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1Ki_2:1-12
10So [And] David slept with his fathers, and was buried in the city of David. 11And the days that David reigned over Israel were forty years: seven years reigned he in Hebron, and thirty and three years reigned he in Jerusalem.
12Then sat Solomon upon the throne of David his father; and his kingdom was established greatly.
1Ki_2:2-4. I go the way, &c. The form of expression reminds one of Jos_23:14; 1Sa_4:9; but especially of Jos_1:7. The exhortation: Be thou strong, therefore, and show thyself a man! does not mean: be consoled on account of my departure, bear it manfully; but it refers to what follows—be strong and brave in the “charge” of Jehovah, in the fulfilment of His prescripts. The expression: ùָׁîַøְúָּ îִùְׁîֶøֶú éְäåָֹä does not convey the sense: consider what Jehovah wills to have considered, i.e., His laws (for then the following would be pleonastic), but rather custodies custodiam Jehovae, keep the charge which thou art bound to Jehovah, to accomplish; be a true watchman in the service of Jehovah and for Him (comp. 1Ch_23:32; 1Ch_12:29; Num_3:6-8; Num_3:38). This charge is fulfilled in walking in the ways of God—in observing His various commandments. The expressions which here, as elsewhere, so frequently standing side by side, denote the latter (Deu_5:28; Deu_8:11; Psa_118:5 sq.), do not admit of sharply-drawn distinctions; but they “denote together the totality of the law upon its different sides and relations to men” (Keil).— äִùְׂëִּéì does not mean exactly “to have good fortune” (Gesenius, De Wette, and others), but to be skilful, wise. He who in all things stands upon the commandments of God, and governs himself thereafter, is and carries himself wisely. What he does, will and must have a prosperous issue, and come to a right conclusion (Deu_29:8; Jer_3:15 sq.; Jer_23:5; Pro_17:8; 2Ki_18:7).—In 1Ki_2:4 the positive promise in 2Sa_7:11 sq. is expressed in negative form, as also in 1Ki_8:25; 1Ki_9:5; Jer_33:17. The ìֹàÎéִëָּøֵú “does not denote a completely unbroken succession, but only the opposite of a break forever” (Hengstenberg). Thy house and seed shall never be exterminated, what catastrophies soever may happen.
1Ki_2:5-6. The charge which David delivers in 1Ki_2:5-9, were not, according to Ewald and Eisenlohr, originally made by him; but were first, at some subsequent time, put into his mouth in order to explain and justify Solomon’s severity to Joab and to Shimei (1Ki_2:28 sq.). This supposition is as unnecessary as arbitrary.—Upon the double murder of which Joab was guilty, comp. 2Sa_3:27 sq., and 1Ki_20:8 sq. The first threw a false suspicion upon David (2Sa_3:37); the second was coupled with scorn and defiance of the royal authority (2Sa_20:11); hence what he has done to me (to my injury).— éָùֶׂí , 1Ki_2:5, literally, he shed “blood of war” in peace, i.e., he furnished an unheard of example when he killed Abner and Amasa, not as foes, in open, honorable warfare, but murderously destroyed the inoffensive. Instead of the second “blood of war,” Thenius, after the Sept. ( áἶìá ἀèῶïí ), reads ãָּí ðַ÷ִé , which makes good sense, certainly, but is unnecessary.—Girdle and shoes are not here introduced as “especial parts of oriental costume” (Thenius, Keil); nor is it thereby said, “from the girdle of his loins, to the latchet of his shoes,” i.e., over and over (Ewald); but girdle and shoes here are rather the marks of the warrior, as in Isa_5:27 and Eph_6:14 sq., for the sword is fastened to the girdle (2Sa_20:8), and the shoes serve for marching, and provided with both, one enters upon battle. David also means to say: Joab has soiled with murder and blood the insignia of his rank and dignity as a soldier and generalissimo, and covered his office with shame and disgrace.—According to thy wisdom. “David does not wish Solomon to invent a pretext for taking Joab’s life; but he exhorts him to observe wisely the right moment and occasion, when Joab shall furnish a reason, to hold him to account also for his blood-guiltiness, so that no murmuring shall arise among the people; but every one can see the justice of the punishment” (Starke).—In peace,i.e., so unpunished as if he had done only good, and committed no crime worthy of death.
