Chapter 1 addresses five topics preliminary to the exegetical portions of this study: Kings’ compositional history, genre (especially in light of comparisons to Greek historiography), and rhetorical purpose, as well as a canonical approach to Kings and an agrarian reading strategy applied to Kings. As opposed to either factual history or fictional story, this volume argues that Kings is best described as a scripture directed at its readers’ theological imaginations. Such an observation suggests the validity of approaching the book from a canonical frame of reference, where its origins, shaping, and reception are understood to sit within a single field of compositional activity. Finally, Chapter 1 describes an agrarian hermeneutic as one reading strategy especially compatible with a canonical approach to the Bible at large.

An overview of the historiography of the Arthaśāstra, beginning with a presentation of the text's formal and informal features. This chapter then goes on to explore the traditional history of the text, which assigns it to a figure called Cāṇakya who probably lived in the late fourth/early third century BCE. A critique of this account is offered based on a preliminary examination of the text's features. Rules out the possibility that the extant text could have been produced at one time by a single author.