1 Kings 1 – 4: Regime Change Begins at Home

So we’ve wrapped up the Books of Samuel. In retrospect, I must say that they are not well named, as Samuel is a fairly minor character who dies midway through the first of his two epinymous books. It clears thing up for me to think of 1 Samuel as the Book of Saul, and 2 Samuel as the Book of David. And from the early going, it looks like 1 Kings is going to be the Book of Solomon. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

The Problem With Monarchy is the Dynastic Wrangling

As 1 Kings open, King David is now old and sick, and is unable to keep warm. They searched throughout Israel for a beautiful girl (1:3) – a phrase that seems unkind to the good women of Jerusalem, don’t you think? – and find one, Abishag, who is willing to act as David’s human bed-warmer. But, the king had no intimate relations with her (1:4), which is some kind of first for the high-spirited old monarch. We can reasonably assume he has one foot in the grave.

That’s certainly what everybody in the palace assumes. His eldest surviving son (after Absalom’s one-way trip on the Mule Express), Adonijah, holes up with General Joab, the high priest, and most of his brothers, and makes some ritual sacrifices in preparation for setting up an interim government. Hearing this, David’s wife Bathsheeba – you know, Uriah’s widow – grabs the highest-ranking priest she can find and makes a beeline for the sickbed. “You promised that my son Solomon would be the next king!” she says. “What’s up with Adonijah holding this big powwow?” (I paraphrase.)

David apparently does want Solomon to be his successor (although one notes that there are only a tiny number of people checking in on him and reporting back with his commands at this point) and arranges for his immediate anointment and coronation while Adonijah’s meeting is still going on. Hearing sounds of celebration and excitement, the older son’s supporters figure out what is going on, make some astute political calculations, and suddenly become fervent Solomon supporters. Adonijah sprints to the Tabernacle, and is only coaxed out when Solomon promises he will not come to harm.

David dies. On his way out, this troubled, highly ambiguous man redeems himself through a speech to his son Solomon, in which David encourages the boy to violently kill many of the key people who have been his staunchest supporters over the last decades. Wait, did I say “redeems?” Sorry, that’s a typo. It’s just David being David, right to the end.

So, Solomon becomes king. Shortly thereafter, Adonijah asks now-King Solomon if he can marry Abishag. This request seems innocent enough – the man apparently likes a warm bed – but it sets Solomon off, and he has Adonijah executed. He sends the old high priest, who had supported Adonijah, into permanent house arrest, replacing him with his own man. General Joab sees which way the wind is blowing, and seeks sanctuary in the Tabernacle. No dice. Solomon has him cut down right there in the sanctuary, even while he clutches the horns of the altar. Everyone with any possible alternative claim to the throne has been tidily taken care of. Or untidily. (Another minor character is kept under house arrest for three years. When Solomon hears that he broke house arrest to do some business in a neighboring village, he has him killed, too. Out with the old! In with the new!)

Solomon settles in. He marries an Egyptian princess. He stays faithful to his father’s religion, except that he offered sacrifices and burned incense on the high places, instead of at the Tabernacle. (3:3) Not a biggie, perhaps, until you recall that having done this very thing on a single occasion was the reason that God abandoned hapless King Saul back in 1 Samuel. Instead of forsaking Solomon, however, God comes to him on one of his sacrificing junkets and offers to grant him a wish. Solomon asks for wisdom, which tickles God, and he is granted not just the wisdom but also wealth, prestige, and long life. On the whole, you'd have to say, he gets a better deal than Saul.

Solomon Splits the Difference

Then comes the famous instance of wisdom. You know the one -- with the two women arguing over which one is the real mother of a little baby? Sure you do.

But, there are several details I did not know in this very familiar story. The women are prostitutes, for one thing, and they live in the same brothel. They both had babies at the same time, but one if the babies died shortly thereafter. Woman #1 says “her son died when she rolled over on him in her sleep, so she stole my baby.” Woman #2 says “she’s crazy; I don’t know what happened to her son, but this one is mine.” None of this is especially important, but it adds some coherence to the usual reading of “so these two women are arguing over a baby.”

Solomon, famously, suggests dividing the baby in half, and this provokes a revealing reaction from the women. It’s kind of like what Hamlet and the play within a play, except with the king provoking the reaction instead of being provoked himself. And everyone is quite impressed with Solomon's cleverness.

