my church in third grade is a "self-pronouncing Bible," which means that every proper name is divided into syllables and marked with diacritical marks.  Since I read this Bible into my 30s, I can read all the funny names about as easily as I can read "John."  An important point, however, is that even if I don't always pronounce every one correctly, I don't care, because it doesn't much matter.  Just go for it!  You can read or download a self-pronouncing Bible.


1 Chronicles 16:7-36, Celebrate and shout in praise! (11/16/2009)

1 and 2 Chronicles covers the same period of history as 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings. The Chronicles are much more interested in the history of the Temple and the Levites than the books of Samuel and Kings are, however. Today's reading is a psalm that David wrote to celebrate the arrival of the Ark of the Covenant in Jerusalem.


1 Chronicles 23:1-6, 13-14, 24-32,  Names and duties of the Levites. (6/28/2010)  

Sandia National Laboratories/Albuquerque is a big place.  They have about 9,700 employees and on-site contractors located in 5.8 million sq. ft. of buildings on a campus of 8,600 acres (mostly empty mesa for testing stuff).  You can go to the Labs' website to see what kinds of jobs they do, but even the numbers I quote here show you that it's a big, busy place.  Each employee has roughly 600 square feet of office and lab space to work in.  (I personally had about 70 square feet, because I didn't have a lab.)
 
The Temple in Jerusalem was a small place.  Although the exact size is unknown (because it's been razed and rebuilt so many times), the campus was roughly 12 acres, and the Temple was about 90 ft x 30 ft, with a porch 30 ft x 15 ft (I Kings 6:2-3), for a total of about 3,150 square feet.  The total number of employees – priests and Levites – was in excess of 38,000, of whom about 24,000 were active.  This is less than 1 square foot of "office space" per person.  Even if you spread them out over the whole campus and run the place 24/7, each Levite had only about 60 square feet.  All things considered, that doesn't seem to give anybody enough space to work.  We'll see tomorrow how they solved the space problem.  Meantime, you can read to see what kinds of jobs they did.


1 Chronicles 24:1-8, 18-20, 30-31,  Distributing the order of service. (6/29/2010)

Have you ever drawn straws, flipped a coin, or played rock, paper, scissors to decide who goes first, does the dishes, or gets the last piece of chocolate?  I suspect that when Og and Ug were in the cave deciding who had to get firewood, they used some similar method. 
 
Let's think for a minute about Zechariah, the father of John the Baptist.  Luke says, "In the days of Herod, king of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah, of the division of Abijah. ... Now while he was serving as priest before God when his division was on duty, according to the custom of the priesthood, he was chosen by lot to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense" (Luke 1:5, 8-9).  What's that all about, anyway? 
 
It was an honor and a privilege to serve in the Temple, and all the priests and Levites wanted to do it, so they decided use an "everybody plays" system.  There were many jobs, and the Temple had to be up and running 24/7.  Presumably some of the jobs and times were more desirable than others:  I suspect everybody wanted to burn incense at 2 p.m., and not many wanted to guard the gates at 2 a.m.  So they had a simple and fair method for assigning jobs – they cast lots.


1 Chronicles 25:1-8,  Duties of the musicians. (6/30/2010)

Some of the Levites were appointed to the special position of musicians in support of Temple worship.  These talented families played musical instruments – lyres, harps, cymbals – and also sang.  I was so surprised to read below that the choir included women that I went back and checked the Hebrew.  It's even more clear in the original than in the ESV:  "... 14 sons and 3 daughters.  All these were under the hands of their father for song in the house of the LORD ..."  There were 288 trained singers.  What a choir! 
 
Notice that the singers were assigned to services by lot, just like everyone else.  The Chancel and Sonrise choirs at St. John's can be grateful that normally they sing at the same time every Sunday, and the worship services do not run 24/7.

1 Chronicles 26:1, 6-9, 12-32,  Duties of the porters. (7/1/2010)  

Some of the Levites were assigned to be porters.  If you are a fan of English mysteries, you know that porters are the guys who control the entrances and keep track of who goes in and out of the campus, monastery, block of flats, or whatever.  The ESV translates this word as "gatekeepers."  Other translations use "Temple guards."  In modern American, "lobby guards" might be appropriate.  Some of them were in charge of keeping track of everything in the treasury - both money and objects - and might appropriately be called "tellers."  The more we read about the duties of the Levites, the more I'm impressed with what a huge operation it was.



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