Category: Hebrew Scripture

David: “bring her to me, set him in the front of the fighting” (2 Sam 11; Pentecost 10B)

This coming Sunday, we read the story of David’s adultery with Bathsheba (2 Sam 11:1–15). This story is known and remembered through the ages—although it is often misinterpreted, in explanations that “blame the woman” for what, in the text, is clearly a series of actions undertaken explicitly by the man who has power, the man who decides to “take” the woman.

In this regard, this ancient story resonates strongly with the experience of millions, if not billions, of women in the modern world. The #MeToo movement attests to the ongoing occurrence of sexual exploitation and abuse of women by men with power. It continues to take place every day, in every country, around the world. Abusive behaviour, abusive words, sexual pressures, rape and domestic violence—the list goes on and on. It is a sad indictment of the overwhelming numbers of males who continue to perpetrate this sad way of being.

Estimates published by the World Health Organisation indicate that “globally about 1 in 3 (30%) of women worldwide have been subjected to either physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence in their lifetime. Most of this violence is intimate partner violence. Worldwide, almost one third (27%) of women aged 15-49 years who have been in a relationship report that they have been subjected to some form of physical and/or sexual violence by their intimate partner.”

The report concluded that “The social and economic costs of intimate partner and sexual violence are enormous and have ripple effects throughout society. Women may suffer isolation, inability to work, loss of wages, lack of participation in regular activities and limited ability to care for themselves and their children.” See https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/violence-against-women

In my previous post, I explored the figure of Bathsheba. In this post, attention turns to David. I have already flagged my support for the view that it was the sin of David, rather than any sinfulness by Bathsheba, which lies at the root of this story. Yet we need to note that it is not just one sin of David which the narrative reports; there are two different (albeit related) and equally serious sins that he committed. See

Bathsheba: “she was very beautiful” (2 Sam 11; Pentecost 10B)

The first sin involves Bathsheba. David has sexual relations with her; “he sent messengers to get her, and she came to him, and he lay with her” (2 Sam 11:4). This resulted in the birth of a child (11:5); sadly, the child later died (12:15–19). What was the nature of this liaison David engineered with Bathsheba? Was it “a fling”? “an affair”? an abuse of his power? Was it adultery? Was it, even, as some maintain, rape?

Richard Davidson has written a fascinating article, “Did King David Rape Bathsheba? A Case Study in Narrative Theology”, published in the Journal of the Adventist Theological Society, 17/2 (Autumn 2006): 81–95. It is also accessible online (see link below). Davidson opens his careful analysis of the story by reporting ways that interpreters have sought to minimise the sin that David committed.

He notes that various commentators have claimed that Bathsheba is “a willing and equal partner to the events that transpire” (Randall Bailey), there is a possible element of “feminine flirtation” (H.W. Hertzberg), Bathsheba showed “complicity in the sexual adventure” (Lillian Klein), or “the text seems to imply that Bathsheba asked to be ‘sent for’ and ‘taken’” (Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan).

Davidson will have nothing of this minimising of what David has done, from those who claim that Bathsheba was somehow complicit. The narrative, he concludes, “represents an indictment directed solely against the man and not the woman, against David and all men in positions of power (whether civil or ecclesiastical or academic) who take advantage of their ‘power’ and victimize women sexually. Power rape receives the strongest possible theological condemnation in this narrative.” See https://digitalcommons.andrews.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1174&context=jats

Indeed, the text could not be clearer; the chapter ends with the definitive conclusion, “the thing that David had done displeased the Lord” (2 Sam 11:27b). The two key factors that Davidson cites in support of this “displeasing thing” actually being a rape are based on his reading of the Hebrew text.

First, he notes that “the fact that the narrator still here calls her ‘the wife of Uriah’ implies her continued fidelity to her husband, as does the reference to Uriah as ‘her lord/husband’. By using the term ba’al [lord] to denote her husband, the narrator intimates that if ‘Uriah is her lord’, then David is not”.

Davidson supports this by noting that the narrator “carefully avoids using the name of Bathsheba throughout the entire episode of David’s sinning” and suggesting that this “makes her character more impersonal, and thus perhaps further conveying the narrator’s intention of suggesting that Bathsheba wasn’t personally responsible.”

This anonymising of Bathsheba in the story is not unusual in terms of other biblical narratives, where women in the story go unnamed. But the reference to Uriah as her ba’al [lord] does suggest a distancing from David, even though he is king,with seemingly unfettered power.

Second, he observes that at the conclusion of the story, after Uriah had been killed and Bathsheba had completed her mourning rites, “David again sent for Bathsheba and ‘harvested’ her”. He comments on the Hebrew word used here, asap; he maintains that it was usually used “for harvesting a crop or mustering an army”, and here it “further implies King David’s capacity for cold and calculating ruthlessness, which was exercised in his power rape of Bathsheba and subsequent summoning (“harvesting”) of her to the palace.”

That might be pushing the point too far. The word asap is indeed used many times to refer to picking crops and taking them home, and also to gathering men for an army. But it is used on some occasions simply to refer to gathering a person to take them to another person, without any sense of duress or force being involved.

We find such a “neutral” sense on the death of Jacob (Gen 49:33), when Saul recruits soldiers for his army (1 Sam 14:52), in the command to care for a neighbour’s lost animal (Deut 22:2), in the psalmist’s words that “if my father and mother forsake me, the Lord will take me up” (Ps 27:10), and in Huldah’s comforting words to King Josiah, “you shall be gathered to your grave in peace; your eyes shall not see all the disaster that I will bring on this place” (2 Ki 22:20).

And there is certainly no direct indication of physical force or emotional abuse in the report of the initial act of intercourse between David and Bathsheba. David sent messengers and “she came to him, and he lay with her” (2 Sam 11:4). But, as already noted, she really had no choice in the matter.

Today, we would call what David did coercive control, and would consider there are implicit “red flags” which the text does not make explicit. Certainly, we cannot argue for any lessening of David’s responsibility by any suggestion of any complicity on the part of Bathsheba. She was forced to have sex; she was raped by the most powerful man in the kingdom.

The second sin committed by David is not “up close and personal” like his rape of Bathsheba. It is perpetrated “at arm’s length” by others, acting at his command. Indeed, whilst the death of Uriah occurs some 150 kms or more away on the battlefield, at Rabbah, where David’s forces were besieging the Ammonites in that city, it is the command that David makes in Jerusalem, over 150km away, that reveals his sin.

And as noted in the previous blog post, David should have been on the front line with his troops; it was spring, “the time when kings go out to battle” (2 Sam 11:1), yet David is leisurely strolling on his roof, looking down to see the happenings in the nearby houses below.

The text is, once again, crystal clear about the initiative that David took and the plot that he himself had concocted: “David wrote a letter to Joab, and sent it by the hand of Uriah. In the letter he wrote, ‘Set Uriah in the forefront of the hardest fighting, and then draw back from him, so that he may be struck down and die.’ As Joab was besieging the city, he assigned Uriah to the place where he knew there were valiant warriors. The men of the city came out and fought with Joab; and some of the servants of David among the people fell. Uriah the Hittite was killed as well.” (2 Sam 11:15–17).

Whilst David does not physically murder Uriah, he issues the order, faithfully transmitted by his general, Joab, and executed by “the men of the city” (11:17). He bears ultimate responsibility. No commentator attempts to extricate him from this. And curiously, we note that the lectionary stops before the death of Uriah is reported; it ends with David’s command in his letter (v.15). It seems a strange marking of the passage. We need to read and hear the story at least through to the denouement of David’s plan: “Uriah the Hittite was killed as well” (v.17).

The situation regarding the clinical way that David carries out his plan is intensified—made worse, or made perfectly clear—by the fact that, in between his rape of Bathsheba and the murder of Uriah, David deliberately courts Uriah in a show of friendship. He asked for Uriah to leave the battlefield and come to him (v.6), enquired about the progress of the war (v.7), granted him a time of leave and sent a gift to him (v.8), and wined and dined him with a feast (v.13).

David’s intentions are clear; he wants Uriah to “go down to his house”—presumably in order for him to sleep with Bathsheba, and thus explain her pregnancy. However, Uriah twice does not do so (vv.9, 13). On the first occasion, he sleeps rough in solidarity with his men on the battle field (v.11). He explicitly states that he does not intend to sleep with his wife. On the second occasion, David has made him drunk, so he sleeps it off “on his couch with the servants of his lord” (v.13).

That Uriah “did not go down to his house”, stated twice, declares his resolute character. He will not take advantage of this unexpected call back to the comfort of the city; he maintains his integrity as one of David’s “warriors”. This is in stark contrast to David’s clinical, self-interested scheming—first, to gain Bathsheba, when she catches his eye, and then to dispatch Uriah, to have him out of the way.

We all know about David’s illicit liaison with Bathsheba—even if, as I have noted, not everybody accepts his total responsibility for what he did, and not everybody accepts that he did actually rape her. He is clearly remembered for this sin; as well as this story, the superscription to Psalm 51 reinforces this. (See more in next week’s blog.)

David’s arrangement of the murder of Uriah ought also to be known and remembered through the ages. He acted with cunning, deception, cruelty, and self-interest. It is a scathing indictment of a powerful male figure—sadly, he is just one of so, so many throughout history.

Writing in With Love to the World, Amel Manyon considers the character of David: “David was a man of faith, but he was not acting responsibly as the leader of his army when he decided to stay in Jerusalem. He was expected to do his duty—at least meditating on the law of Moses, praying, or writing psalms. Perhaps he was bored, with nothing to do?” (That’s a rather generous assessment of David’s character, I think.)

Manyon rightly notes that David “used his positional power to force Bathsheba into immorality. At the time, Bathsheba would have had no choice but to obey her leader, the King—but that is not an excuse for the leader to justify his actions. When David sent for Uriah, husband of Bathsheba, he had an opportunity to learn about leadership. Uriah had not allowed himself to enjoy time with his wife when his fellow soldiers were exposing their lives to danger for their country; David under such circumstances indulged in sinful lust and criminal actions.” The contrast is indeed striking.

Manyon relates what she says about David to contemporary leaders, noting that “we should not use our power to take what does not belong to us.” It’s a simple, succinct application. Indeed, this is what is conveyed in next week’s lectionary passage (2 Sam 12), where Nathan confronts David with the extent of his sin—he used his power to grasp what belonged to another man.

A very generous assessment of David is offered later in the long narrative history telling of the Kings of Israel and Judah. During the assessment of the reign of Abijam, a great-grandson of David and the second King of Judah after the kingdom was split in two at the death of Solomon, the narrator assesses the poor character of Abijam as one who “committed all the sins that his father did before him; his heart was not true to the Lord his God, like the heart of his father David” (1 Ki 15:3).

The narrator notes that, despite this flawed character, Abijam was able to rule for three years only because the Lord looked favourably upon David, of whom it is said, “he did what was right in the sight of the Lord, and did not turn aside from anything that he commanded him all the days of his life, except in the matter of Uriah the Hittite” (1 Ki 15:5). How interesting—and telling—that it is the sin against Uriah that is mentioned, and not the sin against Bathsheba.

What model of leadership is offered by this tale? The initial compilers of the sagas of Israel could have skimmed over this episode, allowing David to be painted in a resolutely positive light. Indeed, this is what the compiler(s) of 1–2 Chronicles does. (There is no story about David and Bathsheba in these books; it is as if it didn’t happen!) But the story is included in 2 Samuel; and David the Adulterer and David the Murderer sit alongside David the Harpist and David the Psalmist in Jewish and Christian traditions. He exemplifies the complexities of every human being. He is Everyperson. We should listen carefully, and learn from the stories told about him.

*****

Once again, I am grateful to Elizabeth Raine for her comments on this post, informed by her careful study of the text.

With Love to the World is a daily Bible reading resource, written and produced within the Uniting Church in Australia, following the Revised Common Lectionary. It offers Sunday worshippers the opportunity to prepare for hearing passages of scripture in the week leading to that day of worship. It seeks to foster “an informed faith” amongst the people of God.

You can subscribe on your phone or iPad via an App, for a subscription of $28 per year. Search for With Love to the World on the App Store, or UCA—With Love to the World on Google Play. For the hard copy resource, for just $28 for a year’s subscription, email Trevor at wlwuca@bigpond.com or phone +61 (2) 9747-1369.

Bathsheba: “she was very beautiful” (2 Sam 11; Pentecost 10B)

This coming Sunday, we read the story of David’s adultery with Bathsheba (2 Sam 11:1–15). This story is known and remembered through the ages—although it is often misinterpreted, in explanations that “blame the woman” for what, in the text, is clearly a series of actions undertaken explicitly by the man who has power, the man who decides to “take” the woman. In this regard, this ancient story resonates strongly with the experience of millions, if not billions, of women in the modern world. The #MeToo movement attests to the ongoing occurrence of sexual exploitation and abuse of women by men with power.

