BONE AWL HANDLE
CANAANITE WHETSTONES
Cuts on this page used by permission of the Palestine Exploration Fund.
By this policy he pleased the people, both in the north and in the south. And after seven years of division the leading men of all the tribes came to David at Hebron, in Judah his headquarters, and made him king over the entire Hebrew nation, north, east, and south.
David's victories.—Soon after this David declared his independence of the Philistines. War broke out and for a time it went against the Hebrews. But in the end they were able to rally their resources under their new leader, and inflicted two crushing defeats on their old enemies, which made them instead of the Philistines once and for all the masters of Canaan.
From the Philistines David turned against the other petty enemies who had so often taken advantage of the weakness of the Hebrews. Already, while a vassal of the Philistines, he had thoroughly punished the Amalekites, in the deserts of the south; and now he gave the Ammonites and Moabites and other enemies on the east a taste of Hebrew warfare. Before many years passed they had all learned their lesson, and there was peace in Canaan.