1Ki_2:7-9. Barzillai. Comp. 2Sa_17:27 sq.At thy table,i.e., not “that they shall have the privilege of eating with the king at the royal table itself” (Keil); but they shall receive their necessary food from the court, like the royal servants (Dan_1:5). The recollection of the noble service of Barzillai leads to the mention of the crime of Shimei, committed on the same occasion (2Sa_16:5 sq., and 1Ki_19:21).— òִîְּêָ (1Ki_2:8) does not mean under thy power (Starke), but near thee. Bahurim, where Shimei dwelt (2Sa_16:5), was a village in the neighborhood of Jerusalem (Joseph. Ant. 7, 9, 7), about one and a-half hours’ (five miles and a quarter) distant from it. David does not say simply, he cursed me; but emphatically, he cursed me with a curse, and adds the epithet, ðִîְøֶöֶú , which, according to Thenius, because the primary signification of îøõ is, to be exhausted, sick, means “heinous” in the sense of horrendus. According to Kimchi and Gesenius, the primary signification is, to be powerful, strong, and for this the remaining passages, where the word occurs, decide (Mic_2:10; Job_6:25; Job_16:3; Vulgate, Maledictio pessima).—For thou art a wise man, and knowest,i.e., I leave to thy discretion the how and when of the punishment. An áἰôßá åὔëïãïò (Josephus), will not be wanting. With blood, the opposite of the “in peace” in 1Ki_2:6, inasmuch as he has deserved it.
1Ki_2:10-11. In the city of David,i.e., in Mount Zion, in which, caves that served as burial vaults were constructed (Winer, R.-W.-B., ii. s. 736). According to Thenius the entrance into these vaults was on the east, in the vale Tyropoeon, in a sloping declivity of the mountain, opposite the spring Siloam. The later kings also were buried here (1Ki_11:43; 1Ki_14:31; 1Ki_15:8, &c.). The still so-called kings’ graves are different, and are situated on the opposite side, to the north of the Damascus gate (Robinson, Palestine, vol. i. p. 240 and 357 sq.). David had, without doubt, prepared these burial-places for himself and his successors. In what high estimation his tomb was held is clear from the circumstance that it was known even during the time of Christ (Act_2:29). According to 2Sa_5:5, six months were added to the seven years. 1Ki_2:12 is the transition to the next section, where it is told how Solomon’s administration was strengthened.
2. It is worthy of remark, that the man who reigned forty years, and whose life as ruler was so rich in experience, should, amongst the counsels he imparted to his successor, have placed this in the fore front; “be thou strong, therefore, and show thyself a man!” He knew what belongs to the office of ruler. Moral weaknesses, swaying hither and thither like a reed moved by the wind; unseasonable pliability is a greater defect in a ruler than if he be overtaken by this or that particular sin in private life. Rightly says the Scripture, Woe to the land whose king is a child (instead of a man), Ecc_10:16. Firmness and manliness, however, are not the fruit of caprice, and of an unbroken heart. It is through grace that the heart is made strong (Heb_13:9).
3. The special directions, which refer to individual persons, David likewise communicates, not as a private man, but as king of Israel. Joab’s double murder had gone fully unpunished. At the time of its commission David was not in a condition to be able to punish him; but he felt the full weight of the deed, and in his horror of it uttered an imprecation of Joab (2Sa_3:29). In the eyes of the people, nevertheless, the non-punishment must have been regarded as an insult against law and righteousness, the charge of which devolved upon the king. “It was a stain upon his reign not yet blotted out. Even upon his death-bed he cannot think otherwise than that it is his duty, as that of the supreme judge, to deliver to his successor a definite direction about it” (Hess, Gesch. David’s, ii. s. 220). It lay upon his conscience, and he desired that this stain somehow (“do according to thy wisdom,” 1Ki_2:1) should be removed. Moreover, Joab’s participation in Adonijah’s revolt must have appeared as dangerous for the throne of Solomon. As the punishment of Joab was to him a matter of conscience, so also was Barzillai’s compensation. What Barzillai had done, he had done for him as king, as the anointed of Jehovah. Such fidelity and devotion to the legitimate reigning house (Königthum) in a time of great and almost universal falling away, ought to be publicly requited, and to be recognized in honorable remembrance after the death of the king. This compensation must serve, no less than the righteous punishment of Joab, to the firm establishment of the throne of Solomon. In direct contrast with the action of Barzillai was that of Shimei. He did not curse David as a private person, but he cursed him with the heaviest curse as the “anointed of Jehovah,” and therein Jehovah himself directly. For blasphemy against the king was on the same level with blasphemy against God (2Ki_21:10). Both were punished with death (Lev_24:14 sq.; Exo_22:27; 2Sa_16:9), hence also Abishai thought that Shimei should be put to death (2Sa_19:22). But David wished on the day when God had shown him a great mercy, to show mercy himself, and upon that account spared his life. But “it was no small matter to allow the miscreant to spend his life near him (no banishment was talked of). And to permit him to spend his days quietly under the following reign (which had never been promised him), would have been a kindness that might have been greatly abused as a precedent of unpunished crimes” (Hess). In fact, Shimei was a dangerous man, and capable of repeating what he had done to David. As for the rest, David left Solomon to choose the manner and time of his punishment, only he was not to go unpunished.