So the man, David, is depicted as exercising a shameful demonstration of sheer power, expressed through sexual violence. He was the King of Israel, and so had become accustomed ordering people around and getting what he wanted.

And it was, after all, “the spring of the year, the time when kings go out to battle” (2 Sam 11:1). He should have been with his troops as they were fighting the Ammonites, but instead he was walking on the rooftop, looking down into the bathing room of a nearby house where Bathsheba was bathing.

Let’s note that it was David who was up on the roof; Bathsheba was not bathing on the roof; he was looking down on her. The text is explicit: “David rose from his couch and was walking about on the roof of the king’s house, [when] he saw from the roof a woman bathing” (11:2). We’ll come back to him in a subsequent post.

In what follows, I am grateful to my wife, Elizabeth Raine, for what she has shared with me as we have explored this story. Elizabeth has spent much time with the texts relating to Bathsheba, and I have benefitted from her knowledge—and, of course, from the female perspective on this story which males need to hear and understand and appreciate.

The woman, Bathsheba, by contrast to the man, is apparently compliant in their coming together; well, what choice did she have, as David was the king, ruler supreme, with courtiers and soldiers ready to do his bidding? She had no chance, it would seem, of avoiding the trap set by David. And it is noteworthy that we hear nothing, in this narrative, of her thoughts about the whole incident. She is completely without voice in the story.

When we first meet Bathsheba in this passage, she is described as “very beautiful” (2 Sam 11:2). Let’s remember that David himself was first revealed to the readers and hearers of the ancient narrative saga as “ruddy, he had beautiful eyes and was handsome” (1 Sam 16:12). The same had been said of handsome Joseph (Gen 39:6), “a handsome young man” named Saul (1 Sam 9:2), and the same would later be said of Adonijah, a son of David (1 Ki 1:6), and much later of Daniel, with his companions in the Chaldean court (Dan 1:4). Commenting favourably on the physical appearance of a character was part of the craft of the ancient storyteller.

Bathsheba stands in a line of even more women who are introduced into the story as “beautiful”: Sarai (Gen 12:11), Leah and her sister Rachel (Gen 29:17), Abigail (1 Sam 25:3), Tamar, the daughter of David (2 Sam 13:1; 14:27), Abishag the Shunnamite (1 Ki 1:3–4), as well as Hadasseh, known as Esther (Est 2:7), the daughters of Job Job 42:15), and the “black and beautiful” lover in the Song of Songs (Song 1:5, 15–16; 4:1, 7), praised as being “as beautiful as Tirzah” (Song 6:4).

Alongside this, Bathsheba is identified in the typical terms of the day, through her relationships with key men: “Bathsheba, daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite” (11:3). However, although Bathsheba has married a foreigner, a Hittite, she did have an Israelite lineage. Her father, Eliam, is identified as the son of “Ahithophel the Gilonite” (2 Sam 23:33)—that is, he was from Giloh, a town in Judah (2 Sam 15:12) which is listed amongst the towns in “the hill country” that were taken under Joshua’s command and allocated to Judah (Josh 15:51). So she should not be regarded as foreign; she is of David’s own people.

A contemporary depiction of Uriah the Hittite

Although we know that the lineage of Uriah was Hittite, from the area to the north of Israel, he nevertheless served in the army of the Israelites, as one of “the servants of David” (2 Sam 11:17). Indeed, we subsequently learn that both Eliam and Uriah were among the chiefs, many of them from foreign tribes, who are numbered amongst “The Thirty” who had joined David’s troops in battle (2 Sam 23:24–38). They were renowned as “mighty warriors” who served David’s cause in these battles (2 Sam 23:8). So Bathsheba’s family had been important for David in gaining and retaining his powerful position.

So the man, David, is depicted as exercising a shameful demonstration of sheer power, expressed through sexual violence. He was the King of Israel, and so had become accustomed ordering people around and getting what he wanted. And it was, after all, “the spring of the year, the time when kings go out to battle” (2 Sam 11:1). He should have been with his troops as they were fighting the Ammonites, but instead he was walking on the rooftop, looking down into the bathing room of a nearby house where Bathsheba was bathing. Let’s note that he was up on the roof; she was not bathing on the roof; he was looking down on her. The text is explicit: “David rose from his couch and was walking about on the roof of the king’s house, [when] he saw from the roof a woman bathing” (11:2). We’ll come back to him in a subsequent post.

As well as this story of Bathsheba’s first encounter with David, she features at two key moments later in the narrative. In 2 Sam 12, we learn the sad news that “the Lord struck the child that Uriah’s wife bore to David, and it became very ill … [then] on the seventh day the child died” (12:15, 18). David, having been physically attracted to Bathsheba and having had intercourse with her, was deeply affected: “he pleaded with God for the child … fasted, and went in and lay all night on the ground” (12:16).

Curiously, once David had learnt that the child had died, he immediately resumed regular life, telling his servants, “while the child was still alive, I fasted and wept … but now he is dead; why should I fast? Can I bring him back again?” (12:21, 23). Strikingly, by contrast, we hear nothing of what Bathsheba felt or thought on this sad occasion. Was she also deeply affected? We might presume so, but the narrator does not choose to convey that.

Did Bathsheba resume normal life as soon as the child died? We might recoil in horror at this thought, and imagine her as carrying out the prescribed period of mourning; but again, the narrator says nothing at all about her reaction. She mourns in silence, unheard, unseen. The woman who was so badly mistreated by the king in her first encounter with him, who learnt that she needed to be subservient to him, has no agency in this later scene. She has been muted.

To his credit, however, the narrator does reveal that David then took care of Bathsheba—although the narrative is sparse at this point, reporting simply that “David consoled his wife Bathsheba, and went to her, and lay with her; and she bore a son, and he named him Solomon” (12:24). Was this to console her, or to satisfy his need for the woman he had chosen to bear him a son and heir? Was his grief for the dying child all about his lineage, rather than for the people involved?

At any rate, amidst the many offspring that David eventually produced (18 sons and one daughter, that we know of), from various wives and concubines, this child, Solomon, was already marked from the start as special; “the Lord loved him, and sent a message by the prophet Nathan; so he named him Jedidiah, because of the Lord” (2:25). Jedidiah means, simply, “beloved of the Lord”.

Bathsheba reappears in the narrative in 1 Kings 1—2, where she speaks as his wife to the king, intervening in matters of the state. First, she attends to the aged, dying king, intervening into the matter of succession. She is introduced here in relation to another male, to whom she was related; this time, she is identified as “Bathsheba, Solomon’s mother” (1 Ki 1:11). Already, as the reign of King David wanes, the star of the future King Solomon was rising.

Her involvement is because she has learnt from Nathan that Adonijah was positioned to succeed David. So Nathan uses Bathsheba to intercede for her son, reminding David of his desire for Solomon to succeed him (1:11–21). David confers with Nathan (1:22–27), and again with Bathsheba (1:28–31), before he orders the action to be taken: “have my son Solomon ride on my own mule, and bring him down to Gihon; there let the priest Zadok and the prophet Nathan anoint him king over Israel” (1:33–34). And so the deed was done. The voice of Bathsheba, at last expressed, was heard. And yet: she only speaks on the urging of Nathan. Her voice is appears conditional, tentative.

Bathsheba is involved in matters of state a second time, after the death of David (2:10), when “Solomon sat on the throne of his father David; and his kingdom was firmly established” (2:12). Here, Adonijah son of Haggith approaches her with a request that she advocate with her son on his behalf (2 Sam 2:13–18). Bathsheba submissively acquiesces to his request, and petitions her son, now the king. Adonijah, it must be noted, was smitten with Abishag the Shunammite, previously described as “very beautiful”, who had served David in his last months (1:1–4).

The intervention of Bathsheba backfires, however; on hearing of Adonijah’s request, King Solomon explodes: “Adonijah has devised this scheme at the risk of his life!” (2:23), and issues the order, “today Adonijah shall be put to death” (2:24). And so, according to the narrator, “King Solomon sent Benaiah son of Jehoiada; he struck him down, and he died” (2:25). Bathsheba has sought exercise her relational influence in these two scenes, seeking to persuade the King on particular courses of action. The first was successful, but not the second. Her attempts to gain a voice in the story of Israel and its kings—one her husband, another her son—seem to be a failure.

After this, there is no further mention of Bathsheba; her son Solomon proceeds to remove other possible contenders for the throne, so that “the kingdom was established in the hand of Solomon” (2:46) and he rules with power and wisdom for decades to come. We remember him primarily for his wisdom. We remember Bathsheba primarily for what David did with her and to her.

The role of Bathsheba in the encounter with David has regularly been misrepresented. In popular (mis)understanding, she is thought to have seduced David. This is not, however, the case. Nothing in the text of 2 Samuel indicates this in any way.

I spent a *happy* eight minutes googling conservative websites to see what they said about Bathsheba’s sin. On setapartpeople.com, we read, “David’s sin was very great, and Bath-sheba’s very small. David’s sin was deliberate and presumptuous; Bath-sheba’s only a sin of carelessness. David committed deliberate adultery and murder; Bath-sheba only carelessly and undesignedly exposed herself before David’s eyes. We have no doubt that David’s sin was great, and Bath-sheba’s small. Yet it remains a fact that Bath-sheba’s little sin was the cause of David’s great sin.” Yoiks.

On gloriouschurch.com, “Anonymous” writes, “Yet the fact remains that it was Bathsheba’s small sin that instigated David’s great sin. It was her minor act of indiscretion, her thoughtless little exposure of her body, that was the spark that kindled a great devouring flame. ‘Behold how great a matter a little fire kindleth!’ On the one side, only a little carelessness, only a little thoughtless unintentional exposure of herself before the eyes of David.”

This website continues, “But on the other side, [she instigates] adultery and guilt of conscience; murder and the loss of a husband; the death in battle of other innocent men; great occasion for the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme; the shame of an illegitimate pregnancy and the death of the child; the uprising and death of Absalom; the defiling of David’s wives in the sight of all Israel; the sword never departing from David’s house (2 Samuel 12:11-18).” Yes, I would remain anonymous, too, after that little diatribe seeking to place the weight of blame for all of David’s sins on Bathsheba!

And various websites, too many to cite and too terrible to actually quote (CBE International, Fossil Creek Church of Christ, My Only Comfort, Elmwood Baptist, the Gospel Broadcasting Network, Moving Towards Modesty … and more), provide careful and specific advice for women and girls on “dressing modestly” (drawing first of all, of course, from 1 Pet 3:1–4) in which the sin of Bathsheba being naked in full sight of the King is cited. (But just try bathing while you are still dressed and taking care of your modesty and still getting properly cleaned !!)

So did Bathsheba seduce David by being naked and stimulating his lust? In fact, the narrative of 2 Sam 11 says no such thing, nor does it provide any warrant at all for suggesting this. Bathsheba is presented as entirely innocent—indeed, as completely passive—in what takes place. Bathsheba is simply taking a bath (v.2).

Yes, Bathsheba was “very beautiful” (v.3), but it was up to David to manage himself appropriately when he happened to see Bathsheba bathing. The common misinterpretation of the incident follows the standard misogynistic practice of blaming the woman for seducing the man, and excusing the man because he was caught by the wiles of the wicked woman. That is not what the text says!

Writing in With Love to the World, Amel Manyon notes that “David used his positional power to force Bathsheba into immorality”, and then observes, “As a leader, we should not use our power to take what does not belong to us. At the time, Bathsheba would have had no choice but to obey her leader, the King—but that is not an excuse for the leader to justify his actions.”

Reflecting on this story in the light of the teachings of Jesus (Mark 9:42–48), James McGrath says, “I’ll take the opportunity to express appreciation for Jesus’ teaching that tells men to pluck out eyes and cut off organs if they are sure they cannot keep from sinning. He doesn’t say to remove someone or something else because it is not the thing that is found tempting that is to blame.” See

Blaming Bathsheba

The rabbis have much to say about Bathsheba. In the Jewish Women’s Archive, Prof. Tamar Kadari indicates that the Rabbis were well aware of Bathsheba’s innocence and David’s sinfulness. She writes that Bathsheba “had been appointed for David during the six days of Creation, but ‘he enjoyed her as an unripe fruit’, that is, he married her before the proper time, when the fruit [the fig] was still unripe. He rather should have waited until she was ready for him, after the death of Uriah (BT Sanhedrin 107a). This exposition is based on a wordplay, since, in the Rabbinic period, bat sheva was the name of an especially fine type of fig (see Mishnah Ma’aserot 2:8).”

See https://jwa.org/encyclopedia/article/bathsheba-midrash-and-aggadah

In the Jewish Virtual Library, it is noted that Bathsheba “was not guilty of adultery since it was the custom that soldiers going to war gave their wives bills of divorce which were to become valid should they fail to return and Uriah did fall in battle (Ket. 9b)”. The article also notes that rabbis later held Bathsheba in high regard: “She was a prophet in that she foresaw that her son would be the wisest of men.”