Larry Gonick, doubtless drawing on some highly authoritative source, argues in his (absolutely brilliant, absolutely masterful) Cartoon History of the Universe (which, if you have never read it, you have never lived, and you should not do ANYTHING more until you have either purchased it or reserved it at your local library. Go! Now!) that the story of Solomon and the women is actually a political parable, and is meant as Solomon’s decree that Israel will under no circumstances be divided among more than one ruler. (First Book, p. 183) It’s a kind of threat, if you will. Interestingly, as the Books of Samuel went on, we saw Israel being referred to increasingly as “Israel and Judah.” There’s an implied internal split there that Solomon might be trying to forestall, but I didn’t catch where and when that split happened, or what’s driving it.

Solomon Sets Up Shop

1 Kings 4 is one of those “paperwork” chapters that were so common in the Pentateuch but have become much less common since. They provide a roster of Solomon’s staff and regional officials, an overview of the palace budget, and a list of some of the new king’s hobbies (speaking proverbs, songwriting, natural history). This material suggest that Solomon, having established by hook and/or crook that he is the guy in charge, is now taking government seriously. He seems to be setting up a strong central administration backed by a local presence throughout the kingdom, maintaining a sizeable standing army, conducting an active and skillful foreign policy, and overall being everything you want from your iron age king. The people of Judah and Israel were as numerous as the sand on the seashore during his reign, we are told. (4:20) They ate, they drank and they were happy. Sounds good.


Next Week: They don’t call it First Temple Judaism for nothin’....

2 Samuel 19 - 24: David at Middle Age

Regular readers will have noticed that I’m a little underwhelmed with King David. As a first-time reader, I expected the famous Israelite king to be great, not only in the sense of militarily mighty, but also in the sense of moral upright. I expected him to set an example. Instead, we find a deeply flawed person. He is a charismatic and talented, but often sloppy, administrator. He is a religious man, but not one who seems to be able to resist getting it on with his neighbor's wife, or anything else in women's robes. Plus, he kills anyone who pisses him off. He's basically a thuggish Bill Clinton.

When we left the king, he was noisily mourning the death of Absalom, the son who had deposed him, sent him into exile, and attacked his armies. As I expected, this is not going down too well with the soldiers and the people, who feel gravely dishonored by his behavior. Joab -- the military commander who seems to be the brains of the administration, frankly -- gives David a memorable tongue-lashing, and the king pulls himself together just in time to exert a modicum of leadership and keep his fledgling state from dissolving into chaos. Most of 2 Samuel 19 recounts details of individuals reaffirming their loyalty to David, and David (acting sensibly, for a change) extending amnesty to people who picked the wrong horse during the uprising.

But things are still unstable, and David doesn't help things by appearing to favor the tribe of Judah over the other eleven clans of his people. In 2 Samuel 19, a "troublemaker" named Sheba becomes a focal point for the resentment of the other tribes, launching a new insurrection against David. David shilly-shallies a little. His first order of business is to deal with the ten concubines who were publically raped by Absalom after he left them behind to take care of his palace. (His solution is to confine them in house arrest for the rest of their lives; he provided for them, but did not lie with them. (3)) Then, he appoints Amasa, who had been Absalom's military commander, to raise an army against Sheba. Amasa, too, drags his feet, and after three days have gone by there's still no army to take on Sheba.

Joab, at this point, has had enough. Never soft on the Absalomist rebellion, he is no doubt galled to have had the enemy commander promoted over him. He jump-starts the situation by stabbing Amasa to death in the road, putting together an army, and immediately heading out after Sheba. He finds him hiding in the city of Abel, which he begins to put to siege. When a woman from the town asks him to not destroy their homes, however, he listens to reason. The folks of Abel catch and dispatch Sheba and toss his head down to Joab, and he leaves in peace. Everyone is more or less happy.


Other events from David's prime

There's a famine, and God explains to David that it is because Saul was excessive in his campaigns against the Giddeonites. This is something that happened quite a while ago, but never mind; David talks to the Giddeonites, who explain that they will feel much better if they can kill seven of Saul's grandchildren. This seems sensible enough, so David hands over the designated seven. The Giddeonites kill them and expose them out on the hillside. The famine lifts, and everyone is happy, except of course for Saul's daughter, who, in one of the most pathos-laden acts of all time, camps out all summer to keep the birds and beasts from eating the bodies of her children. At the end of the summer, David hears about this, is touched, and gives everybody a nice burial.

There's another war with the Philistines, and David goes down to personally lead his army again. Aging and presumably badly out of shape, he has to be rescued by his officers, who make him promise that he will direct future military operations from the capital.

Even in headquarters, he can be a liability. In yet another campaign against the Philistines, David is at a command center that is cut off by enemy troops, and starts getting a craving for Bethlehem water. Not just any water, mind you. Bethlehem water. It's all he'll talk about So, three of his best men hack and hew their way through enemy lines, hike to Bethlehem, hike back, hew their way back through enemy lines, and bring their CinC his precious water.

