<p>Current scholarly debate over the historical character of David's rule generally considers the biblical portrait to represent David as king of Judah first, and subsequently over ';all Israel.' The ninth-century Tel Dan inscription, which refers to the ';House of David' (byt dwd), is often taken as evidence for the dynasty of Judah. Mahri Leonard-Fleckman argues that references to Judah in the story of David as king do not suffice to constitute a coherent stratum of material about Judah as a political entity. Comparing the ';house of . . .' terminology in the ninth-century Tel Dan inscription with early first-millennium Assyrian usage, then giving close examination to the ';house of David' materials in 2 Samuel and 1 Kings, she understands the ';house of David' as a small body politic connected to David, but distinct from any Judean dynastic context.</p><p>One implication is that the identification of Judah as a later southern kingdom may have less to do with an Israelite secession from Jerusalem than with an Israelite rejection of David's lineage and the subsequent redactional creation of Judah-centric language on the part of a Davidic coterie.</p>