Then the article claims that Bathsheba “is numbered among the 22 women of valor (Mid. Hag. to Gen. 23:1)”—although I can’t find any such list of 22 “women of valour”. There are seven matriarchs—Sarah, Hagar, Rebekah, Leah, Rachel, and Bilhah and Zilpah—and (with one overlap, Sarah), seven prophets—Sarah, Miriam, Deborah, Hannah, Abigail, Huldah, and Esther—but no list of 22 women. Nevertheless, it is clear that Bathsheba was valued and honoured in rabbinic writings.

And so should we, too; from a most unpropitious start, she ended up an apparently significant character in David’s life, if the stories in 1 Kings 1—2 are to be accepted. And then, of course, in Christian scripture and tradition, this woman is (anonymously) given a place in the lineage of Jesus that Matthew reports in his “account of the origins of Jesus”, when he notes that “David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah” (Matt 1:6b). She is a part of the reason that the (fictive) descent of Jesus from David is claimed; she is one of just four women identified in this genealogy as ancestors of the Messiah himself.

So here’s to Bathsheba! Long may we remember, honour, and value her.

My thanks to Elizabeth Raine for her insights into the character of Bathsheba and the narratives about her.

With Love to the World is a daily Bible reading resource, written and produced within the Uniting Church in Australia, following the Revised Common Lectionary. It offers Sunday worshippers the opportunity to prepare for hearing passages of scripture in the week leading to that day of worship. It seeks to foster “an informed faith” amongst the people of God.

You can subscribe on your phone or iPad via an App, for a subscription of $28 per year. Search for With Love to the World on the App Store, or UCA—With Love to the World on Google Play. For the hard copy resource, for just $28 for a year’s subscription, email Trevor at wlwuca@bigpond.com or phone +61 (2) 9747-1369.

A king forever (2 Sam 7; Pentecost 9B)

“A king forever”. That is the promise of these well-known words in 2 Samuel 7, which we will hear and reflect on in worship this coming Sunday. They are significant words for Jews; they are also significant words for Christians, for they have informed the way that followers of Jesus would talk about him. The words are given initially to David, only the second king of Israel, but the one who would provide descendants to sit on the throne for half a millennium.

The words of the prophet Nathan, given to him (as he says) by the Lord God, are reported and remembered over those centuries as validation of the power of those kings, even though so many of them “did evil in the sight of the Lord” (as later verses in the historical narratives of Israel report). God stood by those leaders over many generations, consistently reminding the people of their responsibility to adhere to the covenant, affirming them at moments when their faith is evident, and rebuking them at times when that is not the case.

These words have been remembered further by Christians, who see that in Jesus, God has sent “the King of the ages” (1 Tim 1:17), to whom “belong the glory and the power forever and ever” (1 Pet 4:11; also Rom 16:26; Eph 3:21). This is in accord with the “eternal purpose that [God] has carried out in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Eph 3:11), to lead believers to “eternal life” (Luke 10:25; John 17:3; Rom 5:21; 6:23).

Of course, in those words which Nathan speaks to David, we recognise the play on words that occurs. David understands God to be promising a “house” which is “a house of cedar” (v.7), but God actually intends to establish “offspring after you … his kingdom” (v.12).

Writing in With Love to the World, Mel Pouvalu observes that “The word “house” is used fifteen times in 2 Samuel 7, where it has three different meanings. It refers to David’s palace (vv.1–2), to the temple of the Lord God (vv.5–7, 13), and then to David’s dynasty (vv.11, 16, 18–19, 25–27, 29).” She continues, “It is important to see that our ways are not God’s ways, even if we mean well. The story promises a stable future for generations to come, and these narratives are reminders that God will always be seeking us.”

The motif of a kingdom that lasts “forever” is linked both with the affirmation that there will be a king “forever”, and also with the belief that the covenant with Israel will last “forever”. That there will be a king “forever” is integral to God’s promise to David that “your throne shall be established forever” (2 Sam 7:16), repeated by the Chronicler, “when your days are fulfilled to go to be with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring after you, one of your own sons, and I will establish his kingdom … and I will establish his throne forever” (1 Chron 17:11–12).

The kingdom that will last “forever” is introduced by God’s words in 2 Samuel 7, where God promises David that “your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me” (2 Sam 7:16). The Chronicler also repeats this promise, quoting God as saying of David, “I will confirm him in my house and in my kingdom forever, and his throne shall be established forever” (1 Chron 17:14).

Affirmation of a covenant that will last forever is found in a number of psalms. “The Lord our God … is mindful of his covenant forever, of the word that he commanded, for a thousand generations, the covenant that he made with Abraham, his sworn promise to Isaac, which he confirmed to Jacob as a statute, to Israel as an everlasting covenant” (Ps 105:7–10).

The covenant is noted in a number of psalms. “The friendship of the Lord is for those who fear him, and he makes his covenant known to them”, sings the psalmist (Ps 25:14). “I have made a covenant with my chosen one, I have sworn to my servant David”, God sings in another psalm; “I will establish your descendants forever, and build your throne for all generations” (Ps 89:3–4).

In this same psalm, God affirms that, even if the children of David “forsake my law and do not walk according to my ordinances”, God will punish them, but “forever I will keep my steadfast love for him, and my covenant with him will stand firm … I will not violate my covenant, or alter the word that went forth from my lips” (Ps 89:28, 34). That covenant is to last “forever” (Ps 111:9).

The ultimate message, then, is that God will stand by the leaders of Israel, punishing them, forgiving them, loving them at each step along the way. A promise to sustain a king and a kingdom “forever”, by virtue of a covenant that lasts “forever”, undergirds this reality for the people of Israel. The modern nation state of Israel has adopted this confident assertion, although without any critical appreciation of the context and the purpose of this promise in antiquity. The dreadful results of this unthinking adoption of the mantra that “God is always with us” is playing out in the many deaths, injuries, and sadness that is taking place in Gaza, even today.

Of course, in the traditional understanding of Christianity, the “forever” component has been taken up in the application of 2 Samuel 7 to Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus is acclaimed as “Son of David” in the Synoptic Gospels (Mark 10:47–48; 12:35; Luke 3:31; 18:38–39; and especially in Matt 1:1, 20; 9:27; 12:23; 15:22; 20:30–31; 21:9, 15; 22:42). This claim is also noted at John 7:42; Rom 1:3; 2 Tim 2:8; Rev 3:7; 5:5; 22:16). The heritage of David lives on in these stories.

This particular son of David, as Christian understanding develops, was understood to be king “forever”; “he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end” (Luke 1:31–33). The covenant that he has renewed and enacted with the people of God is “forever” (Heb 9:15; 12:20); and the kingdom that he proclaimed and for which we hope will also be “forever” (2 Pet 1:11).

In the late first century document that we know as letter to the Ephesians, for instance, the resurrected Jesus is seen as seated at the right hand of God “in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion, and above every name that is named” (Eph 1:20–21). That place of authority for Jesus is envisaged as stretching into eternity, “not only in this age but also in the age to come” (1:20), and as encompassing all places, for God “has put all things under his feet and has made him the head over all things” (1:22).

The global and eternal rule of Christ is here clearly articulated. The statement by the writer that God “seated [Jesus] at his right hand in the heavenly places, far above all rule and authority and power and dominion” (1:20–21) has inspired the development of the imagery of Christ as Pantocrator (Greek for “ruler of all”) in Eastern churches, both Orthodox and Catholic.


Jesus Christ Pantocrator; from a mosaic in the Hagia Sophia mosque (formerly a church), in Istanbul

This line of thinking has culminated in the festival of the Reign of Christ, which has been celebrated in the Roman Catholic Church since it was introduced by Pope Pius XI in 1925. It has since been adopted by Lutheran, Anglican, and various Protestant churches around the world, and also, apparently, by the Western Rite parishes of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia.

1925 was a time when Fascist dictators were rising to power in Europe. I have read that “the specific impetus for the Pope establishing this universal feast of the Church was the martyrdom of a Catholic priest, Blessed Miguel Pro, during the Mexican revolution”; see Today’s Catholic, 18 Nov 2014, at

Christ the King

The article continues, “The institution of this feast was, therefore, almost an act of defiance from the Church against all those who at that time were seeking to absolutize their own political ideologies, insisting boldly that no earthly power, no particular political system or military dictatorship is ever absolute. Rather, only God is eternal and only the Kingdom of God is an absolute value, which never fails.”

The scriptures puncture the pomposity of powerful kings, and subversively present Jesus as the one who stands against all that those kings did. This festival provides a unique way of reflecting on the eternal kingship of Jesus. It offers a distinctive way for considering how the kingship bestowed upon David has been understood to last “forever”.

With Love to the World is a daily Bible reading resource, written and produced within the Uniting Church in Australia, following the Revised Common Lectionary. It offers Sunday worshippers the opportunity to prepare for hearing passages of scripture in the week leading to that day of worship. It seeks to foster “an informed faith” amongst the people of God.

You can subscribe on your phone or iPad via an App, for a subscription of $28 per year. Search for With Love to the World on the App Store, or UCA—With Love to the World on Google Play. For the hard copy resource, for just $28 for a year’s subscription, email Trevor at wlwuca@bigpond.com or phone +61 (2) 9747-1369.

King David and the Ark of the Covenant (2 Sam 6; Pentecost 8B)

For the passage from Hebrew Scripture this coming Sunday, the lectionary offers us selected verses from 2 Sam 6:1–19. Last week, we heard the brief account of how David, the king of Judah, took the city of Jerusalem from its inhabitants, the Jebusites, and was anointed as king of “all Israel” (5:1–10). Next week, we will hear of the promise that God makes to David, that “I will make for you a great name … your throne shall be established forever” (7:1–14).

In between these two pivotal events, establishing beyond doubt that David was both the conqueror supreme of the earlier inhabitants and the progenitor of a dynasty—“the house of David”—that would hold power for centuries to come, we have a curious, yet significant, account relating to The Ark of the Covenant (6:1–19). David uses the Ark to reinforce and undergird his authority; his intention in bringing into the city, Jerusalem, was to confirm absolutely that he was God’s anointed, in Jerusalem, ruling over all Israel.

The Ark of the Covenant had long been a focal point for people in Israel. It had travelled with them from the wilderness days (Num 10:33–36), being carried along the way by the Levites (Deut 10:8). In the book of Deuteronomy, it is important because it contained “the book of the law” which Moses had written, and which was to be read to the people of Israel every seven years (Deut 31:9–13; se also Exod 40:20).

Another perspective is offered in the priestly prescriptions relating to the complex system of sacrifices and offerings that was overseen by the priests, that are reported in excruciating detail in Exodus 25—30 and then again in Leviticus 1—7. Here, the significance of the Ark is primarily that it contained the Mercy Seat (Exod 25:17–22). It was the smearing of blood on the Mercy Seat, performed once a year by the High Priest on the Day of Atonement, that secured the forgiveness of all the sins of the people from the past year (Lev 16:1–34; see esp. vv.14–15).

The narrative of Numbers draws these two strands together, when it reports that “when Moses went into the tent of meeting to speak with the Lord, he would hear the voice speaking to him from above the mercy seat that was on the ark of the covenant from between the two cherubim; thus it spoke to him” (Num 7:89). So the significance of the Mercy Seat in the Ark of the Covenant is high.

Regardless of the significance invested in the Ark, its presence with the people during the 40 years in the wilderness was important. It appears at the end of that period of time, when Joshua prepares to lead the people into the land of Canaan. On the command of Joshua, “while all Israel were crossing over on dry ground, the priests who bore the ark of the covenant of the Lord stood on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan, until the entire nation finished crossing over the Jordan” (Josh 3:17). The miraculous power of the Ark is thus demonstrated.

What would it have looked like if there
was photography at the time???

It is referred to only once in the whole of Judges, in the closing scenes, after the abomination perpetrated by the Benjaminites in Gibeah (Judg 19). The Israelites had “inquired of the Lord (for the ark of the covenant of God was there in those days)”, and received the voice of God from the ark, “go up, for tomorrow I will give them into your hand” (Judg 20:27).

Soon after, in the very first battle with the Philistines in 1 Samuel, the Ark was captured. It had been in “the temple of the Lord” at Shiloh when Eli was priest (1 Sam 1:20, 24-28; 3:2–3), but after losing their encounter with the Philistines at Aphek, the Israelites decided to bring the Ark from Shiloh to the battlefield to reverse the result (4:1–4). The presence of the Ark, at first discomforting to the Philistines, was not able to turn the tide; “Israel was defeated, and they fled, … there was a very great slaughter, for there fell of Israel thirty thousand foot soldiers; the ark of God was captured” (4:10–11).