But he refused to drink it; instead, he poured it out before the Lord. "Far be it from me, O Lord, to do this!" he said. "Is it not the blood of men who went at the risk of their lives?" And David would not drink it. (23:16-17)

I think that sound you are hearing is the grinding of Joab's teeth, echoing down the ages.

Then, in 2 Samuel 24, comes an odd chapter about how God inflicts a plague on the Israelites because David wants to know how many soldiers are in his army. It starts like this:

Again the anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and he incited David against them, saying, "Go and take a census of Israel and Judah. (24:1)

So David tells Joab to count the soldiers, but Joab resists, saying that's an insane idea, but David overrules him. So the soldiers get counted (1.3 million!), but then David feels terribly guilty, and after that God offers him a choice of three terrible punishments, from which he chooses a short plague (indeed, a better choice than defeat in war or extended famine, in my view).

So, if you are like me, you are wondering what the hell is going on. I had to do some external research on this one. The first clue is that the "he" in verse 24:1 is thought to refer to Satan. Now, the Bible is terrible for pronouns with vague referents, but this one really takes the cake. We have not even heard of a character called Satan, or any other kind of devil for that matter, so that casual "he" is quite a stretch at this point in the Bible.

The second clue is that counting things was apparently considered by the Israelites to constitute claiming ownership of them. So God, to whom the Israelites belong, can command a census (as he did twice back in Moses' time). But for King David to do so means that he is claiming God's people, and therefore God's property, as his own. Phew! Truly, this is a story that has lost its cultural reference points over the years. In the end, anyway, David builds a new altar at a spot where God tells him to, and the plague stops. Everyone is happy, excepting only the 70,000 plague victims, their friends, family, and well-wishers.


Boring Bits

Intermixed with the above, there are several lists of the leading warriors in David's army. I'm sure this was a real thrill for them and their descendants -- "my grandpa's in the Bible!" excited children might have boasted, had the concept of "Bible" been in place -- but it isn't very interesting reading now. We do, however, get to read about how, in another battle with the Philistines at Gob, Elhanan son of Jaare-Oregim the Bethlehemite killed Goliath the Gittite, who had a spear with a shaft like a weaver's rod. (19) "Goliath" must have been a common name. You always hear about "David and Goliath," but never about "Elhanan and Goliath."

Then, David bursts into song. The songs of David are often cited by people who think that the Bible has great literary merit. Who knows, in the original Hebrew perhaps they sparkle with wit and wordplay. In English, they sound like middle-of-the-rock Christian rock lyrics. Or a list of randomly strung-together pro-God utterances, which is to say much the same thing:

You are my lamp, O Lord;
the Lord turns my darkness into light
With your help I can advance against a troop;
with my God I can scale a wall
As for God, his way is perfect;
the word of the Lord is flawless.
He is a shield for all who take refuge in him.
For who is God besides the Lord?
And who is the Rock except our God? (23: 29-32)

There is also a lot of righteous boasting, which is a real hoot coming from David:

All his laws are before me;
Ihave not turned away from his decrees.
I have been blameless before him
and have kept myself from sin. (23: 23-24)

Suggested chorus: "Except for, among many other incidents, at least one but probably two times that I started screwing married women and then had their husbands killed so I could have them all to myself, I have kept myself from sin, oh yeah!"

So, as I was saying, regular readers will have noticed that I’m a little underwhelmed with King David.


That’s it for 2 Samuel!


Next Week: 1 Kings, baby!

2 Samuel 13 - 19: Absalom, Absalom – A Squalid Tale of Dynastic Dynamics

Amnon and Tamar

In the course of time, begins 2 Samuel 13, Amnon son of David fell in love with Tamar, the beautiful sister of Absalom son of David. (1) If you apply the transitive property to this phrase, you realize that Amnon has in fact fallen in love with his own sister, or at best his half-sister. Which is not cool.

The second sentence is perhaps even more memorable: Amnon became frustrated to the point of illness on account of his sister Tamar, for she was a virgin, and it seemed impossible for him to do anything to her. This may be referring to the social segregation of the royal daughters, not to the physical evidence that would be left by “doing anything to her,” but still, it’s a remarkably crass sentiment. The "to" is a remarkably crass preposition.

Amnon solves his little dilemma by employing trickery to get his sister alone, and then – despite her pleas for him not to destroy both of their lives, and despite her offer to marry him so they can have a proper incestuous relationship – he rapes her. Having raped her, Amnon finds satisfaction elusive: Then Amnon hated her with intense hatred. In fact, he hated her more than he had loved her. (15) He has the servant throw her out of the house. She goes to live in shame and disgrace, a desolate woman, at Absalom’s place, and Absalom and King David seethe silently.

