as a king from the house or dynasty of David. The inscription created a sensation because it was the oldest archaeological evidence for the existence of a dynasty that originated in a figure named David.1 These two events from modern-day Israel remind us at the outset of at least two images of David that exist in our world today. There is the contemporary image of David, one that has been forged through millennia of Jewish and Christian history, through ancient, medieval, and modern art, and is now