1 Chronicles 15 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.
Time Period
Around 1000 BC, three months after the first attempt to move the ark
Location
Jerusalem, with the ark carried up from the house of Obed-Edom nearby into a tent David has pitched for it
Audience
Post-exile Judeans, especially the Levite families who staffed the rebuilt temple
Situation
David tries again, this time appointing Levites to carry the ark on their shoulders as the law required, organising singers and instrumentalists for the procession, and leading the celebration himself while his wife Michal watches with contempt.
Key Background
The correction is the point of the chapter: David says explicitly that the first attempt failed because the Levites did not carry it, so the second is done by the book. Music here is not decoration but an appointed office, with named leaders, assigned instruments and technical performance notes of the kind that appear in psalm headings, and this is where the writer traces the origin of the temple choirs his readers knew. The linen garment David wears is priestly dress rather than royal robes, which is part of what Michal, a king's daughter, finds humiliating in a reigning monarch.
David built houses for himself in the City of David, and he prepared a place for the of and pitched a for it.
Then David said, "No one is to carry the chest of God except the because Yahweh chose them to carry the chest of Yahweh and to serve him forever."
David gathered all Israel together at Jerusalem to bring the chest of Yahweh up to the place he had prepared for it.
David assembled the of and the Levites:
From the descendants of Uriel the leader, with 120 of his relatives.
From the descendants of Merari: Asaiah the leader, with 220 of his relatives.
From the descendants of Gershom: Joel the leader, with 130 of his relatives.
From the descendants of Elizaphan: Shemaiah the leader, with 200 of his relatives.
From the descendants of Hebron: Eliel the leader, with 80 of his relatives.
From the descendants of Uzziel: Amminadab the leader, with 112 of his relatives.
David summoned and the priests, and the Levites Uriel, Asaiah, Joel, Shemaiah, Eliel, and Amminadab.
He told them, "You are the heads of the Levite families. You and your relatives must for so you can bring the chest of Yahweh, the of Israel, up to the place I've prepared for it."
"Because you weren't the ones who carried it the first time, Yahweh our God out us — we didn't seek him in the out."
So the priests and Levites made themselves ready for God so they could bring up the chest of Yahweh, the God of Israel.
The Levites carried the chest of God on their with the just as Moses had commanded based on what Yahweh had said.
David told the Levite leaders to appoint their relatives as musicians, to play their instruments — and — to raise sounds of celebration as loud as they could.
The Levites appointed son of Joel, and from his relatives, son of Berechiah, and from the descendants of Merari their relatives, Ethan son of Kushaiah.
And with them their relatives of the second rank: Zechariah, Jaaziel, Shemiramoth, Jehiel, Unni, Eliab, Benaiah, Maaseiah, Mattithiah, Eliphelehu, Mikneiah, and Obed-edom and Jeiel, the
The musicians Heman, Asaph, and Ethan were appointed to sound the bronze cymbals.
Zechariah, Aziel, Shemiramoth, Jehiel, Unni, Eliab, Maaseiah, and Benaiah played lyres set to
Mattithiah, Eliphelehu, Mikneiah, Obed-edom, Jeiel, and Azaziah led with harps tuned to the
Chenaniah, leader of the Levites in the because he was skilled at it.
Berechiah and Elkanah were gatekeepers for the chest.
Shebaniah, Joshaphat, Nethanel, Amasai, Zechariah, Benaiah, and Eliezer the priests blew in front of the chest of God. Obed-edom and Jehiah were also gatekeepers for the chest.
So David, the elders of Israel, and the commanders of thousands went to bring the of up from the house of with great celebration.
Because the Levites who were carrying the chest of Yahweh's covenant, they sacrificed seven bulls and seven rams.
David was wearing a of as were all the Levites carrying the chest, the musicians, and Chenaniah the music director. David also wore a
All Israel brought up the chest of Yahweh's covenant with shouts of joy, with the sound of the trumpets, and cymbals, playing loudly on harps and lyres.
As the chest of Yahweh's covenant entered the City of David, of watched from a window. When she saw King David and she him in her heart.