Wow.

You could structure a whole seminar in gender relations around this little family tale. I will just highlight a few of the more basic points here, as an exercise in fish-barrel shooting:

If you are frustrated to the point of illness because you have the hots for someone, it’s really your own damn fault. Go for a run or something.

If you are really “in love,” your consideration for the feelings of your intended ought to keep you from raping him or her.

Amnon may not hate his sister as much as he hates himself for what he has done.

Gratifying your desires at the cost of harming someone close to you is not likely to be very satisfying, really.

Silent anger about problematic family dynamics will only make things worse, in the end.

Absalom

A few years later, Absalom holds a big sheep-shearing up in the hills. He invites all of his brothers. At a signal, he has his men kill Amnon, and then flees to a neighboring kingdom, Geshur.

The text never says anything about David putting Absalom in exile, but it is implied that Absalom can’t come back without his permission. David wants his favorite son to come home, but refuses to send for him until he is tricked into it a few years later by General Joab. Absalom comes home to Jerusalem, but is never allowed to see the king.

Things seem like they are going well for Absalom – he’s good looking, healthy, four kids, servants – but he is very sad that he can’t talk to his dad. He calls for Joab to discuss the situation, but Joab refuses to talk to him. He calls for Joab again, but he refuses again. Then he has his servants set Joab’s barley on fire, and now Joab comes to talk to him. Absalom knows how to get a guy’s attention.

So, Joab agrees to set up a meeting. Absalom goes and meets with his father the king, and they seem to kiss and make up. You would think that the storm is over, that everything is going to be fine. But you would be wrong!


Absalom in Rebellion

A thing about the Bible, it doesn’t always make clear what peoples’ motivations are. Absalom seems to have reconciled himself with his father, but before long he begins building his own connections with the Israelite movers and shakers and making innuendo about his father’s abilities. After a few years of this, he enacts a coup, and David and his followers are forced to flee Jerusalem. There is a lot of detail about who flees with him, and who stays behind to try to get in good with the new regime, and who stays behind to spy on Absalom and report back to David, and so on. Ten concubines are left behind, oddly, to take care of the palace. (16)

Absalom and his army takes the capital. Many Israelites seem to be on the fence, still hoping that there will be some kind of reconciliation between father and son. Wanting people to take sides, Absalom pitches a tent on top of the palace and lay with his father’s concubines in the sight of all Israel. The theory seems to be that, once you’ve publically raped all of your dad’s girlfriends, it’s clear that things aren’t going to be patched up between you. Which seems pretty plausible, actually.

Eventually, Absalom marches against David with a vast army. David very publically tells his generals to take it easy on Absalom, to bring him back alive. It doesn’t seem like this would make a good pre-battle pep-talk, but in any event David’s forces win the day. Which brings us to the only detail from the Absalom story that I already knew.


Absalom Takes His Last Mule Ride

Fleeing from the rout of his army on a mule, Absalom gets caught in a tree. What I remember from Sunday School is that his head got wedged between branches, but the Wiki, which is always right, says he gets caught by his hair. The text doesn’t specify, saying only that the mule keeps going and leaves Absalom hanging there in the tree.

A soldier reports to Joab on Absalom’s predicament. “Why didn’t you kill him?” asks Joab. “No way,” says the soldier, “you heard what the king said.” But Joab – the same Joab who followed David’s dodgy orders (to make sure Uriah got killed) so unflinchingly a few years ago – is having none of it. He and his bodyguard go and kill Absalom where he hangs. This seems to reflect a certain contempt for David’s affection for his rebellious son, but I’m not sure.

If this really is an issue, David’s reaction to the news that his armies have won the day isn’t going to help anything. Does he give thanks to God? Does he praise his mighty generals? Does he join the exultant triumph of the common soldiers? Does he mourn the 20,000 who died on the field? No, he does not. Instead, he keeps asking what happened to his son -- you know, the enemy commander. And when told that Absalom is dead, he bursts into tears and loud public lamentations. If only I had died instead of you, he wails. (33) Perfectly understandable, but perhaps not the finest display of wartime leadership.

Next Week: It’s really hard to write these teasers anymore. I never have a clue what’s coming next week.

2 Samuel 7-12: David Remains Problematic

Well, King David is who he is, and I suppose the problem in this relationship is me. Me and my expectations. Somehow, I just figured that being a big famous Biblical hero and all, he would have some sort of greater-than-usual moral stature. Instead he is, I suppose, refreshingly prone to human frailties. He's certainly prone to human frailties.