4. David’s conduct on his dying-bed has frequently been regarded as a great reproach to him. The latest (secular) history passes the following judgment upon it: “If David’s life and deeds had not sufficiently shown his mind, these last words of the dying man would leave no doubt about his character.… We must turn away from such blood-thirsty desire for revenge which, though innate with the Semitic races, is united here with a concealment of purpose and malice that are peculiar to David. His vengeance, even out of the grave itself, determines to strike, through the hand of his son, an insignificant man, to whom he (David) had once promised forgiveness when he himself was in a strait. Forgetting all the services and victories he owed to Joab, David determines, in order to gratify a long-cherished ill-feeling, to have a man, to whom he owed his kingdom and whom he himself had not ventured to touch, murdered by his son, ostensibly for two acts which Joab did, if not with David’s consent, yet by no means against his will; the fruits of which David had willingly accepted, and which acts he had not made the slightest efforts to punish” (Duncker, Gesch. des Alterthums, i. s. 386). In this view it is entirely overlooked that David did not then speak as a private man, but as a theocratic king, and this judgment of him is quite false, no regard being paid to the time and the circumstances. The rough, false assassin Joab, who finally conspires with Adonijah, is made to appear as a man of high merit, and the blasphemer and traitor Shimei, as an insignificant, unfairly-treated man, while David, who departs life without one crime on his conscience as king, and who desires to fulfil the demands of justice as well as of gratitude, is said to have displayed the whole of his wicked and malicious character at the last. “Nothing but an uncritical confusion, which wished to behold in David a saint and a complete model of virtue (which the Scriptures nowhere assert him to be), could call forth, as contrast, the degradation of the king, which is as one-sided as unpsychological” (Winer, R.-W.-B., i s. 258). [Yes! but our author forgets that David had sworn to Shimei, Thou shalt not die! (2Sa_19:23); and “the king” it was (i.e., David as king) that “swore unto him.” Clearly David’s act of grace to Shimei was an act of royal right, royal clemency, and nothing but sophistry can justify his dying charge to Solomon not to let the unfortunate man die in peace.—E. H.] When Bunsen’s Bibel-werk says: “The vengeance of David can never be justified from the Christian point of view,” it is quite overlooked that that point of view is not the fitting one here. David belonged to the Old Testament economy, to the time of the law, not the gospel, and his conduct must be judged in the light of the former. It is an anachronism to measure Old Testament persons by the standard of the sermon on the mount. Besides, the same apostle who exhorts the believers as follows: Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, immediately after, speaking of authorities—and David speaks as such here—tells them that they are “ministers of God, revengers to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil” (Rom_12:9; Rom_13:4). In the kingdom of God in which the law of earthly punishments prevailed, such a crime (like that of Joab and Shimei) could not remain unpunished. He, too, who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; who, when He suffered, threatened not (1Pe_2:23), announced in a parable the final judgment of His enemies: “But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me” (Luk_19:27 : v. Gerlach). We scarcely find as many instances of personal love to a foe, generosity and goodness, in the life of any Old Testament hero, as in David’s. It is evident that the author of our books does not relate the commissions objected to, to vilify David at the last, as Duncker does, but on the contrary he tells them, to his honor, to show how entirely king of Israel David was, even on his dying-bed.
5. Chronicles (1Ch_29:28) relates the death of David with the addition that “he died in a good old age, full of days, riches, and honor.” We see how much he was honored even in death, from the fact that his weapons were preserved as relics in the sanctuary (2Ki_11:10). Compare the eulogy in Sir_47:2-11. For the character of the great, and indeed greatest, king of Israel, though now so often unjustly judged, by whose name the expected Messiah was designated by the prophets (Eze_34:23; Eze_37:24; Hos_3:5), comp. Niemeyer, Charaktistik der Bibel, iv. s. 107–358, and Ewald, Gesch. Isr., iii. s. 250–257, which says, with regard to the “last (poetical) words” of David (2Sa_23:1-7): “No prince, especially one who did not inherit the kingdom, could close his life with more blessed divine peace, or a more assured and cheerful view into the future.”
1Ki_2:2. Various as are the paths of men from their birth, yet they all, kings as well as beggars, rich and poor, go the way to the grave (Sir_40:1-3). And yet so many live as if they had not to travel that road (Psa_39:5-6; Psa_90:11-12).—The passing nature and vanity of the world, with its allurements and splendor, is a strong exhortation and warning from God to hold fast to the word that lives forever, and shall not pass even when heaven and earth pass away (1Pe_1:24-25; 1Jn_2:17; Luk_21:33).—Be firm and be a man! What is requisite to be one? how shall one become one? of what use? (Heb_13:9; 1Co_15:5-8; 1Co_16:13).