The Ark was sent first to Ashdod (5:1), then to Enron (5:10), before it was returned to Israel seven months later (6:1–16). They had placed inside the Ark “five gold tumours and five gold mice, according to the number of the lords of the Philistines” (6:4–5), “one for Ashdod, one for Gaza, one for Ashkelon, one for Gath, one for Ekron” (6:17). These images served as a guilt offering to the Lord God, in the hope that they would be “healed and ransomed” (6:3).

But the people of Beth-shemesh shied away from having this potent artefact in their village; after all, it has killed seventy descendants of Jeconiah who “did not rejoice with the people of Beth-shemesh when they greeted the ark of the Lord” (6:17). So it was sent on to Kiriath-jearim, where it remained without incident for 20 years (7:1–2).

The Ark then fades from the story during those years, as the narrative turns to the question of kingship (1 Sam 8—10) and Saul is eventually anointed as King (10:1). It remains absent from the accounts of Saul’s battles (1 Sam 11—14) until, out of the blue, Saul calls for the Ark to be brought to Gibeah, in the hill country of Ephraim, where he had made his base (1 Sam 14:16–18), and the particular battle being waged against the Philistines was won (14:23). Presumably it continues its travels with Saul; the next time it is mentioned is in the story we read this week in 2 Sam 6.

David bringing the Ark into Jerusalem: reproduction of a page
in an illuminated manuscript held by the J. Paul Getty Museum.

In this week’s story, David effects a change in the role played by the Ark. It is brought into Jerusalem and stays grounded there; in due course, a permanent temple will be built on the site under Solomon. When David is forced to flee the city (2 Sam 15:13–18), he takes the Ark with him to the edge of the wilderness (15:23–24), but then orders it to be sent back into the city (15:25–29). The Ark will remain as a symbol of his rule over the city and, indeed, the whole nation.

Writing in With Love to the World, Michael Brown reflects on the militaristic colonizing of King David, as he consolidates and reinforces his dominance. He observes that “David, the just-minted king of an expanded territory was starting something big and new. His royal city, permanent army, and large harem pointed to a very different reign. Yet those who prized the traditions might have queried whether this reign had legitimacy.”

This is where the Ark comes into play. Brown continues, observing that it was now “perfect timing for the ark, languishing in the back blocks but traditionally identified closely with God’s presence, to be brought by David to the new royal city as a symbol of God’s blessing.”

The Ark once again does not feature in the story told in the ensuing chapters, until after David has died (1 Ki 2:10). Once he is king, Solomon “came to Jerusalem where he stood before the ark of the covenant of the Lord; he offered up burnt offerings and offerings of well-being, and provided a feast for all his servants” (1 Ki 3:15). The Ark was due to be superseded by the Temple, in whose inner courtyard the Ark would be placed (1 Ki 6:19).

And so, at the dedication of the Temple, “the priests brought the ark of the covenant of the Lord to its place, in the inner sanctuary of the house, in the most holy place, underneath the wings of the cherubim” (1 Ki 8:6, 21). The narrator declares that “there was nothing in the ark except the two tablets of stone that Moses had placed there at Horeb, where the Lord made a covenant with the Israelites, when they came out of the land of Egypt” (1 Ki 8:9).

Transporting the Ark of the Covenant, gilded brass relief,
Cathedral of Sainte-Marie, Auch, France.

We hear nothing more of the Ark until centuries later when Jeremiah, in exile, reports the words of the Lord: “when you have multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, they shall no longer say, “The ark of the covenant of the Lord.” It shall not come to mind, or be remembered, or missed; nor shall another one be made.” (Jer 3:16). According to an even later report, Jeremiah himself had taken “the tent and the ark and the altar of incense” and his them in a cave on “the mountain where Moses had gone up and had seen the inheritance of God” (2 Macc 2:1–5, referring to Mount Sinai of Exod 19:16–25; 24:15–18).

Cue the movie featuring Indiana Jones and the raiders of the lost ark … … …

A critical issue for us, from the story of the Ark and how it was used in ancient Israel, is the interplay between political and religious leadership that is portrayed in the Hebrew Bible narratives.What might tgat mean for people of faith today, as we reflect on and live out our faith in the public life of society?

Throughout all ancient societies, religion was very closely linked to the political situation of the particular society. In the years leading up to the story that we hear this coming Sunday, the people of Israel had been engaged in one war after another. Even when the Israelites were settled in the land, they did not have control of the whole of the land of Israel. Only after he has won victory in a number of battles, could David claim to be king of Israel. The story we hear this Sunday was when the whole land had, at last, been placed under his control.

To celebrate, he declares that Jerusalem is to be the capital city, and to commemorate this event, the Ark is brought into the new capital city. From this point onwards, not only is Jerusalem the political capital of Israel, but it is also the place where God dwells, where God is to be found.

David knows that the ruling monarch must be seen to be favoured by God. What better way than to make his chosen capital the centre of the religion of Israel? Any disgruntled Jews from the northern kingdom cannot attack David’s city without seeming to attack God, so David has astutely consolidated his grip on the monarchical power.

In one way, it makes sense to link religious celebration with political victory. This is a natural connection that people have often made throughout history – thanking the god who they worship when a significant military victory is won.

But it is also a dangerous practice. It can lead to political leaders making claims about God being on their side and not on the other side. It can lead to arrogant actions. It can lead to a distortion of religion, when it is pressed into the service of the state. The kings of ancient Israel are not immune to these charges; from Samuel onwards, prophet after prophet had made it very clear that kings frequently put self and power before their obedience to God.

In today’s world there are many instances of corrupt governments and abuse of power, where human rights are ignored and God’s name is abused. Russia, China, Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, various Middle Eastern countries, Myanmar and some other Asian nations, and quite a number of sub-Saharan African countries come to mind. And even democracies, heading by the United States of America, display indications of the abuse of power and the presence of corruption. The problem is endemic.

As people of faith, we need to be on our guard against the temptation to use our faith to claim superiority or act unethically. Rather, our faith should guide us to act in ways that influence for good the politics of the society in which we live. Only then can we expect the church to inspire and transform the society around us. Only then can we truly be called people of God.

See also

David and Michal, Uzzah and the Ark (2 Sam 6; Pentecost 8B)

With Love to the World is a daily Bible reading resource, written and produced within the Uniting Church in Australia, following the Revised Common Lectionary. It offers Sunday worshippers the opportunity to prepare for hearing passages of scripture in the week leading to that day of worship. It seeks to foster “an informed faith” amongst the people of God.

You can subscribe on your phone or iPad via an App, for a subscription of $28 per year. Search for With Love to the World on the App Store, or UCA—With Love to the World on Google Play. For the hard copy resource, for just $28 for a year’s subscription, email Trevor at wlwuca@bigpond.com or phone +61 (2) 9747-1369.

David took the stronghold of Zion, which is now the city of David (2 Sam 5; Pentecost 7B)

Jerusalem. It features in the passage that is proposed by the lectionary for reading and reflection in worship this coming Sunday (2 Sam 5:1–10). Jerusalem. The name of the city evokes all manner of responses.

In our own time, Jerusalem has been the focal point for bitterly-contested claims about land. On a high point in the city, the sacred Jewish site of Mount Zion, on a base which formed the foundation for the Temple built two millennia ago, sits the gleaming gold dome of a Muslim holy building. It has been contested territory for decades, ever since the modern state of Israel was established. Today, both Israeli Jews and Palestinian Muslims claim Jerusalem as the capital city of their contested territory.

Jerusalem has significance in Jewish tradition as the place where Abraham was said to have been tested by a command to sacrifice his son, Isaac (Gen 22), where David based his kingdom over a united Judah and Israel (2 Sam 5), where Solomon built a temple to the Lord God (1 Ki 3:1; 8:1–9:25), and where the returning exiles came to focus their rebuilding of religion and society after their years in Babylon (Ezra 1—3; Neh 7—8). The more highly conservative of Jews today anticipate that, when the Messiah comes, he will oversee the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem.

Jerusalem also has significance in Islam, as the last place visited by the Prophet Mohammed before he ascended into the heavens (Quran 17:1), as well as being a key place in the events to take place at the end of the world. The city is called Al-Quds, meaning “the noble, sacred place”. It is reported that Mohammed instructed faithful people to make pilgrimages to three places: Mecca, Medinah, and Jerusalem. The Dome of the Rock, with its golden-topped mosque, is a stunning reminder of the importance of the city to Muslims.

And Jerusalem has gained central significance in Christianity because it was the place where Jesus was arrested, tried, crucified, and buried (Mark 14—15 and parallels); where, in some traditions, his earliest disciples laid claim to having seen him alive (Luke 24:33–53; John 20:19–29); and where, according to Luke’s orderly narrative, the first gathering of “apostles and elders” made decisions about “what God had done … among the Gentiles” (Acts 15:6–29).

So the passage for this coming Sunday (2 Sam 5:1–10) touches on a deeply symbolic element of the story, not only of ancient Israelite religion and modern Judaism, but also of contemporary Christian and Muslim sensitivities about Jerusalem.

The city of Jerusalem in 1997, showing the quarters
allocated to Jews, Christians, Muslims, and Armenians
(Encyclopedia Britannica)

The history-like narratives that form the books in the extended series of Exodus, Numbers, Joshua, Judges, 1–2 Samuel, and 1–2 Kings tell the story, mythologised and valorised, of the development of Israel from its early days. These narratives most likely originated as oral stories, told and retold over the years, coming into written form many centuries after they were first told. We have access to these stories only through the written compilation that we have in Hebrew Scripture, most likely finalised in the time leading up to or during the exiles of the people of Israel and Judah from the 7th and 6th centuries BCE.

The lectionary selection this Sunday (2 Sam 5:1–10) tells of the taking of Jerusalem by the army of King David, soon after the elders of Israel had anointed him as king (2 Sam 5:3). His rule, we are told, would last for another 33 years; coming after the seven years that he had already ruled Judah, this would make for forty years as king (2 Sam 5:4-5). And in these biblical narratives, “forty years” is the way of describing “a long, long time”. The dominance of David over his kingdom is signalled in this claim.

In listening to this passage, we need to remember that we are not dealing with a precise and accurate historical account of David’s taking control of the city of Jerusalem; not that such an objective factual account could ever exist, for all “history” is told from a specific perspective, and other perspectives on the same events are equally possible and valid. So this is an account from a later time, told to explain and justify the place that Jerusalem has held amongst “the house of David”, the people of Israel.

The city forms a stronghold for David, as he consolidates his power. This is but one in a number of battles that David engaged in, beginning with his his centre-stage role in the ongoing war against the Philistines, when he slew the giant Goliath (1 Sam 17). David held power through years of wrangling with Saul, before his dominance was secured. His earlier years as ruler of the united kingdom continued to be unsettled. The narrator cites a song that was later sung about these two kings, as their troops battled each other, as well as mutual enemies: “Saul has killed his thousands, and David his ten thousands” (1 Sam 21:11).

After fighting the Philistines, Saul has 85 priests of Nob slaughtered (22:1–19); David leads his men in “raids on the Geshurites, the Girzites, and the Amalekites … leaving neither man nor woman alive” (27:8–11). He did battle once again with the Philistines (29:1–11); the narrator then provides a list of the many towns “where David and his men had roamed” (30:27–31). Presumably in those places they had murdered and pillaged as well.

2 Sam 8–12 lists ongoing battles in which David features: attacking the Philistines yet again (8:1), then the Moabites (8:2), the Syrians under Hadadezer of Zobah (8:3–8), the Edomites (8:13–14), the Ammonites (10:14) and the Arameans (10:15–19), and then the Ammonites once again (12:26–31). The conquest of Jerusalem from the Jebusites that features in the passage we read this coming Sunday (2 Sam 5:1–10) is but one of many armed conflicts that David leads.

It is ironic that the name of the city, Jerusalem, most likely means “city of peace”; the word combines two Semitic roots, yry, meaning “foundation”, and shlm, meaning “peace”. The name signifies that the city provides the foundation for peace. Yet the city was (and sadly, today, continues to be) anything but a city of peace. Even in his day, David used the site as a means to his own political ends; he takes the city from its Jebusite inhabitants and builds a foundation where God’s holiness could be reinforced and celebrated.

The Jebusites had long been the inhabitants of the city named in scripture as Jerusalem. This people appear with regularity in the list of peoples who were “the inhabitants of the land” that was initially, so the story goes, promised to Abraham and his descendants: “to your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites” (Gen 15:18–21).

In the book of Exodus, the Lord God declares of the Israelites in Egypt, “I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the country of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites” (Exod 3:7–8; see also 3:17; 13:5; 23:23; 33:2; 34:11).

Numbers 32 then purports to give a detailed account, in advance, of the various kingdoms and their cities that will be conquered and divided up amongst the twelve tribes of Israel, as they capture them, dispossess the people (see v.39), and rename the towns and villages. The command to “dispossess” the people of their land runs through Moses’s long speech that is reported in Deuteronomy (see Deut 7:17; 9:1–3; 11:1–3; 12:29; 31:3).

