John Kitto Morning Bible Devotions: September 27

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John Kitto Morning Bible Devotions: September 27

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The Restoration

2Sa_19:9-15; 2Sa_19:41-43; 2Sa_20:1-26

Absalom is dead. David is victorious. What more has the king to do but to cross the Jordan, march to Jerusalem, and take possession of his throne! This had been ill speed—it had been too abrupt. David is much to be commended for the delicacy with which he acted. Seeing that the defection of the people, and the preference of Absalom, had been so general among the tribes west of the Jordan, he feared even the appearance of forcing himself upon them, or seeming to recover possession of his throne as a conqueror. He therefore tarried beyond the river, waiting to be invited back. There was some delay in giving this invitation, perhaps because the king’s wish and his mauve in delaying to move westward, were not at first understood. When these were understood, and that the king seemed thus voluntarily to throw back the option into their hands, his delicacy was not so generally appreciated as it deserved. There was a strife of parties—and some seemed inclined to accept the option he appeared to offer, by declining to receive him; and it appears to us not unlikely that if any acceptable candidates had appeared, the division of the realm into two, if not into three kingdoms, might then have taken place. David’s power was safe beyond the Jordan, and in any event he would have reigned there—and so far the promise to him would have been accomplished. But on this side the river, the seeds of disunion between the great tribe of Judah and the other tribes had already so far ripened, that they would scarcely have concurred in the choice of a new sovereign unconnected with the house of David, and thus the disruption, which after another reign took place, would then have been consummated. As it was, the strife of parties ended in the general, but scarcely unanimous, determination to recall David; and it is remarkable that the initiative was taken by the ten tribes, which, it is important to observe, already in these discussions are, for the first time, called Israel, as distinct from Judah. But it is likely that, although it now first appears, this distinction had actually grown up while David reigned over Judah only, and Ishbosheth over the other tribes. Ishbosheth’s kingdom must have had some name to distinguish it from that of Judah, and what so likely as that it should have been the name of Israel, at least among the populace? As both the kings considered themselves entitled to the sole dominion, they may have avoided the appearance of limiting their claim, by calling themselves, respectively, kings of Judah and of Israel; and the fact is, that in the history they are never so designated. But the populace, in every age and country, will have names for things, whether they be appropriate or not; and there can be no doubt that the people of Israel had a short and easy name, free from ceremonial circumlocution, for the realm of Ishbosheth.

When David became acquainted with the desire of the ten tribes to recall him, he felt himself in a new difficulty. It was a separate decision of the ten tribes, in which his own tribe of Judah had not concurred. Some may think that he might have assumed the fact of that tribe’s attachment to him; but it seems to us that the facility with which Absalom had been hailed as king at Hebron, and been joined by such numbers as enabled him to move at once upon Jerusalem, might well justify David in suspecting that the procrastination of the Judahites arose from some disinclination to receive him. The step he did take is, however, of questionable discretion. There was great danger in adopting a course which might indicate to the other tribes that he took a separate interest in Judah; as it was too well remembered that he belonged to it, and that it had for some years been his separate kingdom. He, however, recognized their tribal interest in him by treating with them separately. He sent the two high-priests to incite them to hasten to escort him home, and not to be the last in the general movement. They did so. Though the last to call him, they were the first to escort him; and when they sent to conduct him home, he at once moved forward, without waiting till the other, and more distant tribes, arrived to take part in this great public act. The dangerous impolicy of this is apparent. The least he could have done was to have waited until the other tribes arrived to concur in this procedure, aware, as he must have been, of the importance which all Orientals attach to such points of ceremony. But it is plain to us that, being aware that eventually the main interest of his house lay in Judah, he was determined to reign there at all hazards, whatever became of the rest of his kingdom.

The result that might be anticipated ensued. When the other tribes came to conduct the king home, they were affronted to find that they had been anticipated, and that Judah alone had assumed the right and honor of bringing the king back. There then arose a hot contention between Israel and Judah. The former contended, with reason, that as they “had ten parts in the king,” and Judah but one, the latter had taken too much upon it in bringing the king back upon its own authority; in reply to which the Judahites used the argument, dangerous for David’s house, but which his own part in the matter had distinctly sanctioned, that they had a right to act as they had done, because the king was peculiarly their own—“was near of kin to them.” David must have smiled to witness this eager contention among the tribes, as to which had the best right to bring back the sovereign whom they had all concurred, but lately, in driving forth.