1Ki_2:3. The last and best will of a father to his son: (a) Trust in God’s protection of yourself and all whom God has confided to your care; (b) walk in His ways; let Him lead and guide you, He will do it well (Pro_23:26; Psa_35:5); (c) keep His ways and ordinances (Ecc_12:13; Psa_1:1-6; Tob_4:6). Such an inheritance is greater and better than all the gold and land he might leave you.—True prudence and wisdom are not born of human thought and much knowledge, but are the fruit of the fear of God, and of walking in His ways and commandments (Psa_111:10; Job_28:28).—God-fearing parents are more anxious about their children keeping close to God and His word, than about leaving them temporal goods.
1Ki_2:4. The promises of God only proceed from His grace, not our merit; but their fulfilment is always coupled with conditions, which we have to perform if we would enjoy them (Heb_11:6; 1Ti_4:8).
1Ki_2:5-9. We cannot go the way of all the world in peace, as long as we have anything remaining on our conscience, or any debt to justice and grateful love to cancel. We should forgive our enemies from our hearts, as we desire the Lord to forgive us, and especially on our dying-beds. But authority was instituted to “do justice; to prevent and punish wickedness;” it commits a sin and has a crime to answer for so long as it does not do this (Rom_13:4; Gen_9:6).
1Ki_2:6. Gray hairs, if found in the way of righteousness, are a crown of glory (Pro_16:31), adorned with which a man may go the way of all flesh in peace and comfort; but an old sinner, whom even gray hairs have not brought to repentance, goes down to the grave without solace or peace.
1Ki_2:7. A noble heart does not forget what was done for him in times of trouble especially, and thinks of it even in the hour of death. The world is ungrateful. A blessing rests on deeds of faithfulness and self-sacrificing disinterested love, and it descends to children and children’s children.
1Ki_2:8-9. A curse rests on those who curse the “powers” which are God’s ministers, instead of praying for them, and they are made, sooner or later, to feel the curse (1Pe_2:17; 1Pe_2:6). The Lord prayed for those who cursed Him; but when they did not repent and become converted, divine judgment came down on them. No doubt a wicked man often goes a long time unpunished for his deeds, but divine justice does not fail to overtake him finally, ere he is aware.—It requires wisdom to punish; a premature ill-judged chastisement does more harm than good.
1Ki_2:10-12. David’s death: (a) He slept with his fathers (Starke: The death of believers is a sleep, and being gathered to their fathers, who also still live with God, and await the coming resurrection to eternal life, Isa_26:19); (b) they rest in the grave. (Rest is good to those who have borne the burden and heat of the day forty years long—that rest which God has promised to those who strive after eternal life with patient continuing in good works. Rom_2:7; Isa_57:2).—David’s grave is a pledge that the memory of the just is blessed (Prov. 40:7; Act_2:29), and that the blessing of the father builds the children’s houses (1Ki_2:12; Sir_3:11).
Footnotes:
1Ki_2:3.—[The Heb. úַּùְׂëִéì bears equally well the sense prosper or do wisely; cf. Jos_1:7. The VV. generally adopt the former.
1Ki_2:4.—[Confirm is the proper sense of éָ÷ִéí as in all the VV.
1Ki_2:4.—[It is better here to preserve the masculine form as in all the VV., the reference being undoubtedly to the line upon the throne.
1Ki_2:4.—[The Vatican Sept. omits the words concerning me, and also with all their soul.
1Ki_2:4.—[De Rossi rejects as spurious the word ìֵàîֹø , which is wanting in Kennicott’s MS. 170, and in the Vulg. and Arab.
1Ki_2:5.—[Many MSS., the Syr. and Arab., express the conjunction åַàֲùֶׁø .
1Ki_2:5.—[The Sept. have here “innocent blood”— áῖìá ἀèῶïí .
1Ki_2:7.—[Heb. îִôְּðֵé .
1Ki_2:8.—[Heb. áֶïÎäַéְîִéðִé —son of the Jaminite, i.e., of the descendants of Jamin, a son of Simeon (Num_26:12). The Heb. for the patriarch Benjamin is written in one word; the Gentile name is written separately, but without the article. All the instances cited by Gesenius in verbo, are either without the article, or else refer to this very Shimei. Of the VV., the Sept. and Vulg. have appreciated the distinction; Chald., Syr., and Arab. agree with the A. V.—F. G.]