THE POLITICS of David’s day was just brutal and bloody as it is today. 

Following the rebellion of Absalom, the people of Israel conclude that their best option is to welcome David home as king. For his part, David tried to win the loyalty of his relatives in the tribe of Judah by replacing one of his nephews, Joab, as commander of the army with another nephew, Amasa—who, we failed to mention, had led Absalom's troops into battle against the army of David! 

These moves had two consequences: First, the murder of Amasa by Joab in a bloody encounter at Gibeon; and second, another conflict between Judah and the northern tribes, which led to the rebellion of Sheba the son of Bichri. 

Sheba’s rebellion ended when Joab and a small force pursued him to the northernmost city in Israel, Abel Beth Maacah, where a wise woman convinced the town that the best way to respond to Joab’s siege was to deliver the severed head of Sheba—finally bringing to an end the civil war triggered by Absalom. 

DAVID’S CAPACITY for self-examination is remarkable. Many powerful people throughout history found it difficult, if not impossible, to admit flaws and learn from mistakes. 

However, David also understood the influence of spirits in the unseen realm on human activity, condemning the elim (“gods”) who administer affairs on Earth unjustly.  

We also discuss “the proud” in Psalm 40:4. The Hebrew word rahabim may be a reference to the “helpers of Rahab” mentioned in Job 9:13, demonic minions of Leviathan—forces of chaos at work in the world even today. 

ONE OF THE hardest things you can do is give thanks to God in the middle of trouble. 

This week, we read a collection of psalms composed by David while he was running from his son Absalom, who’d raised an army and was marching on Jerusalem. Remarkably, in the midst of David’s heartbreak, realizing that either he or his son would die in the battle to come and reflecting on his failures as a father, he was still able to give thanks and put his trust in the Lord.

DAVID WAS NOT a good father. That’s obvious from the way his own children treated each other—and him.

Sometimes, kids turn out badly despite their parents’ best efforts. David seems to have been unable to discipline his sons. Amnon, his eldest, raped his half-sister, Tamar, and was murdered by David’s second son, Absalom. After a few years in exile, he returned to Jerusalem and began plotting to overthrow David, who, as we read last week, fled Jerusalem to spare the city the devastation of war. 

This week, we read that Absalom, on the advice of David’s former counselor Ahitophel, “went in” to David’s concubines—a crass but very blunt message to Israel that the old man was powerless to stop Absalom from taking over. 

But God foiled the plans of Absalom, Ahitophel, and the unseen principalities and powers that schemed to hijack the House of David. In a battle that probably took place east of the Jordan River, Absalom was undone by his pride and his long, flowing hair. And tragically, even though Absalom’s rebellion led to a civil war that claimed the lives of 20,000 men, David grieved more for Absalom than for those who had risked and lost their lives in David’s defense. 

TALK ABOUT ingratitude: David’s son Absalom, who’d fled to his grandfather’s kingdom of Geshur, returned to Jerusalem after a two-year exile and apparently began scheming to remove David from the throne as soon as he came home. 

We discuss the ploy by Absalom’s cousin, David’s nephew Joab, to return the king’s oldest surviving son to Jerusalem, and how Absalom forced Joab to meet with him and arrange his reconciliation with David. Once Absalom had regained David’s trust, he set about undermining his father’s authority, winning over the hearts of Israel through shrewd political campaigning in the gate of the city.  

David, upon (finally!) realizing that he was in mortal danger, abandoned Jerusalem—not from fear, but to spare the city and its people from the destruction of a siege. We also talk about David’s flight from the city. His route, across the Kidron Valley toward the Jordan River, foreshadowed the path of Jesus from Jerusalem to the Crucifixion on the summit of the Mount of Olives.

THE PSALMS this week follow our chronological reading order, meaning they were written by David after he was confronted by the prophet Nathan for conspiring to kill Uriah the Hittite so that David could take his wife, Bathsheba. 

