The books of Samuel and Kings bring the Bible's primary narrative to a closewith a more obvious perspective from the kingdom of Judah. Judah's finalcollapse brings the narrative to an end in 2 Kings 24–5, and thepossibility that David's house could be restored is kept open byJehoiachin's place at the Babylonian royal table in the last lines(25:27–30). Throughout the books of Kings, attention bounces back andforth between Israel and Judah, but Israel's kings are burdened with theconstant reminder of Jeroboam's religious failure with the calves at Dan andBethel (1 Kings 14:28; etc.), and only Judah's rulers have the capacity toplease Yahweh fully, like David (1 Kings 14:11; etc.). The books of Samuelprovide a background for this account of kings by introducing David asheroic founder. Although the David narrative is constructed from materialthat identifies him entirely by rule over Israel, its combination with thebooks of Kings makes clear the ultimate preoccupation of the writers withthe royal house of Judah, which kept authority through all the centuries ofthis kingdom.

As we move to the first millennium, the relationship of the Bible to historymay at first seem more straightforward than with the earlier narrative. Atleast these books present Israel as a kingdom, a name and form familiar tothe ninth-century texts outside the Bible. Archaeologists and historiansdebate the utility of Samuel and Kings for historical study, with particularenergy surrounding the possible extent of a realm for David and Solomon. Myimmediate interest is rather the way in which the political structures ofthe biblical narrative shape historical interpretation, whether more or lessis believed of the Bible's content. Faced with direct knowledge only of thetwo kingdoms in their later forms, the compilers produced a scheme formonarchy as a whole that resolved all tensions by two names, Israel andJudah. The writers’ own realm in the south was named Judah, and theyportrayed the kingdom as maintaining this identity from the first moment ofdivision at the time of Rehoboam. While the other kingdom may have bornemore than one name, including the regional label Ephraim (Isa. 7:17; Hos.4:17; etc.), the writers chose the broader designation as Israel to providea stable identity in parallel to Judah.