Deuteronomy 9:1–3

The instructions are clear: “You must demolish completely all the places where the nations whom you are about to dispossess served their gods, on the mountain heights, on the hills, and under every leafy tree. Break down their altars, smash their pillars, burn their sacred poles with fire, and hew down the idols of their gods, and thus blot out their name from their places. You shall not worship the Lord your God in such ways.” (Deut 12:2–4).

Before this speech, as they stand on the threshold of the land of Canaan, the people were hesitant about entering; it was reported, “the people [in Canaan] are stronger and taller than we; the cities are large and fortified up to heaven” (Deut 1:28). The Lord God chastens them and insists they press ahead to enter the land, where they will find “a land with fine, large cities that you did not build, houses filled with all sorts of goods that you did not fill, hewn cisterns that you did not hew, vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant” (Deut 6:10–11). For will give this all to them.

The book of Joshua then recounts the forceful invasion of the tribes of Israel into the land of Canaan, when list of the peoples whom “the living God who without fail will drive out from before you” includes “the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites, and Jebusites” (3:10; see also 12:8; 24:11). The violence perpetrated in this invasion and conquest is made clear by incident after incident in this book and then in the following book of Judges. It was a violent time indeed.

The Jebusites are amongst the peoples identified in the genealogical lists of Genesis as the descendants of Canaan (Gen 10:15–18); in Numbers, we learn that “the Amalekites live in the land of the Negeb; the Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites live in the hill country; and the Canaanites live by the sea, and along the Jordan” (Num 13:29).

At one point in the narrative relating to Joshua, the Israelites engaged in battle with the king of Jerusalem and four other kings (Josh 10:1–5); they were put to death (Josh 10:23–27) and the boundary if the land of the people of Judah was said to have gone “up by the valley of the son of Hinnom at the southern slope of the Jebusites (that is, Jerusalem)” (Josh 5:8). However, the account of the towns of Judah concludes with the note that “the people of Judah could not drive out the Jebusites, the inhabitants of Jerusalem; so the Jebusites live with the people of Judah in Jerusalem to this day” (Josh 15:63).

Then, when the book of Judges was compiled, a similar note was included to the effect that “the Lord was with Judah, and he took possession of the hill country … [but] the Benjaminites did not drive out the Jebusites who lived in Jerusalem; so the Jebusites have lived in Jerusalem among the Benjaminites to this day” (Judg 1:19, 21).

As an explanation as to how “the Israelites did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, forgetting the Lord their God, and worshiping the Baals and the Asherahs” (Judg 3:7), the author of this narrative explains that “the Israelites lived among the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; and they took their daughters as wives for themselves, and their own daughters they gave to their sons; and they worshiped their gods” (Judg 3:5–6).

So when David comes to the city, the narrative preserved in the scriptures of the Israelites clearly records that he led his army into the city to take “the stronghold of Zion” and to proclaim that it “is now the city of David” (2 Sam 5:7). Hebrew Scripture makes it abundantly clear that the Israelites took over control of this remaining Canaanite settlement by force, just as earlier generations of Israelites had invaded and conquered the people of the wider territory of Canaan, and then waged war against the Philistines.

The narrative had earlier reported that the youthful David, after he had fought and killed the Philistine giant, Goliath, had taken Goliath’s head in triumph into Jerusalem (1 Sam 17:54). However, at this point the narrative had not recorded the transfer of power in Jerusalem from the Jebusites to the Israelites. So this claim is a somewhat anachronistic note, most likely influenced by the understanding that Jerusalem would become the central location of importance for David’s kingdom. (It would be like an Australian talking about going to Canberra in the late 19th century, years before the city was established in 1913.)

A depiction of 2 Sam 5:8

In this Sunday’s passage, as David’s Israelite troops approach the city, a curious declaration is made by the local inhabitants, the Jebusites, that any people marked by the imperfection of impurities—the blind, the lame—will be barred from it (v.8). An article on the Jebusites in the Jewish Encyclopedia refers to “a midrash quoted by Rashi on II Sam. v. 6” which explained that “the Jebusites had in their city two figures—one of a blind person, representing Isaac, and one of a lame person, representing Jacob—and these figures had in their mouths the words of the covenant made between Abraham and the Jebusites.” If that was the case, then the Jebusites were presumably trusting in these idols to ensure the security of their city against the Israelite invaders.

See https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/8542-jebusites

Another view is summarised by Daniel Gavron in his article on “History of Jerusalem: Myth and Reality of King David’s Jerusalem”, in the Jewish Virtual Library. Gavron notes that the eminent Israeli scholar Yigael Yadin had proposed that the people with disabilities were actually to be used as the “first line of defence” against David and his troops.

Yadin draws on the connection between the Jebusites and the ancient Hittite kingdom, noting that there is evidence that soldiers in that kingdom were required to swear an oath of loyalty to the king; should they fail in that loyalty, they would become lame or blind or deaf. So the threat posed by the blind or the lame was to be met by the soldiers of David by their attacking the city—they were used as taunts by David to provoke his men to attack.

See https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/myth-and-reality-of-king-david-s-jerusalem#google_vignette

It is worth noting, perhaps, that the blind and the lame form part of a large cluster of unclean people who were prohibited from bring offerings to the holy God in the Temple (Lev 21:16–18). They are also those whom, according to Jeremiah, the Lord God will come to gather exiles “from the farthest parts of the earth, among them the blind and the lame, those with child and those in labour, together; a great company, they shall return here” (namely, to Jerusalem; Jer 31:8).

Then, of course, they are amongst those who attest to the way that the power of God is at work in Jesus: “the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them” (Matt 11:5; Luke 7:22). Blind and lame came to Jesus by the Sea of Galilee (Matt 15:30–31) and in the Temple in Jerusalem (Matt 21:14); and Jesus instructs his followers, “when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind” (Luke 14:13; also 14:21). They form part of the signs of the kingdom of God which is breaking into the world through Jesus.

Out of the depths (Psalm 130; Pentecost 6B)

The psalm offered by the lectionary for this coming Sunday, Psalm 130, is one of a series of 15 psalms (Psalms 120—134), each of which is each identified as shir hammalowt, “a song of ascents”. They are so called because it is believed they were sung by faithful Israelites as they made their pilgrimage, ascending to Jerusalem, on one of the three annual festivals—the Feast of Unleavened Bread (Passover), the Feast of Weeks (Pentecost), and the Feast of Tabernacles (as listed in Deut 16:16).

The series of Songs of Ascent begins with “in my distress I cry to the Lord” (Ps 120:1), moving on to “I lift up my eyes to the hills” (Ps 121:1). I like to imagine that this was being sung as the outline of the city built on and around Mount Zion appeared in the far distance. We can imagine the pilgrims drawing closer to the walls of the city as the psalmist sings, “I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!’” (Ps 122:1), then sings of lifting up their eyes to “you who are enthroned in the heavens” (Ps 123:1).

Next, the pilgrims offer expressions of trust in God (Ps 124:8; 125:1–2), celebrating “when the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion” (Ps 126:1), and yearn that the Lord God might “restore our fortunes … like the watercourses in the Negeb” (Ps 126:4).

By this time, I imagine the pilgrims viewing both the city from outside its walls and the Temple on its highest point, singing “unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain; unless the Lord guards the city, the guard keeps watch in vain” (Ps 127:1). This psalm then celebrates the gift of sons (Ps 127:4–5) and the following psalm celebrates “your wife [who] will be like a fruitful vine within your house; your children will be like olive shoots around your table”, concluding “thus shall the man be blessed who fears the Lord” (Ps 128:3–4).

I also like to imagine that, as the pilgrims were entering the city, the pilgrims sang to celebrate, “the Lord is righteous; he has cut the cords of the wicked” (Ps 129:4), followed by a heartfelt cry to God from “out of the depths” (Ps 130:1) and an affirmation that “with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him is great power to redeem” (Ps 130:7).

Next, the psalmist simply observes, “I have calmed and quieted my soul” (Ps 131:2); and then, as the Temple is immediately before them, the pilgrims sing, “Let us go to his dwelling place, let us worship at his footstool” (Ps 132:7).

Then follows the two shortest of all the Songs of Ascent, to bring the series to a close. One song celebrates the unity of the people, with oil running down the head “like the dew of Hermon, which falls on the mountains of Zion” (Ps 133:3), and then in the final song the pilgrims are “stand[ing] by night in the house of the Lord”, concluding with the prayer, “may the Lord, maker of heaven and earth, bless you from Zion” (Ps 134:3). It is a beautiful blessing to conclude the whole sequence.

In Psalm 130, the psalmist utters a cry of deep despair: “out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord” (Ps 130:1), picking up the opening prayer of the first song of ascent, “in my distress I cry to the Lord, that he may answer me” (Ps 120:1). The depths of the earth were the place where sinful people went (Ps 63:9; Isa 14:15), following the lead of the Egyptians who pursued the Israelites and “went down into the depths like a stone” (Exod 5:4–5; Neh 9:11; Isa 63:11–13). There, in the depths, God’s anger burned (Deut 32:22). It would indeed be a place causing distress, as the psalmist’s prayer recognises.

However, those banished to the depths were able to be brought back from the depths by God’s decree (Ps 68:22; 71:20; 86:13), so in this psalm the cry of the psalmist from the depths is followed by the plea, “Lord, hear my voice! Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications!” (Ps 130:2).

This plea, “hear my voice”, is uttered in three other psalms (Ps 28:2; 64:1; 119:49), and twice the psalmist affirms that God does indeed listen: “O Lord, in the morning you hear my voice” (Ps 5:3) and “evening and morning and at noon I utter my complaint and moan, and he will hear my voice” (Ps 55:17).

Supplication is regularly made by the psalmist (Ps 28:2; 30:8; 55:1; 86:6; 119:170; 142:1) and the affirmation is clear: “the Lord has heard my supplication; the Lord accepts my prayer” (Ps 6:9). The psalmist’s confidence in God’s trustworthy response to prayer is undergirded by three qualities attributed to God in this short psalm: forgiveness (v.4), steadfast love (v.7a), and power to redeem (vv.7b—8).

The psalmist prays for forgiveness from God (Ps 25:18: 79:9) and affirms that “Praise is due to you, O God, in Zion; and to you shall vows be performed, O you who answer prayer!”, for “when deeds of iniquity overwhelm us, you forgive our transgressions” (Ps 65:1–3). In another psalm, we hear the song, “happy are those whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered” (Ps 32:1), which thus undergirds the affirmation in this psalm, “there is forgiveness with you, so that you may be revered” (Ps 130:4).

With this trusting attitude, the psalmist sings, “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits” (Ps 130:5–6), reflecting a common attitude across many psalms, waiting for the Lord: “you are the God of my salvation; for you I wait all day long” (Ps 25:5); “it is for you, O Lord, that I wait; it is you, O Lord my God, who will answer” (Ps 38:15); “for God alone my soul waits in silence, for my hope is from him” (Ps 62:5). So the psalmist encourages others, “be strong, and let your heart take courage, all you who wait for the Lord” (Ps 31:24) and affirms that “those who wait for the Lord shall inherit the land” (Ps 37:9).

As the psalmist waits, it is trust in the steadfast love of God which is envisaged and yearned for (Ps 130:7). Elsewhere, the psalmist addresses God as “a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness” (Ps 86:15) and sings of how “steadfast love and faithfulness will meet; righteousness and peace will kiss each other” (Ps 85:10). The refrain which praises God’s steadfast love and faithfulness is found in many places in the Hebrew Scriptures (Exod 34:6; 2 Chron 30:8–9; Neh 9:17, 32; Jonah 4:2; Joel 2:13; Ps 86:15; 103:8, 11; 111:4; 145:8–9).

Accordingly, the prophet Micah affirms that God’s steadfast love will rescue those who “lick dust like a snake, like the crawling things of the earth”, and will indeed “cast all our sins into the depths of the sea” (Mic 7:17, 19). This may be a vivid description of the state in which the psalmist finds themself, as they cry “out of the depths” (v.1); there, the steadfast love of the Lord will indeed meet them (v.7). So the psalmist confidently affirms, “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope” (Ps 130:5).

In that waiting, the psalmist believes, the redemption of the Lord will surely be experienced: “Israel, hope in the Lord! For with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him is great power to redeem. It is he who will redeem Israel from all its iniquities” (Ps 103:7–8). Through the establishment of the covenant and the giving of Torah, God “sent redemption to his people;” (Ps 111:9), and so prayers seeking redemption are regularly offered: “rise up, come to our help; redeem us for the sake of your steadfast love” (Ps 44:26); “redeem me from human oppression, that I may keep your precepts” (Ps 119:134); “as for me, I walk in my integrity; redeem me, and be gracious to me” (Ps 26:11).