God, David, and Prophecy

Today's reading starts with a revelation to someone named Nathan, but it's not that guy Nathan who was in your dorm back in college, it's Nathan the Old Testament prophet. He is given a somewhat cryptic message, one that seems to imply that it would be a good idea for David to construct a permanent home for the Ark of the Covenant -- still spoken of here as the physical embodiment of God. In return, God will render David's kingdom and dynasty permanent. Informed of this, David rushes to the Ark and makes an intimate, rambling prayer praising God and asking that the prophecy in the revelation come true.

Now here's an interesting thing. Some Protestant denominations technically believe that human beings can not really have free will. An all-knowing God, the reasoning goes, must by definition know everything that is ever going to happen. Since deviating from God's expectations is impossible, we all must be on a invariable track toward our final destiny.

Among other problems with this line of thinking -- it sure feels like free will, for instance -- it would seem from the Scriptural evidence in 2 Samuel 7 that God doesn't really know what's giong to happen in the future. His predictions, here as elsewhere, have simply not panned out. He tells David, for instance, that Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me; your throne will be established forever. (16) He says that I will provide a place for my people Israel and will plant them so that they can have a home of their own and no longer be disturbed. Wicked people will not oppress them anymore.... (10) Mind, this is not a covenent, and there is no proviso for "as long as y'all are good." It's just stated that this is the way it's going to be. A literal interpretation of 2 Samuel would have to conclude that the Romans, the Dispora, and 20 centuries of pogram and persecution were things that God didn't see coming for his chosen people.

David in Love and War

Meanwhile, David leads the Israelites on a whirlwind of military adventures. We learn of horses hamstrung, quantities of bronze captured, thousands and tens of thousands cut down. We learn of how, after finally defeating the Moabites, David

made them lie down on the ground and measured them off with a length of cord. Every two lengths of them were put to death, and the third length was allowed to live. (8:2)

Some lucky peoples are merely enslaved, or even allowed to become subject nations, after their armies are defeated. The Ammonites are made slaves, for instance. The Bible goes into quite a bit of depth about the cause, tactics, and conclusion of the Ammonite War, weaving it in and around some stories of David's life. I won't go into all that; basically, this is a war where the Israelites keep their winning streak alive and continue their expansion and subjugation of the neighboring kingdoms.

Chapter 9 is an interesting interlude in all the action. Feeling nostalic about his late buddy Jonathan, David asks around until he locates Jonathan's son Mephibosheth. Mephibosheth is lame in both feet, as he was dropped in the panic when his father and grandfather, King Saul, were slain by the Philistines. David restores all of Saul's personal property and lands to Mephibosheth, and announces that he will henceforth always eat at the king's table. This is presented as a magnanimous gesture, but it is not hard to imagine an ulterior motive. Young Mephi is the legitimate heir to King Saul if you go by paternity, and therefore he's a potential rival to David's power and reign. By making him a perpetual guest in the court, David both coopts and undermines any claim Mephibosheth might make to the throne. Plus, he keeps him where he can keep an eye on him.

It is pretty obvious that David has, as they say, an "eye for the ladies," and his rise to high office hasn't changed this. He's walking on the roof of his palace one night, and he sees a smokin' hottie bathing nearby. Discrete inquiries reveal that this is Bathsheba, wife of Uriah the Hittite. Uriah is out of town; in fact, he's on campaign with David's army. So, David sends for Bathsheba, and she comes on over to his place. She is ritually pure, so David decides -- how can I put this in a dignified way? -- to do the big freaky-freak with her. Commandments get broken.

Listen up, kids. That's how people get pregnant. Bathsheba sends word, in fact, that she is pregnant.

David, considering the outcomes of his actions, determines to do the right and moral thing. That's right: he calls Uriah back from the wars, hoping to give the hapless Hittite enough of a conjugal furlough so as to, shall we say, confuse the paternity issue. The baffled Uriah, more an infantryman than a messenger, is asked some perfunctary questions about how things are going back at the front, given a handsome royal gift, and told to go home to his wife. Unfortunately, Uriah is a dedicated patriot and soldier. "my master Joab [David's general] and my lord's men are camped in the open fields. How could I go to my house to eat and drink and lie with my wife?"

Touched by Uriah's devotion to duty and principle, David knows what he must do. The next day, he gets Uriah really, really drunk, and tries again. But noble Uriah sleeps in the street once more, unwilling to enjoy comfort when his comrades are suffering.

Moved by the moral example of his heroic subject, David sees that he must step up and take responsibity for his actions. So, he sends Uriah back to the front lines with a note for General Joab. The note instructs Joab to make sure Uriah dies in battle. Joab, an obediant soldier, arranges a tactical error that results in the death of a number of his soldiers, including Uriah. After a decent period of mourning, Bathsheba marries David. Everybody's happy! So remember, kids, always do the right thing, and everything will turn out fine.


