The city of David
David took the stronghold of Zion from the Jebusites, made Jerusalem his city, and brought the ark of God up into it.
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The whole story
The Jebusites mocked David, saying even the blind and the lame could hold their stronghold against him. Joab went up first, by the water shaft as many read it, and took it, and David dwelt in the fort and called it the city of David. Hiram king of Tyre sent cedar trees, carpenters and masons, and they built David a house.
When the ark of God was brought up from the house of Obededom, David danced before the LORD with all his might, wearing a linen ephod, with shouting and the sound of the trumpet. His wife Michal looked down from a window and despised him in her heart; he answered that he would be yet more humble than this before the LORD.
The City of David lies on the narrow ridge south of the Temple Mount, above the spring of Gihon. Excavations there have uncovered a great stepped stone structure and massive walls, which some argue were David’s palace, and Hezekiah’s tunnel, cut later to bring the spring’s water inside the walls, can still be walked through.
Nevertheless David took the strong hold of Zion: the same is the city of David.
2 Samuel 5:7, KJV
Where it happened
Jerusalem.
The city is known; the gold mark is the Temple Mount, where Solomon’s temple stood.
Every story stands at its place on the Worldwide Watch map: the Bible’s world, on the map.
More from the kingdom
Samuel and Kings
Sources and editorial method
Research and editorial references used for this page include:
- The King James Bible, as published by bible-api.com
- The Book of Enoch, translated by R. H. Charles (1917), Project Gutenberg
Every story is told from the King James Bible, and from the Book of Enoch in R. H. Charles’s translation (1917) where a story names it. Every quotation was checked word for word against those texts. Where a place is not known, the page says so. The paintings and the narration were made for the house.