The psalmist is confident, also, about God’s redemptive activity: “I call upon God, and the Lord will save me … he will redeem me unharmed from the battle that I wage, for many are arrayed against me” (Ps 55:16, 18). The foundational story of the Exodus, the primal myth of the people of Israel, assures the psalmist of the promise of abode that “I will free you from the burdens of the Egyptians and deliver you from slavery to them; I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment” (Exod 6:6).

That same divine redemption continued to bring the people into the land promised to them; as David asked of God, “is there another nation on earth whose God went to redeem it as a people, and to make a name for himself, doing great and awesome things for them, by driving out before his people nations and their gods?” (2 Sam 7:23; 1 Chron 17:21). So as the psalmist prays out of the depths, confidently waiting for God to act, they know that “it is [the Lord] who will redeem Israel from all its iniquities” (Ps 130:8).

This psalm resonates with me, from its opening plea, “out of the depths I cry”, to its closing affirmation that, through “the steadfast love” of the Lord, “he will redeem”. In my own moments of deep distress, I have experienced comfort and assurance that I am not unvalued. The love and care of people, grounded in their own faith and expressed in specifically acts of support for and encouragement towards me, have brought the transforming, redeeming presence of the loving God into my life at those moments of distress. I am grateful for this; my own faith has been deepened and strengthened in this way.

My favourite musical setting of the psalm is that by contemporary Estonian composer Arvo Pärt, a setting for a four-part male choir, with organ and percussion. In this short seven- minute piece, Pärt employs his distinctive style of a slowly-moving ostinato in the deep notes of the organ as a foundation, over which the choir moves slowly, building in volume to a climactic moment in unison, just before the music dies away at the end, returning to silence, the ending marked by a single note from a tubular bell.

Music critic John Irvine, in reviewing this piece, wrote: “De Profundis (1980) is an impassioned and yet simple vocal setting … where the voices climb out of the very depths of despair, with a funereal drum beat. Immediately we are drawn into an atmosphere of impassioned worship and reverence.” (https://www.crossrhythms.co.uk/products/Paul_Hilliars_Theatre_Of_Voices/Arvo_Part_De_Profundis/17054/)

This is the artwork that Elizabeth purchased for me on my 70th birthday. It is a piece which we saw at the “Urban Narratives” exhibition last year in Newcastle, held by Timeless Textiles. It is called De Profundis, Latin for “Out of the Depths”, which is how Psalm 130 begins. This psalm contains the affirmation of hope, “my soul waits for the Lord, more than those who watch for the morning”.

The artwork was made by ESZTER BORNEMISZA, an artist based in Budapest, Hungary. She works with waste newspaper, vintage cloth, and other soft materials that she finds “discarded”. Her basic process of creation is machine stitching and paper casting with additional elements of printing, dyeing and painting.

She writes, “From the beginning I have worked with various used textiles, which I have inherited and received from friends. I feel more conscious of environmental issues when I recycle material trying to draw attention to the environmental impact of waste; while tons of garments end up in the dump, we still keep the same level of consumption. I also like to experiment with used materials that I up-cycle to give them new connotations: spoilt X-ray films, computer keyboard integrated circuit films and buttons, discarded electric and chicken-wires and plastic covering sheets from constructions wastes.

“Recently I have mainly used newsprints that play a central role in my work as they provide further visual experiences by their ephemeral character. They are fragile; the content is obsolete sometimes already at the hour of appearance while still bearing fragments of important details from the recent past. They deliver deluges of information from which we must sift out the true from the fake. I use them in my recent translucent works capturing the play of opaque and open elements that play an important role: the shadow behind the work adds another layer of complexity.”

This explains something of why I really love this striking piece of art—combining wonderful artistic creativity with social commentary and environmental responsibility!

See her portfolio of works at https://bornemisza.com

David, Jonathan, and Michal (1 Sam 18–20; 2 Sam 1; Pentecost 6B)

In the days leading up to this Sunday, we are thinking of the lament which opens the book we know as 2 Samuel, where David sings of his love for both King Saul and his son Jonathan (2 Sam 1:1, 17–27). As the lectionary has jumped from the rollicking yarn of how David killed Goliath (1 Sam 17), to this sorrowful lament that David sings (2 Sam 1), it has leapt over some important stories.

Jonathan as depicted by photographer James C. Lewis

We have had little opportunity to consider Jonathan, who had been in an intense and intimate relationship with David; he features in the battles of 1 Sam 13—14, but the lectionary has omitted all of these scenes. Nor have we had opportunity to consider Michal, the sister of Jonathan, who was married to David as his first wife—of eight: for after her came Ahinoam the Yizre’elite; Abigail, the widow of Nabal the Carmelite; Maacah, the daughter of Talmay, king of Geshur; Haggith; Abigail; and Eglah.

A list in 1 Chron 3:1–8 identifies eighteen of David’s sons, before concluding “these were David’s sons, besides the sons of the concubines”, and then adding the tag- line, “and Tamar was their sister” (1 Chron 3:9).

David’s relationship with Jonathan was, as we have seen, intense and intimate: “the soul of Jonathan was bound to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul. Saul took him that day and would not let him return to his father’s house. Then Jonathan made a covenant with David, because he loved him as his own soul.” (1 Sam 18:1–3).

The verb used here is אָהַב (ahab), the same used throughout the ancestral narratives for the love of a man for a woman (Gen 24:67; 25:28; 29:18, 20, 30, 32; 34:3; Judg 16:4; 1 Sam 1:5; 2 Sam 13:1, 4, 15; 1 Ki 11:1; 2 Chron 11:21). It is also used for God’s love for Israel (Deut 7:8; 1 Ki 10,9; 2 Chron 2:11; 9:8)—and, of course, God is understood as the husband (masculine) of Israel (feminine) (Hos 2:16; Isa 54:5–7; Jer 31:32; Ezek 16:8–14; and see Eph 5:31–32; Rev 21:2).

David’s relationship with Michal comes after her father, Saul, had offered David his daughter Merab as his wife—an offer which David politely declined (1 Sam 18:17–19). The first we know of Michal is the stark comment, “Saul’s daughter Michal loved David” (18:20, repeated at v.28). The verb used is אָהַב (ahab), the same used of David’s love for Jonathan (1 Sam 20:17; 2 Sam 1:16). Michal’s love for David had the same quality, the same character, as Jonathan’s love for David, and David’s love for Jonathan.

Perhaps we might reflect more on what David says when he compares Jonathan’s love for him with the love of women for him (2 Sam 1:26). Remember, he had no less than eight wives, who bore him at least nineteen children! So David knew a lot, we might assume about “the love of women”.

In his lament, David remembers that Jonathan’s love for him was “wonderful” (2 Sam 1:27). This is one possible translation of the word used here, פָלָא (pala), which has the sense of something extraordinary, something surpassing normal phenomena. It is used on occasion to refer to the miraculous “signs” that God performed in redeeming Israel from slavery in Egypt (Exod 3:20; Judg 6:13; 1 Chron 16:9–12; Neh 9:17) and that are promised to Israel in future years (Exod 34:10; Josh 3:5). David’s praise for Jonathan’s love is high indeed!

It is worth pondering these two forms of love that revolve around David in the early stages of his kingship. My wife, Elizabeth Raine, has undertaken a careful analysis of how these two relationships are described, and has noted a striking set of comparisons that are drawn between the way that David experienced his living relationship with Jonathan, and his relationship with his first wife, Michal.

David had married Michal (1 Sam 18:20–27) soon after he had entered into the covenant with Jonathan (1 Sam 18:3–5). Michal and Jonathan are both children of Saul, but they show more loyalty to Saul’s competitor (David) than to Saul. Their stories are told side-by-side side in 1 Samuel 18—20. What follows is Elizabeth’s analysis.

When we make careful comparisons, the results are surprising: traditional Hebrew male traits are attached to Michal, the female; whilst traditional Hebrew feminine traits are linked with Jonathan, the male. David relates to Michal as a man relates to a man, whilst David relates to Jonathan as a man relates to a woman.

David and Michal

We are told that Michal loved David and made it known (1 Sam 18:20, 18:28). This is the only time in 1—2 Samuel when a woman chooses her husband; usually the man chooses his wife. We note that it is never said that David married Michal for love, unlike the feelings that he appears to have had for Bathsheba (2 Sam 12:24; so also at the end of his life, in 1 Ki 1–2). Rather, David marries Michal for political reasons; he wants to be the son-in-law of King Saul.

Michal’s masculinity is contrasted with effeminate nature of her husband, Paltiel, who runs along crying when David forcibly reclaims Michal (2 Sam 3:16). Michal’s masculine traits are on show when she takes assertive physical action, unlike the typical Hebrew female (with just a few exceptions, like Jael and Deborah). First, Michal saves David by physically lowering him out a window (1 Sam 19:12). Then, she arranges her bed to make it appear that David is there (1 Sam 19:13), she lies to messengers, and then she lies to Saul (1 Sam 19:14–15).

Finally, Michal never bore a child to David; she does not fulfil the primary female role for women. And Michal is never described as beautiful, as other biblical women are: Abigail (1 Sam 25:3), Bathsheba (2 Sam 11:2), Tamar (2 Sam 13:1; 14:27), the queen of Ophir (Ps 45:11), and Esther (Esther 2:7)—and, over and over, the woman, “black and beautiful”, of the Song of Solomon.

Thus, Michal is cast in a most unfeminine role.

David and Jonathan

By contrast, David’s love and tenderness are reserved for Jonathan (2 Sam 1:26). On a number of occasions, as we have noted, Jonathan makes known his warm feelings for David (1 Sam 18:1; 19:1; 20:17). When Jonathan declares his feelings for David, David meets him and reciprocates with extravagant actions: “he prostrated himself with his face to the ground, bowed three times, and they kissed each other, and wept with each other; David wept the more” (1 Sam 20:41).

David and Jonathan kissed and wept with intensity until David ends their encounter with words pregnant with meaning: “the Lord shall be between me and you, and between my descendants and your descendants, forever” (1 Sam 20:42). These words evoke the covenantal commitment made by Jacob with Laban at Galeed—the Mizpah blessing, “the Lord watch between you and me, when we are absent one from the other” (Gen 31:49). The intensity of David’s covenantal promise is unparalleled elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible.

The narrative is clear that Jonathan assumes a role exactly like David’s women. Saul condemns Jonathan for choosing “the son of Jesse”—he won’t even name him (1 Sam 20:30–31)—and says it “to your own shame and the shame of your mother’s nakedness”, a polite way of referring to her genitalia (1 Sam 20:30). Saul is angered at his public shaming by Jonathan’s choice, and he wants to put David to death (1 Sam 20:31). When the tables turn later, David refuses to kill Saul (1 Sam 24:8–15), turning around Saul’s view of him (1 Sam 24:17–21).

David and Jonathan contract a covenant which is analogous to a marriage agreement (1 Sam 18:3) and the text, as we have seen, stresses a number of times that Jonathon had love for David. Jonathan, in turn, is prepared to give up his kingdom for David (1 Sam 18:3). Then, in David’s lament after he learns of Jonathan’s death, he declares that his love for Jonathan was greater than his love for any woman (2 Sam 1:26).

Although Jonathan saves the life of David, he never uses physical means; it is not by action, but by talk, that he does this—exhibiting much more of the characteristic feminine traits in this regard (1 Sam 20:26—29). When David concocts a lie for Jonathan to tell the messengers, Jonathan remains passive (1 Sam 20:4—11); in this, Jonathan acts in the way that Abigail later does (1 Sam 25). Then, David later adopts Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan (2 Sam 4:4; 9:6–13).

Finally, we might well deduce that, as David presumably had sexual relations with each of his wives, resulting in children from most of them, we can reasonably assume that the love which “passes the love of women” that David expresses for Jonathon (2 Sam 1:26) may well have included sexual relations.

Thus, Jonathan is cast in a most unmasculine role.

When we look at the whole story that is told in this section of 1–2 Samuel, it is very important that we note Jonathan was part of God’s divine plan. His love for David is never condemned by God or by others in the narrative, with the exception of his father, Saul, who had been cursed by God. The love that David had for Jonathan, and that Jonathan reciprocated, was expressed in a fully-formed, deep, mature relationship, about which the text gives many affirming indications.

For earlier posts on the David—Jonathan—Saul relationships, see

Saul and Jonathan, beloved and lovely! part 1 (1 Sam 18–20; 2 Sam 1; Pentecost 6B)

and

Saul and Jonathan, beloved and lovely! part 2 (1 Sam 18–20; 2 Sam 1; Pentecost 6B)

Saul and Jonathan, beloved and lovely! part 2 (1 Sam 18–20; 2 Sam 1; Pentecost 6B)

For the Hebrew Scripture passage this coming Sunday, the lectionary offers a controversial passage (2 Sam 1:1, 17–27). The controversy revolves around the nature of the relationship between David and Jonathan. That relationship has an interesting history, and comes to a full expression in this passage.