Wait, scratch that last part. Actually, God gets pretty angry with David over the whole Bathsheba affair. Nathan goes to David, and tells a little parable about rich men and poor men and sheep, the gist of which is, David has been very, very naughty. As a result, God makes David & Bathsheba's child sicken and, despite a week of praying, fasting, and prostration from David, die.

In the process of comforting Bathsheba for her loss, however, David gets her pregnant again, and this second child is born and lives. His name is Solomon.


Next Time: More Moral Reasoning with King David!

2 Samuel 1-6: David, King

David Mourns Saul

The narrative of 1 Samuel continues unbroken into the Book of 2 Samuel. A messenger from the battle in which King Saul has just fallen runs exhausted into David’s camp. He tells how the battle went against the Israelites, and how Saul, surrounded by chariots, had attempted suicide. But he apparently botched it, and, impaled and helpless as the Philistines pressed closer, he asked the messenger to finish him off. Afterwards, the messenger manages to sneak the crown and royal armband off of the battlefield and, three days later, delivers them to David.

David and his men are distraught by the news, and fall to weeping. They pump the messenger for as much information as he can give. Then, they execute him for having killed the king. No doubt the messenger, who had followed the king’s orders, and then voluntarily fled three days across the desert at enormous personal risk in order to protect the emblems of royal power, dies with a look of considerable surprise on his face. And to put the situation into full context, let’s remember that David had intended to be part of the army that attacked Saul, and was mighty peeved when he wasn’t allowed to participate.

David himself seems to have forgotten the last several years of hostilities between himself and Saul, and breaks into a long sentimental song about the late king with the highly quotable line how the mighty have fallen! (1:19) There’s a stanza about Jonathan in there, too, which rings oddly on the modern ear:

I grieve for you, Jonathan my brother;
you were very dear to me.
Your love for me was wonderful,
more wonderful than that of women. (1:26)

Civil War

So now Israel has lost its first king. As is often the case in such situations, there is a secession crisis. With God’s guidance, David goes to Hebron and sets himself up King of Judah. All of the other tribes fall in behind Saul’s son Ish-Bostheth. Things get a little hard to follow – ambiguous pronouns can be a bitch in the Bible – but there are some brawls, and battles, and plenty of tension between the two courts.

In general, David’s fortunes are on the rise, and Ish-Botheth’s on the wane. Although we aren’t given any real details, the general impression is that Saul’s son is pretty ineffectual as a ruler. A key moment comes when Ish-Bostheth pisses off his right-hand man, Abner, by accusing him of sleeping with the late king’s concubine. Abner goes over to David, bringing the support of most of the local leaders with him. All of this is about as riveting as most accounts of small town politics, when you don’t happen to live in the small town.

With Ish-Bostheth’s administration crumbling, two of his own military officers kill him and bring his head to David. “Here is the head of Ish-Bostheth son of Saul, your enemy,” they tell him, “who tried to take your life. This day the Lord has avenged my lord the king against Saul and his offspring.” (4: 8)

David does not receive this gesture of support as they expect, however. As with the messenger who finished off Saul, he has these two guys killed and their mutilated bodies hung by the local watering hole, where everyone will have to see them at least a couple times a day. If this seems a little ungrateful from a man who they have just made the undisputed king, it’s interesting to note that a consistent theme of all of these stories of young David – that you must never harm a king, because the king is anointed by God – is going to serve him awfully well, now that he is himself the king.

David in Charge

The King! David, for reasons that aren’t entirely clear, marches on an impregnable fortress-town of the Jebusites called.... wait for it.... Jerusalem! Somehow, it’s not clear exactly how, they manage to take the place. As the prosperity of David’s reign expands, he builds up the town and has a royal palace built for himself. He defeats a few Philistine invasions. In a big national celebration, he has the Ark of the Covenant brought to Jerusalem, confirming the “City of David” as the Israelite national capital, both political and religious.

David takes place in the general partying down that accompanies the arrival of the Ark, and his first wife Michal takes him to task for acting so common. They have a big fight over it, which may also reflect some bottled up tension about how he had her dragged away from her second husband, whom she married while David was out in Philistine territory with his band of bloodthirsty brigands. It just goes to show that even powerful celebrities must sometimes deal with marital discord.

Next Week: What will David do next?

1 Samuel 23 - 31: The Many Moods of Young King David

So, to bring us up to date: After centuries of loose rulership by "Judges," the Israelites asked the religious leader Samuel to appoint them a king. Samuel picked Saul, who has proven to be a good military and administrative leader, but who has fallen out of God's favor for neglecting the details of His instructions. Samuel has privately annointed David as a replacement king, and although nobody knows about that he's the king-in-waiting David has become very popular after his colorful dispatching of the Philistine champion Goliath. Saul sees David as a rival to the peoples' affection, accurately enough, and has made several attempts on his life. Because of this, David has fled out into the desert, where he has begun to attract a band of followers.