The argument of the Judahites was by no means calculated to conciliate the ten tribes; and there can be no doubt that the king himself incurred a share in their displeasure for the part he had taken in this matter, for it was certainly on his distinct invitation that the men of Judah had acted. Here, as Chalmers aptly describes it, “was a festerment that broke out at a future day.” Even now, as he remarks, this feeling, on the part of Israel, “came to a formidable eruption.” Among the watchers of events was one Sheba, the son of Bichri, who, perceiving the disgust of the ten tribes at the arrogance of the men of Judah, thought that the contention of the other tribes for ten parts in David, might easily be turned into a disavowal of any part in him. He therefore raised the seditious cry, “We have no part in David, neither have we inheritance in the son of Jesse, every man to his tents, O Israel.” This cry, in the present state of feeling, acted like magic. Nearly all the men of Israel left the king to the Judahites, and he was, by them, escorted from the Jordan to Jerusalem.

Here was a perilous emergency. David had no hesitation that this outbreak was to be treated as sedition. But whom was he to employ? Considering that this recall was like the commencement of a new reign, which vacated the warrant by which all offices were previously held, he had offered to Amasa (the late commander of Absalom’s forces) the lure of making him commander-in-chief, in place of Joab—a step which we cannot view with satisfaction, involving, as it did, the sacrifice of the long-tried devotion of Joab and Abishai (who would not be likely to overlook this affront to his brother), regardless of the high services they had often and lately rendered to the king and the state, for the purpose of purchasing the allegiance of one who had but yesterday been in arms against him, and who had certainly not acquired much military reputation in the campaign. He was to have the rewards of Albermarle, without the services of Monk. The truth is, no doubt, that the king thought that he might thus, by a side blow, rid himself of the inconveniently overpowering influence of Joab, and relieve himself from the presence of the man who had slain Absalom, but whom he durst not ostensibly punish on that account. He was, however, greatly mistaken in his calculation, and much overrated his own strength. Joab was not thus easily to be disposed of.

Amasa was, however, made commander-in-chief, and it was to him that David committed the charge of putting down Sheba’s dangerous insurrection. He was ordered to collect the forces of Judah within three days, and appear with them at Jerusalem. The rapid Joab would hardly have required even three days for this service; but this time passed and Amasa appeared not. This fact is significant. The men did not approve of the step which the king had taken, and were reluctant to follow this new leader, so that he could not get the required force together in the time assigned. This might have convinced David that he had again erred; and, himself sudden and quick in his military operations, and accustomed to the sharp, rapid, and decisive action of Joab, he could little brook this tardiness. Still, however, reluctant to call Joab again into service, yet aware of the danger of delay, he commissioned Abishai to put down this dangerous conspiracy. He only had been commissioned, but Joab went with him, and, doubtless, became the actual commander. They had got no further than Gibeon, where they halted, than Amasa, with such forces as he had got together, overtook them. On his approach, Joab went to meet him, and so contrived that his sword should fall out of its sheath to the ground, as he drew near to him. Snatching it hastily up, without pausing to sheath it, in the polite zeal of his attention to Amasa, he took hold of his beard, to impress upon it the kiss of affectionate respect, saying, “Art thou in health, my brother?” and as the words passed his lips, and the beard was in his hand, he buried the naked sword in the body of Amasa, under the fifth rib. This was almost exactly as he had before dealt with Abner, and from almost entirely the same motives. This, however, is by much the more villainous act of the two, seeing that it stood more entirely on the ground of personal objects. In Abner’s case he had the excuse, at least, of vengeance for a brother’s blood, as well as of a real or pretended belief that Abner designed to betray David. But here there was nakedly nothing but the desire to fling a formidable rival from his path. One knows not whether most to be astonished at the atrocity or the hardihood of the deed. It was no less than the murder of a general at the head of his troops. But Joab knew his own influence. One near him cried, “He that favoreth Joab, and he that is for David, let him follow Joab.” And such was the power of that name, and the wonderful ascendancy the owner of it had acquired over the troops, that the men of Amasa forthwith joined the others in following Joab in pursuit of Sheba. The advantage of this unexpected promptitude appears in the fact, that the rebel leader, being allowed no time to gather strength, shut himself up in the strong town of Abel Beth-Maachah, where the people, to escape a siege, after some parley with Joab, cut off Sheba’s head, and threw it to him over the wall.

This ended this dangerous commotion, and although the result was the establishment of David’s power over all Israel, some damage had been sustained by all the parties concerned. The king himself had committed some serious political indiscretions, tending to establish an ill-feeling between Israel and Judah; while the high-handed manner in which Joab had resumed his command had satisfied David that he could not be displaced, and must materially have deepened his now settled hatred of the high officer to whom he was obliged to entrust the military power of the state, while his horror at the murder of Amasa was not lessened by his inability to call the assassin to account, or by the consciousness that his own untoward proceedings had been the exciting cause of this frightful crime.

In going through these sad passages, the question continually recurs—How is it we no more hear of David asking counsel of the Lord? The time was, when the sacred oracle was consulted on matters of comparatively small importance; but since he became king over all Israel, we have had only one instance of his resort to this sure guidance, and that was at the beginning of his reign. We shall not be far wrong in ascribing to this neglect the serious mistakes into which he appears to have fallen.