<Tr> <Td> Bible portal </Td> </Tr> <Tr> <Td> <Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> </Td> </Tr> <Ul> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> <Li> </Li> </Ul> <P> The Books of Samuel, 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel, form part of the narrative history of Israel in the Nevi'im or "prophets" section of the Hebrew Bible / Old Testament, called the Deuteronomistic history, a series of books (Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings) that constitute a theological history of the Israelites and aim to explain God's law for Israel under the guidance of the prophets . According to Jewish tradition, the book was written by Samuel, with additions by the prophets Gad and Nathan; modern scholarly thinking is that the entire Deuteronomistic history was composed in the period c. 630--540 BC by combining a number of independent texts of various ages . </P>

At what point in israel's history does the book of 1 samuel begin