We discuss the repentant heart of David that comes through in these psalms—acknowledging his guilt and pleading with God to wipe away his sin, transgression, and iniquity. 

Then we return to 2 Samuel for a preview of the turbulent period of David’s life that followed when his oldest sons began plotting to succeed David on the throne. His eldest, Amnon, sinned by raping his half-sister, Tamar; in turn, Tamar’s brother, Absalom, took revenge by plotting Amnon’s murder two years later. 

In both cases, David didn’t help matters. For one thing, he didn’t punish Amnon for raping his half-sister—David’s own daughter! That was compounded by his failure to punish Absalom for the murder of Amnon. 

For his part, based on what he eventually did, it’s not clear that Absalom was avenging his sister’s assault by killing his half-brother or using her humiliation to justify eliminating an obstacle between himself and the throne of David. 

DAVID’S PLOY to take the wife of Uriah the Hittite is another story that shows that the Bible has not been cleaned up to make the humans used by God look more, well, saintly. 

Bathsheba, whose name probably derives from Hurrian meaning “lady of Hebat,” the chief female deity of the Hurrian pantheon, was impregnated by David while her husband, Uriah the Hittite, fought with the army in Ammon. After trying unsuccessfully to avoid responsibility for his child by convincing Uriah to be with Bathsheba while on leave from the army, David plotted with his nephew Joab, who commanded the army, to leave Uriah unprotected in battle so he’d be killed. 

This despicable ploy was transparent enough to Joab and anyone else with eyes to see, but it was obviously not hidden from God. This led to an epic confrontation between David and the prophet Nathan, who came to David with a story about a wealthy man stealing a lamb from a poor man. David declared that the wealthy man deserved to die—to which Nathan replied, “You are the man!” 

We discuss David’s response to the decree that his child would die, and that rebellion would arise within David’s house. We also note that the entire incident with Bathsheba is missing from 1 Chronicles, possibly because the writer of the account compiled after the Babylonian captivity found the story just too distasteful to connect to David. 

And we talk about the Philistine giants in 1 Chronicles 20, a preview of a deeper discussion we’ll have when we read the parallel account in 2 Samuel 21 (in about six weeks, if we keep to our posted schedule). Basically, the Hebrew phrase translated “descendants of the giants” does not mean what the English words imply. Goliath and the other Philistine “giants” were big, yes (although the Septuagint translation and the first-century Jewish historian Josephus write that Goliath was 6’9”, not 9’9”), but more importantly, they were members of a warrior cult. 

THE TONE of this week’s psalms seems odd given the military victories of David that we studied last week. 

This is why we use a chronological reading order: We see in this week’s readings that David, despite his success on the battlefield, really grappled with the opposition he faced from enemies both from without and within his kingdom. But despite his occasional cries of despair, David always returned to give the Lord thanks and praise.

DAVID’S KINGDOM faced a strong test from his neighbors to the east and north as a coalition of Ammonites and Arameans tried to take down the new Israelite kingdom. 

We discuss the nearly identical accounts in 2 Samuel and 1 Chronicles and the wonderful attitude of David’s nephew and general Joab: “Be of good courage, and let us be courageous for our people, and for the cities of our God, and may the Lord do what seems good to him.” 

DAVID’S KINGDOM expanded outward in all directions, possibly reaching as far as the Euphrates in northern Syria. 

This week, we read the records of David’s wars against the Arameans of Damascus and Zobah to the north, the small kingdoms east of the Jordan (Ammon, Moab, and Edom), and the Amalekites in the south.  

We discuss the historical context of David’s reign and the recent discovery of an Iron Age kingdom in southern Turkey and northern Syria, known from inscriptions as Palistin (and probably related to the Philistines who settled between Israel and Egypt), whose best-known king, Taita, may be the Toi/Tou mentioned in 2 Sam. 8 and 1 Chr. 18. 

We also discuss David’s kindness to Jonathan’s son Mephibosheth, something that would have been unusual in a time when preserving the life of a male descendant of the former king, Saul, would have been unusual.