In recent decades, a critical question that has been the focus of interpretation of the relationship between Jonathan and David has been, was this a loving same-gender relationship? Quite a number of scholars have argued that this was, indeed, the case.

Of course, more conservative and fundamentalist interpreters steadfastly refute this. They offer a number of arguments in support of their claims. The way that Jonathan’s love for David (1 Sam 18:3; 20:17) and the way that David describes his love for Jonathan (2 Sam 1:26) did not have sexual connotations, they claim. Alongside this, David is never said to have “known” Jonathan, which is a way that sexual intercourse is elsewhere described (Gen 4:1, 17, 25; 1 Sam 1:19).

These conservative scholars do not see the forming of a covenant (1 Sam 18:3) as signalling a loving relationship, as it was a political mechanism, as we noted in the previous blog on this passage. They claim that the “knitting” or “binding” of Jonathan’s soul to David (1 Sam 18:1) was more akin to the love of a father for his son; they also claim that Jonathan’s shedding of his clothes (1 Sam 18:4) was not in order to make love, but done as a political gesture.

However, I think that such arguments swim against the strong current that flows through the story of Jonathan and David. Writing thirty years ago, the biblical scholars Danna Nolan Fewell and David M. Gunn observed that “few commentators afford serious consideration to reading a homosexual dimension in the story of David and Jonathan”.

Fewell and Gunn note that “this is hardly surprising, given that until recently, most have been writing out of a strongly homophobic tradition… [but] far from stretching probability, a homosexual reading … finds many anchor points in the text.” (Fewell and Gunn, Gender, Power and Promise: The Subject of the Bible’s First Story  [Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1993], 148-49.) we need to explore this claim in more detail.

The key feature of the relationship that is anchored in the text is conveyed in the word אַהֲבָה (ahabah), which is translated “love”. It is a word which appears 40 times throughout the Hebrew Scriptures, describing the relationship that God has with Israel (Deut 7:8; 1 Ki 10:9; 2 Chron 2:11; 9:8), as well as that between husband and wife (Prov 5:19; Eccl 9:9), and most specifically the sexually-passionate love expressed in the Song of Songs (Song 2:5–7; 3:5, 10). In these latter places, there are strong romantic and sexual dimensions to its meaning.

Certainly, love defines the relationship between Jonathan and David; the word is used three times in this regard, as we have noted above (1 Sam 18:3; 20:17; 2 Sam 1:26 ). Joel Baden, in a fine article “Understanding David and Jonathan”, notes that “over and over again we are told that Jonathan loved David”. He observes that while the most common sense of the term is “a non-romantic meaning of ‘covenant loyalty’ … the use of the word in the case of Jonathan seems to go beyond that.”

Baden lists the accumulation of evidence in a series of key verses. First, “Jonathan does not just ‘love’ David. ‘Jonathan’s soul became bound up with the soul of David’ (18:1).

Second, when we read that “Jonathan ‘delighted greatly in David’ (19:1)”, Baden notes that “the same Hebrew word used in Genesis to describe Shechem’s desire for Jacob’s daughter Dinah (Gen 34:19).”

Third, Baden observes that when Jonathan dies, “David laments for him in these words: ‘More wonderful was your love for me than the love of women’ (2 Sam 1:26)”. That is a very strong statement indeed; as Baden notes, “the comparison to the love of women can hardly have a political valence; this is as close to an expression of romantic attachment between two men as we find in the Bible.”

Representations of Jonathan and David
by photographer James C. Lewis

Indeed, we might reflect more on David’s comparison of Jonathan’s love for him with the love of women for him. Remember, he had no less than eight wives, who bore him at least eighteen children! So David knew a lot, we might assume about “the love of women”. It is worth pondering the comparisons that are drawn between the way that David experienced his living relationship with Jonathan, and his relationship with his first wife, Michal, whom he had married soon after he had entered into the covenant with Jonathan (1 Sam 18:20–27)—thereby incurring the wrath of Saul (18:28–29). I will explore this in a subsequent blog.

For the full discussion by Baden, see https://bibleinterp.arizona.edu/articles/2013/12/bad378027

*****

I think there are two important factors to consider as we think further about the relationship that David had with Jonathan. The first has to do with the function of the Jonathan—David relationship in the whole Samuel—Kings narrative. The second has to do without understanding of same gender sexual attraction.

With regard to the first matter: is it satisfactory simply to read the story of David and Jonathan as entirely political? Or, by contrast, as entirely personal? In a fine recent article, Nila Hiraeth offers a thoughtful and detailed consideration of the issues, drawing on a range of recent scholarly discussions of the story of David and Jonathan.

See https://thecooperativehub.com/the-opinions/the-opinions/jonathan-s-love-and-david-s-lament-part-3

Hiraeth proposes that the whole Samuel tradition (from his birth at 1 Sam 1 through to his death at 1 Sam 25) “has something to say about post exilic attitudes toward Israel’s transition to monarchy; specifically, a whispering undercurrent weighs the human cost of political pursuits and power-plays”. That is, the whole narrative has a politico-religious edge to it; the particular relationships within the narrative each contribute to that overarching purpose.

Hiraeth therefore does not discount the political dimension of the David—Jonathan relationship; she maintains that it is indeed present, but considers that this does not override the personal dimension of the story. In other words, it is not a binary, either-or, black-or-white scenario. Both political and personal aspects are integral to the story. “In Jonathan’s love we find personal attachment overlaid with political consequence”, she writes, and “in David’s lament we find political gain overlaid with personal loss”.

In terms of what this means, then, for a “queer reading” of the story of David and Jonathan, Hiraeth proposes that the story addresses the age-old tension between love and power. She notes that “the ultimate example for the prioritizing of the personal over the political in the David-Jonathan material is Jonathan, who chooses love over power. The text goes on to suggest that such an ordering of priorities can save lives, bestow dignity, shame kings into right action and move gods to mercy. Beauty for ashes; the government of heaven.”

And so, she concludes that “the David-Jonathan material of the Samuel tradition speaks most helpfully to contemporary discussions around Scripture and sexual identity, where the saving of lives and the bestowing of dignity are central concerns, and where the Christian traditions’ prioritising of power over love continues to carry a terrible human cost.”


David and Jonathan. “La Somme le Roi”, AD 1290;
French illuminated ms (detail); British Museum

A second factor that is important to consider in reading this story—as, indeed, with every story within these ancient narratives that includes elements of same gender attraction or activity—is to recognise the significant difference between ancient understandings and contemporary conceptions of sexual identity and attraction. We need to take care with how we use the terms “homosexual” and “heterosexual”. What we today understand by these terms is, most likely, not what the ancient thought about sexual identity and attraction.

Hiraeth observes that “the Bible clearly presupposes certain attitudes about sex and gender that are rooted in the socio-sexual mores of the ancient Mediterranean world and are foreign to the views likely to be defended openly by most adherents of Christianity and Judaism.” In undertaking a thorough and detailed literary-critical analysis of the texts, Hiraeth observes that “the privileging of a political or theological-political reading of Jonathan’s love over and against a personal and potentially erotic and/or sexual reading arguably has less to do with the text itself and more to do with the imposition of heteronormative values upon the text.” See https://thecooperativehub.com/the-opinions/the-opinions/jonathan-s-love-and-david-s-lament-part-3

The most detailed and helpful recent scholarly work that has been done with regard to ancient and modern conceptualisings of sexuality has been the research of Prof. Bill Loader, who over the past decade has published a number of full-length books as well as more focussed articles. See https://billloader.com

Books by Bill Loader, displayed on his website
https://billloader.com

Prof. Loader has stated an important principle of interpretation when it comes to dealing with “homosexuality” in the Bible. He notes that biblical texts reflect a worldview quite different from what contemporary scientific research reveals. He proposes that “we need to respect what these texts are and neither read into them our modern scientific understandings nor for dogmatic reasons assert that they are inerrant or adequate accounts of reality.” See https://www.billloader.com/LoaderSameSex.pdf

Citing the matter that generated great controversy in the 19th century—evolution—he observes that “mostly we have no hesitation in recognising the distance between our understandings and theirs [in antiquity] about creation’s age and evolution”. So when we think about sexuality and gender, it should be possible that just as “new information enables us to see that creation is much older and complex”, so we can see that “reducing humankind to simply male and female in an exclusive sense and denying the fact that the matter is much more complex and includes variation and fluidity, at least around the edges, or suggesting this all changed with the first human sin, is inadequate.”

In other words, when we today recognise that people can quite readily identify as “gay” or “lesbian” or “bisexual” or “asexual”, we are a world away from the ancient world in which the biblical texts were written, in which it was assumed that all people were heterosexual but some took part from time to time in sexual activity with people of the same gender. That is radically different from the committed, loving, lifelong same gender relationships that we know exist in the world today.

Prof. Loader has made available his research in an accessible series of short studies, at https://billloader.com/SexualityStudies.pdf

So let us read this passage recounting David’s love for Saul and particularly Jonathan with care. Let’s not “assume” what we think is the reality; let’s not “condemn” what we find abhorrent; let’s not “dismiss” what does not align with our personal commitments. Let’s be open to the strong possibility that the relationship between David and Jonathan was a mutually-fulfilling, deeply personal, committed and loving relationship between two adult men who had a deep-seated attraction to one another. It’s a passage that challenges us in multiple ways!

*****

For part one, see

Saul and Jonathan, beloved and lovely! part 1 (1 Sam 18–20; 2 Sam 1; Pentecost 6B)

Saul and Jonathan, beloved and lovely! part 1 (1 Sam 18–20; 2 Sam 1; Pentecost 6B)

For the Hebrew Scripture passage this coming Sunday, the lectionary offers a passage (2 Sam 1:1, 17–27) that has been the subject of controversy. The passage is a lament, sung by David on the death of Jonathan, the son of Saul. The controversy revolves around the nature of the relationship between David and Jonathan. That relationship has an interesting history, and comes to a full expression in this passage.

Depiction of Jonathan by photographer Samuel C. Lewis

We first meet Jonathan, son of Saul, when he led a thousand troops, defeating the Philistines in a battle at Gibeah (1 Sam 13:2–3). He was successful in a number of subsequent battles; Jonathan was renowned for his skill with bow and sword (2 Sam 1:22). David had met him after he had slain the Philistine giant, Goliath (1 Sam 17); the narrator of this book observes that “the soul of Jonathan was bound to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul” (1 Sam 18:1).

What Jonathan does is striking, as he “stripped himself of the robe that he was wearing, and gave it to David, and his armour, and even his sword and his bow and his belt” (1 Sam 18:4). As Saul’s firstborn son, Jonathan might have expected to have inherited the crown from his father; instead, he divests himself of all the royal trappings and places them on the one anointed as king, his friend David. The imagery has political significance. But does it also have a personal dimension?

The friendship between David and Jonathan continued through various battles until, eventually, “the Philistines overtook Saul and his sons; and the Philistines killed Jonathan and Abinadab and Malchishua, the sons of Saul” (1 Sam 31:2). Saul himself was wounded (1 Sam 31:3) but then, sensing the inevitable, he “took his own sword and fell upon it” (1 Sam 31:4).

With the death of Saul and the earlier death of Samuel (1 Sam 25:1), a new era was beginning. David, previously anointed as king over Israel by Samuel (1 Sam 16:13), was now also anointed as king over Judah (2 Sam 2:4). A united monarchy would continue for decades.

Depiction of Saul by photographer Samuel C. Lewis

The relationship between Jonathan and David has been the cause of renewed enquiry in recent decades. Was the love expressed by these two men for one another simply “bruvver love”, as best mates; or was it deeper and more controversial than this? Loving relationships between people of the same gender are increasingly accepted in today’s world, at least in Western societies. Was that what was happening between the king and the former king’s son?

The “great delight” that Jonathan had for David (1 Sam 19:1) and his complete trust in him (1 Sam 20:4) leads them to form a covenant together on the basis that Jonathan loved David “as he loved his own life” (1 Sam 20:16–17).

Entering into a covenant with another person is a serious undertaking. Abraham and Abimelech covenant together at Beersheba, so that Abraham can live peaceably amongst the Philistines (Gen 21:22–34).

Laban and Jacob covenant together at Galeed to consolidate the two-decades-long relationship between the two men (Gen 31:43–55). David made a covenant with the elders of Israel at Hebron when he was anointed as king over Israel (2 Sam 5:1–5). Jehoida made a covenant with the captains of the Carites and of the guards, so that his son Joash would be protected and ultimately proclaimed king (2 Ki 11:4–12).

And, of course, the Lord God made a covenant with Noah and the whole of creation (Gen 9), and then renewed that covenant a number of times—with Abram (Gen 17), with Isaac and with Jacob (Lev 26:42), with all Israel through Moses (Exod 19, 24), under Joshua (John 24), and then with David (2 Sam 7) and various of his descendants. All major exilic prophets look to a time when God will renew the covenant with the people back in the land (Isa 55–56; Jer 31:31–35; Ezek 16:59–63; 37:24–28). The people of Israel were bound to the Lord God in covenant; the steadfast love that God shows towards Israel is an expression of that covenant.