It's an unstable political situation that all this is going down in, and things don't get any more stable in the final chapters of 1 Samuel. Here's what happens:

1 Samuel 23 -- David, the Heroic!

David hears that an Israelite city called Keilah is under siege by the Philistines, and rides down to save the town. He is victorious, but Saul, hoping to trip David inside the walled city, then leads the army toward the site. David escapes into the countryside, but the locals tell Saul (who is the King, after all) where David is hiding. We're on the verge of a showdown when Saul has to move his army elsewhere to deal with a fresh Philistine incursion. David establishes a secure hideout in caves near the Crags of the Wild Goats.

1 Samuel 24 -- David, the Merciful!

With the Philistines taken care of, Saul continues the search for David up in the hills. One day, Saul steps into a cave to take a leak, unaware that the cave is crawling with David and his well-armed henchmen. However, David merely cuts off a little scrap of Saul's robe; the king never even realizes there are other people in the cave.

After Saul leaves, David goes out and shouts at him. See, my father, look at this piece of your robe in my hand! he says. I cut off the corner of your robe but did not kill you. (11) David claims that he is not a rebel, and just wants to be back in the king's good graces. Ashamed of his behavior, Saul admits he has been being a jerk, and says may the Lord reward you well for the way you treated me today. I know that you will surely be king and that the kingdom of Israel will be established in your hands (19-20) David is reassured, but is nervous enough to stay in the caves rather than going back home.

1 Samuel 25 -- David, the Thug!

Samuel dies. I guess we won't be seeing any more of him. OR WILL WE.....?

Meanwhile, David moves into the Desert of Maon. There is a household living nearby headed by a couple named Nabal and Abigail. She was an intelligent and beautiful woman, we learn, but her husband... was surly and mean in his dealings (3), not unlike the situation here at Castle5000. David's gang has been providing protection for the area, making sure that nothing gets stolen, but when he sends the boys around to ask for food, Nabal tells them to get lost. David, keen to find a workable solution to the standoff, decides to kill Nabal and everyone in his household for this injustice.

Word of this gets to Abigail, who leaps into action, puts together as much food as she can scrounge up, and meets David and his death squad en route. She eloquently offers up the food, and David is grateful both for being fed and for being deterred from making the hit, which he realizes -- a bit belatedly, it seems to me -- would have been a sin. He is so grateful, in fact, that after Nabal dies of natural causes a few weeks later, he takes Abigail as his third wife. Hmmm....

1 Samuel 26 -- David, Who Doesn't Believe in Regicide!

Saul saddles up his army and rides out against David again. This is presented as duplicity or malice, but one notes that David has been running something of a protection racket out in the hills, so this might also be interpreted as the kind of legitimate anti-briggandage activity you want from your king. Whatever. David sneaks into Saul's camp at night and takes the spear and water jug from beside him as he sleeps. Having left the camp, he scolds the king's men at a distance for not having given their master adequate protection, and lets Saul know that his life has been spared a second time. The Lord delivered you into my hands today, but I would not lay a hand on the Lord's annointed, he yells. (23) Saul is again moved, gets choked up, blesses David and predicts that great triumphs are in the young man's future.

1 Samuel 27 -- David, Slayer of the Innocent!

David sees the writing on the wall, however -- to use a Biblical reference we haven't got to yet -- and determines to leave Saul's lands before the king changes his mind again. He sets up household in the land of the Philistines, where his band makes their living by looting and killing. Whenever David attacked an area, he did not leave a man or woman alive, but took sheep and cattle, donkeys and camels, and clothes. (8) This is not, I might add, because of any special instructions from God. Instead, David is just killing anyone who might inform on him to the Philistine authority. (11)

I hadn't known much about David before this reading, but had always had an impression of him as a heroic and morally upright figure. I am surprised to see that, here in his adult life, he is so far a minor warlord noteworthy mostly as an extortionist and a murderer. You learn a lot when you read the Bible.

1 Samuel 28 -- The Witch of Endor

Saul is fighting with the Philistines again, and he's nervous that God will no longer talk to him. He disguises himself and goes to a witch in Endor, who raises Samuel from the dead. Samuel tells Saul that he is doomed and will die in battle against the Philistines the next day.

This chapter is so downright weird that I looked into it a little bit. Apparently, this little black-magic ghost story was always seen through the ages as a fairly obvious example of how you can't take the Bible literally, before the big 20th Century boom in fundamentalism. Also, it's the probable source of the name of Endora, in Bewitched. Again, you learn a lot....

