This was a fascinating book for me.  As a Christian, I have read about King David throughout my life.  This book was written from a Jewish perspective which included a lot more background regarding the culture and norms that were relevant to King David. I felt that the author had a thing against King David and didn't celebrate him like Christians.  None the less it seemed that the Jewish perspective is more "legal" than the Christian perspective that I am accustomed.  A great book for stretching one's understanding of ancient Israel. 

Israel Drazin, the author of this thin volume, has a unique writing style that often disregards standard English sentence structure and usage, which detracts from the flow of the overall commentaries he makes about King David. His insights are, for the most part, interesting, although many of them seem to stretch the issue beyond bounds or come across as exceedingly didactic. Because the structure of the book is so didactic, it loses much of its appeal to interest and for understanding the human condition. King David is a colossal figure in the Old Testament whose life, as delineated in the bilble, offers unending opportunities for deep analysis and observation with immense human appeal. ( )

I am reviewing this for Librarything. This book was amazing. I don't remember a book that I have ever read that I did so much research on my own. Not to make sure Mr. Drazin was right or wrong, but to broaden my knowledge of King David. I am so drawn to a book. I have read II Samuel in so many Bible translations and this book gave me another look at it and King David. Mr. Drazin gave you questions and then he made you really think. I have to say this is one book that I will keep in my library and let others borrow to read. It is such an interesting translation. ( )

Brilliantly researched and scholarly work which attempts to account for some of the difficulties and disasters of David's reign. Totally unafraid of the weight of previous scholarship Drazin demolishes many established arguments in a cogent fashion. His style is highly readable and yet he does not scorn the use of footnotes and appendices where appropriate. I learnt a lot from this book and expect to return to it often when preparing sermons. ( )

Israel Drazin’s “The Tragedies of King David” is a highly engaging book that explores the latter part of the biblical King David’s life from just after the death of King Saul to his own death and the start of King Solomon’s reign (II Samuel to I Kings 2:46) through posing a variety of engaging questions and then presenting various past Rabbinical interpretations as well as Drazin’s own view.

Drazin divides the book into seven parts: David’s preparation to rule the united tribes of Israel, David as King of Judah and Israel, David as King of all Israel, the affair with Bat-Sheba, the conflict between David and his son Absalom, Joab’s assistance to Absalom, the aftermath - including Saul’s surviving family - and the census, and finally, David’s death and the passing on of the throne to Solomon.

Drawing on from a variety of rabbinical and scholarly interpretations, Drazin provides the reader with several viewpoints from which to survey the incidents of King David’s life covered in this book. Generally, the three interpretative viewpoints covered might be termed: Traditional and Literal as represented by Rashi, a Deistic Position as represented by Maimonides, and the Historical Critical and Textual Critical view as represented by Erlich. Drazin himself, when presenting his own opinion, tends to side with the latter, more modernist, view of Erlich.

I found this book to be a very worthwhile and alternative look into the Book of II Samuel and the life of David. I would recommend the “The Tragedies of King David” to anybody with an interest in the Bible, and certainly those interested in the life of King David and those interested in the issue of hermeneutics; that of the problem of interpreting a written text.

The formatting of the book is superb. The decent font and layout made this book extremely enjoyable to read. Gefen Publishing deserves kudos on the physical layout as does Drazin for the informative and thought-provoking book itself. ( )