Human-to-human covenants were political tools, creating alliances amongst the leaders of various tribes or nations of people in the ancient world. The covenant formed between Jonathan and David clearly has political implications. Jonathan, the son of Saul and rightful heir to the throne, hands over his armour to David (1 Sam 18:4) to signal that he is ceding power to David as the next king. The scene is infused with the political freight of an ancient covenant.

The poem in this week’s reading (2 Sam 1:19–27) offers a clear and loving acknowledgement by David of his respect and love for Saul. Despite the many difficulties encountered in their relationship, at the end of Saul’s life, David is able to acknowledge the virtue of the first King of Israel, and his son. “Saul and Jonathan, beloved and lovely!”, he sings; “in life and in death they were not divided; they were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions” (2 Sam 1:23).

Writing in With Love to the World, Kyounghee Cho reflects on the character of David seen in this passage. She writes, “David means “beloved”. David was tremendously loved by God. He was loved by the people of Israel, and now he is cherished and praised as an exemplary figure of faith by Christians worldwide. Today’s passage shows why God loved him and gives a lesson for believers of God. King Saul, David’s enemy, who had been chasing him for 10 years to kill him, died. While Saul’s demise might have been welcome news to David, he understood it not from his personal standpoint but from the perspective of the nation and its people.”

Kyounghee continues, “David paid tribute to Saul as the chosen leader of God and his soldiers as the army of the Lord of Hosts. He composed an elegy and instructed the people of Judah to learn it and sing it.” The song is a wonderful testimony to the king whose name came to characterise most strongly the chosen people, in covenant with the Lord God.

The story of David dominates the quasi-historical narrative of the early decades of the monarchy in Israel, stretching from his initial appearance at 1 Samuel 16 to his death at 1 Kings 2. The covenant people who come in following centuries are regularly identified as “the house of David” (2 Sam 3:1–6; 1 Ki 12:19–20, 26; 13:2; 14:8; 2 Ki 17:21; 2 Chron 10:19; 21:7; Neh 12:37; Ps 122:5; Isa 7:2, 13; 22:22; Jer 21:12; Zech 12:7–14; 13:1; Tobit 1:4; Sirach 48:15; 51:12; and see Luke 1:27).

This identification, of course, is highlighted many times in the New Testament, where Jesus is identified as “Son of David” in the Synoptic Gospels (Mark 10:47–48; 12:35; Luke 3:31; 18:38–39; and especially in Matt 1:1, 20; 9:27; 12:23; 15:22; 20:30–31; 21:9, 15; 22:42). This claim is also noted at John 7:42; Rom 1:3; 2 Tim 2:8; Rev 3:7; 5:5; 22:16). The heritage of David lives on in these stories.

The lament sung by David in 2 Sam 1 also provides a beautiful acknowledgement of the depth and strength of the love that undergirds this covenant between Jonathan and David. Peppering his song with the refrain “how the mighty have fallen” (vv. 19, 25, 27), David laments over his friend: “greatly beloved were you to me; your love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women” (2 Sam 1:26).

Could it be that, even in ancient Israel, such love between two men was valued and accepted? That will form the focus of the next blog that I will offer on this passage.

As we continue through narrative passages from the Hebrew Scriptures, this Sunday, we come to David’s poetic lament for his friend, Jonathan (2 Sam 1). This passage invites us to consider the depth of love that David expressed for Jonathan: “your love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women”. Just what can we make of this relationship? (This is the second of three posts this week on this topic.)

See

Saul and Jonathan, beloved and lovely! part 2 (1 Sam 18–20; 2 Sam 1; Pentecost 6B)

*****

With Love to the World is a daily Bible reading resource, written and produced within the Uniting Church in Australia, following the Revised Common Lectionary. It offers Sunday worshippers the opportunity to prepare for hearing passages of scripture in the week leading to that day of worship. It seeks to foster “an informed faith” amongst the people of God.

You can subscribe on your phone or iPad via an App, for a subscription of $28 per year. Search for With Love to the World on the App Store, or UCA—With Love to the World on Google Play. For the hard copy resource, for just $28 for a year’s subscription, email Trevor at wlwuca@bigpond.com or phone +61 (2) 9747-1369.

Diminutive David and the giant Goliath (1 Sam 17; Pentecost 5B)

The Hebrew Scripture passage which the lectionary offers us for this coming Sunday—the next in the series of stories from the early days of the monarchy in Israel—feeds into the “David worship” that we find in these ancient narratives. From the moment that David is introduced, as being “ruddy, and had beautiful eyes, and was handsome” (1 Sam 16:12), the narrator is concerned to present him in the most positive way. For the moment, at least.

David provides a better alternative to Saul. Saul had won a significant battle against the Philistines, but did not wait for Samuel the prophet to come to preside over the sacrifice he offered (ch.13). Soon after this, he made a rash oath, forbidding his troops to eat before sundown. His son Jonathan ate, however, and chided his father: “my father has troubled the land; see how my eyes have brightened because I tasted a little of this honey” (ch.14).

When instructed by Samuel to destroy all that was taken in his defeat of the Amalekites —“do not spare them, but kill both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey”, Samuel instructed him—he kept the best of these spoils and destroyed only what was “despised and worthless” (ch.15). (Mind you, we might well be horrified at Samuel’s instructions and side with Saul on this!) So Saul has offended the Lord God; the kingship will be taken from him, as we saw last week.

By contrast, when Samuel first sees David, the narrator introduces him with the description, “he was ruddy, and had beautiful eyes, and was handsome” (16:12). And yet, the narrator has already told us that the Lord God “[does] not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature … the Lord does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart” (1 Sam 16:7). What is in the heart of David, that so pleases the Lord?

So in this Sunday’s passage—1 Sam 17:32–49, an extract from a much longer account of this pivotal encounter (all 58 verses of ch.17), we see David in action against the Philistines. In this extract we read some of what leads up the climactic moment when David “put his hand in his bag, took out a stone, slung it, and struck the Philistine on his forehead; the stone sank into his forehead, and he fell face down on the ground” (17:49). It’s the stuff that Sunday School lessons and Cecil B. DeMille films were made of!

This story of David and Goliath is legendary. It fits with a pattern, found throughout the mythic sagas of Israel (Genesis to Nehemiah), in which the underdog, the least expected person, plays a key role in leading God’s people. Think Jacob the supplanter, think Joseph the favourite youngest son, think Moses the murderer and Rahab the harlot, or Daniel with his strange diet and zany dream interpretations.

Even Jesus later picked up on this motif very strongly; the last becoming first, the child symbolising the kingdom, amd his saying, “among those born of women no one has arisen greater than John the Baptist; yet the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he” (Matt 11:11).

As youngest child and one challenged in physical prowess, the diminutive David stands before the giant Goliath; it seems the match would be over before it began. When Goliath stood and roared at the Israelites, goading them to come out and fight, “give me a man, that we may fight together”, the narrator captures their panicked mood: “Saul and all Israel heard these words of the Philistine, they were dismayed and greatly afraid” (1 Sam 17:8–11).

That is not surprising, given not only the size of Goliath (four cubits and a span, that is, almost 3 metres, or 9’9” tall) but also his accoutrements: “he had a helmet of bronze on his head, and he was armed with a coat of mail; the weight of the coat was five thousand shekels of bronze. He had greaves of bronze on his legs and a javelin of bronze slung between his shoulders. The shaft of his spear was like a weaver’s beam, and his spear’s head weighed six hundred shekels of iron; and his shield-bearer went before him” (17:4–7).

Not so, however, as the story unfolds. David brings provisions for his brothers after they had been involved in 40 days of battle—a biblical way of saying “an awfully long time had passed” (17:16). Still, the reaction of the Israelites was that of fear; “when they saw the man, they fled from him” (17:24). Saul tries to talk him out of stepping up to fight the giant; “you are just a boy, and he has been a warrior from his youth” (17:33).

So we come to the passage proposed by the lectionary for this coming Sunday (17:32–49). David protests; as a shepherd, he has killed lions and bears in defending his flock, “and this uncircumcised Philistine shall be like one of them, since he has defied the armies of the living God” (17:37). Notice the scathing put down of this giant of a man as merely an “uncircumcised Philistine” and the implicit grouping of him with savage beasts. David is confident that “the Lord, who saved me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear, will save me from the hand of this Philistine” (17:37).

David, full of trust, steps up to the mark; the Philistine “disdained him, for he was only a youth, ruddy and handsome in appearance” (17:42), words which echo the initial description of David (16:12). Whereas they were used to advocate for David at that point, here they form a denigrating dismissal of him; a nice irony! Goliath goads him: “am I a dog, that you come to me with sticks?” (17:43); and invites David to draw near.

David holds his ground, delivering a short sermon on God’s sovereign power in this situation (17:45–47). We might reflect on whether (a) we would have the same equanimity at this moment; and (b) whether we find this theological perspective persuasive, or troublingly simplistic, or anathema to our understanding of God.

Since David stands firm, Goliath begins to approach him; now David joins the battle (17:48). The end is short and swift: “David put his hand in his bag, took out a stone, slung it, and struck the Philistine on his forehead; the stone sank into his forehead, and he fell face down on the ground” (17:49).

The remaining verses (omitted by the lectionary) tell of David severing Goliath’s head, the Philistines retreating, the typical battlefield behaviour of the victors in plundering the camp of their defeated foes, and the victory march of the Israelites as David bore the head of Goliath (17:50–54).

A short coda (17:55–58) places the young David before King Saul; this encounter had very significant consequences for David, since “when David had finished speaking to Saul, the soul of Jonathan was bound to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul” (18:1). That is an important lead into the passage that we will read and hear the Sunday after next, concerning David and Jonathan.

Writing in With Love to the World, Sione Leaaetoa says, “the story has been used widely in Western culture as a metaphor for describing any individual or group of people who have the courage to overcome great odds to defeat an oppressor or overcome or some great obstacle. There is certainly an aspect of human courage in this story; but the passage is primarily about being bold and having an unwavering faith in the Lord.”

He notes that “the story makes it clear that when Saul and the Israelites heard Goliath’s challenge, they were ‘dismayed and terrified’ (v.11)”, but then that David would “remind them of who they are, ‘the armies of the living God’ (vv.26, 36); hence, God is the one that will fight their battle and give them the victory.” Sione then concludes, “As children of the living God, through all the battles or challenges we may face in life, we need to remember that God is with us.”

Strategic cunning allows the shepherd boy to defeat the towering enemy. That appears to be how God works to bring about the victory. What model does this offer us? I am not advocating for the use of physical violence to bring about victory—but that was the way of things at that time in history (and still is, for many, today).

So I am left with questions: Why is this story told? Are there elements of this story that inform how we “live by faith” in today’s world? I wonder what you think they might be?

We can’t leave this story without commenting on the ancient Philistines and modern Palestinians. In what ways might the biblical stories about the Israelites doing battle with the Philistines mirror and inform how we think about the conflict between the modern state of Israel and displaced Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank?

There are, to be sure, certain linguistic similarities between the two words, Philistia and Palestina. However, there is no historical evidence at all that proves any familial continuity between the ancient Philistines and contemporary Palestinians. They connection is simply from the ancient use of the term Palestina in the Roman province, Syria Palestina, which was a latinizing of a Semitic word that we transliterate as Philistines.

However, there are historical matters to consider in terms of who lived in the land, how other people dealt with the people living in the land when they invaded that land, and what claims stand from this. Establishing the state of Israel and displacing thousands of Palestinians in 1947–48 has not “righted wrongs”, but exacerbated them.

Neither Muslim hegemony over the city of Jerusalem in medieval times, nor ancient Israelite dominance in Jerusalem and surrounds three millennia ago, represent the bedrock of land ownership; history reveals this all too well. We will return to this issue in future blogs, as we continue to trace the story of ancient Israel in 1–2 Samuel and 1 Kings. What we need today is to tread carefully and respectfully with the different claims that are being pressed, tragically, through violent means.

I have given this consideration, in the light of the terrible situation at present in Gaza, in

Israel, the West Bank, and Hamas: a prayer for peace, and a yearning for justice

and see also

Significant days, reflecting Shoah, Independence, Nakba, and 7 October.

*****

With Love to the World is a daily Bible reading resource, written and produced within the Uniting Church in Australia, following the Revised Common Lectionary. It offers Sunday worshippers the opportunity to prepare for hearing passages of scripture in the week leading to that day of worship. It seeks to foster “an informed faith” amongst the people of God.

You can subscribe on your phone or iPad via an App, for a subscription of $28 per year. Search for With Love to the World on the App Store, or UCA—With Love to the World on Google Play. For the hard copy resource, for just $28 for a year’s subscription, email Trevor at wlwuca@bigpond.com or phone +61 (2) 9747-1369.