1 Samuel 29 -- David, Traitor to His People!

The King of the Philistines leads his army against Saul, and David enlists himself and his men... on the Philistine side! The Philistine generals don't trust him, though, so the Philistine king sends him packing home, grumbling.

1 Samuel 30 -- David suffers a setback, but comes out smelling like a rose

When David and the men get back to the settlement where he has been living, he finds that Amalekites have raided it while they were gone, burned it, and abducted all of the women and children. After having wept aloud until they had no more strength to weep, David and the guys take off in pursuit. Through a lucky break or two, they find the Amelekites a few days later, and fight a day-long pitched battle, after which they recover not only their wives and children and property, but also the phat loot that the raiders had been stealing from everyone else in Judah. There is great rejoicing as David splits the bounty with great fairness among his men, sending portions also to various local rulers and political connections.

1 Samuel 31 -- Saul's Unhappy End

The Philistines turn out not to have needed David and his men anyway. They triumph easily over the Israelites. All of Saul's sons -- including David's buddy Jonathan -- are killed in the fighting, and recognizing his situation as hopeless, Saul falls on his own sword. The Philistines lop off his head when they find his body, then tack his headless corpse up on a city wall to advertise their triumph. Bad form. No one likes a gloating winner.

...and that brings us to the end of 1 Samuel. With Samuel having died -- although we can't really say he's been resting comfortably in his grave, what with the necromancy -- it is a little surprising that the next book is called 2 Samuel. Maybe we'll find out why! Or maybe it's just a random naming convention.


Next Time: We start 2 Samuel!

1 Samuel 17-22: Underdog Makes Good!

The story of David and Goliath, told in 1 Samuel 17, is remarkable in being exactly what I remembered from Sunday school. Young David is sent to the battlefield to bring bread to his older brothers, who are serving in the army, and there he sees how terrified the troops are of the Philistine champion, Goliath. I'd be terrified too. Goliath is 9 feet tall, wears 125 pounds of armor, and wields a spear with a 15 pound tip. This is not a small man. But the little shephard beans him in the forehead with one shot from his sling, and down he goes.

Interestingly, this clash of champions only kicks off the battle, rather than serving as a way of avoiding it. The whole idea of a battle between champions is that the side whose champion wins will get the privileges of winning without the necessary bloodshed, but when David saws off Goliath's head to finish him off, the Philistines run in panic and the Israelites make chase and attack them. So, although David taking out Goliath swings morale and initiative to the Israelites, it can't really be seen as decisive to the battle. After all, he only killed one guy out of a whole army.


Anyway, after his high-profile triumph, David is a real hero. The people become increasingly fond of him, and he befriend's King Saul's son Jonathan. But Saul himself grows jealous of the young boy. He gives David increasingly dangerous military missions, hoping that he'll die in action, but David always prevails. Raising the stakes, Saul promises his daughter Michal (no relation) in marriage to David if he will produce 100 Philistine foreskins. Never one to shrink from a challenge, David goes out and kills 200 Philistines, cuts off their... well, you get the idea. Not only does David survive the mission, Saul has exchanged the princess for a bucket of foreskins. He could have done better.

Note: The battle of David and Goliath are a popular subject for children's tales, but they never mention the bucket of foreskins. Why do you suppose that is?

The Psyche of Psaul

It's hard to diagnose people who lived thousands of years ago -- especially since, technically, I'm not qualified to diagnose anybody -- but you have to wonder is Saul has some organic mental health issues. He needs David around to soother him during his frequent bouts of possession by evil spirits, but he's also so jealous that he's trying to have the boy killed. Saul also has extreme anger-management issues, on two occasions attracking David with a spear and completely freaking out on his son when the young man intervenes on David's behalf.

It's a bad scene, and after the second spear incident David gets the heck out of Dodge. Jonathan and his wife Michal help him escape. Saul, however, has really lost it at this point, and he goes chasing David into the wilderness. Learning that a priest has innocently given David some bread and Goliath's old sword, Saul explodes with rage. The priest had no reason to think that David was not still in the king's favor, but no matter. The hapless guy is executed, along with 85 other priests, all of their families, the entire population of their town, and all of the livestock.

David, meanwhile, has been keeping himself scarce, hanging out in such places as the Cave of Adullam, the court of the Moabite king, the Forest of Hereth, and Bag End in the Shire. No, just kidding with that last one. Saul's increasingly erratic and draconian reign is increasingly alienating and displacing more and more people, and many of them find their way to David's hideouts. By the end of today's reading, he seems to have a small rebel army in the making.


Next time: Usually, when there's a rebel army gathering, rebellion is a safe bet.