Joab the commander-in-chief strode out of the conference tent where his officers and the officials of David's court had been sitting in conclave. He began to make his way with purposeful steps towards the house in which David had shut himself up to bemoan the death of his favourite son, Absalom. The warriors of Judah, standing and sitting about in groups watched him go in silence. There was an air of gloom and despondency throughout the camp. Joab glanced morosely at some of them as he walked past. These men had followed David loyally into exile and had fought like tigers to defend him from his rebellious son Absalom and the hosts of Israel. They had won the day, the northern tribes' forces were defeated and dispersed, Absalom their leader was dead and the threat to David's kingship removed. The king could go back to Jerusalem and resume his reign, and everything would be as it was before. The disgrace of their ignominious flight from the capital would be wiped out by the triumph and glory of their return. They would bring back their king with rejoicing to place him once again upon the throne of the Lord. But now, most unaccountably, all this rosy anticipation had vanished. So far from setting himself at the head of his victorious warriors to lead a triumphal march to Jerusalem, he was sitting in a darkened room away from them all weeping and lamenting his lost son. They could hear his voice now, penetrating the closed door. "O my son Absalom, O Absalom, my son, my son. They looked at each other as men ashamed and uncertain, and watched their leader as he strode up to the door, opened it and went in.

David looked up, cold hostility in his eyes as he recognised his visitor. He made to speak, but Joab waved him peremptorily to silence. "This day" declared the old soldier bluntly "you have put to shame all your loyal servants who have saved your life. You love your enemies and hate your friends. You have shown this day I perceive, that if Absalom had lived and all we had died this day, then it had pleased you well". He looked down at the recumbent figure of the man he had served so loyally though unscrupulously, contempt showing on his face. "Now therefore arise, go out and speak kindly to your servants; for I swear by the Lord, if you do not go, not a man will stay with you this night; and this will be worse for you than all the evil that has come upon you from your youth until now. (2 Samuel 19.7 RSV).

There seems little doubt that from this time, about six years from the end of his reign, David was losing his hold over the nation. More than forty years had passed since the young women of Israel had eulogized his victorious return from battle with dances and the song "Saul has slain his thousands but David his ten thousands". The virile, handsome youth they had idolized had become a remote and somewhat embittered old man indulgent towards his close friends but distant from the mass of his people. There are indications too, that at this period of his life his physical powers were failing. In 2 Samuel 18 and 21 there are instances where the men of Israel dissuaded him from going into battle with them on this score. Chapter 21.15-17 alludes to an incident when David, in battle with the Philistines, would have been killed had not his nephew Abishai come to his aid and rescued him, after which David went out to battle no more. Joab's warning therefore was no empty threat; David must be made to realise that his hold on the throne was by no means so secure as he imagined, and the sooner he took active control of the situation the better.

So David bestirred himself and appeared once more at the head of his supporters. They were still at Mahanaim, three days' journey from Jerusalem and even although Absalom was dead anything could be happening there while the king was missing. Joab realised that even if David did not see the danger, he must get the king back to Jerusalem and firmly in control before the pro-Israel and anti-Judah influences in the nation had found another figure among David's remaining sons to set up as king. So preparations for the return went on apace.

Perhaps he need not have worried. There is some ambiguity about the precise order of events at this time as related in 2 Sam.19 but it does seem that with the death of Absalom there was considerably uncertainty and perhaps some apprehension among the northern tribes as to the next move. They were painfully aware that they, not Judah, had espoused the rebellion of Absalom and now he was dead and the rebellion had failed. What kind of treatment could they expect when David returned in triumph, as return he must? Perhaps the wisest course would be to take the initiative in bringing him back! "'Absalom, whom we anointed over us, is dead in battle.'" they said. 'David saved us out of the hand of the Philistines in time gone by.' "Why do you say nothing about bringing the king back". There must have been ambassadors sent to David at Mahanaim to sound out his attitude, for the next we hear in 2 Sam 19 is David's demand of the men of Judah back at Jerusalem for an explanation in their tardiness in welcoming him back and so giving the advantage to the northern tribes. "Why are they last to welcome back the King?" So the situation developed into an undignified scramble to be the first at Jordan to welcome the king back and to escort him to Jerusalem, a contest which was won by the men of Judah, who had the advantage of being nearer the scene to start with. But it was a contest that only served further to embitter relations between the Ten Tribes and the Two, leading eventually to the separation at the death of Solomon some forty-five years later.

A casual allusion in 2 Sam 19.13 throws a flood of light upon the political manoeuvrings of the time and not particularly to David's credit either. He sent a message to the men of Judah still at Jerusalem appointing Amasa, son of his sister Abigail and therefore cousin to Joab, to be commander in chief of the armed forces in the place of Joab. Amasa had espoused the cause of Absalom and was, therefore, one of the rebels; in thus condoning his disloyalty and appointing him to this high office, David was probably attempting to placate the pro‑Absalom faction and encourage their future loyalty to him. It is also probable that he was trying by this means to get rid of Joab, whom he must have suspected, if he did not have positive knowledge, of being responsible for Absalom's death - as indeed he was, recorded in 2 Samuel 18. He speedily found out that his judgment was at fault again, Joab was not the kind of man to take such an insult lying down and the upshot in the long run was more trouble for David.

Almost immediately the trouble came. A fierce controversy arose between the "'men of Israel" and "the men of Judah" - probably the leaders and notables of the various tribes - over the action of Judah in bringing back and re-installing David as king without giving opportunity for the participation of the ten northern tribes. Here was the old rivalry springing up again in full force. According to 2 Samuel 20 the lead in this latest insurrection was taken by one Sheba, a Benjamite, a member of Saul's own tribe. He raise the standard of revolt. "We have no part in David" he cried "neither have we inheritance in the son of Jesse. To your tents, O Israel." And Judah remained loyal to David. Once again the kingdom was divided.

David acted . He summoned Amasa, his new commander-in-chief, and instructed him to assemble the warriors of Judah and present himself with them within three days. It looks as though he was preparing for a full-scale punitive expedition. Amasa disappeared to execute his commission and the three days passed. There was no sign of Amasa or his men. David was getting edgy. He summoned Abishai, Joab's younger brother, hitherto not in the forefront of affairs but evidently of some note in the army, instructing him to go in pursuit of Sheba before he could entrench himself in the strongholds of northern Israel. His quarrel with Joab evidently prohibited him from summoning that worthy, even although he was the most experienced tactician of them all. Somehow or other, by the time Abishai had reached Gibeon a few miles north of Jerusalem, he found himself teaming up with Amasa and his men. Amasa apparently had gone into action without the formality of reporting to David first as the latter had instructed.

Now another factor came in to complicate the situation. Joab, that hardened and utterly ruthless old campaigner, although out of office and in disgrace, turned up with his own men and attached himself to the pursuers. It is evident that each of these mutually jealous and competing army leaders held a loyalty of their own men superior even to the loyalty of those men to David. Joab's men were still following him and now in this latest tussle with the northern tribes it was Joab they looked to as their leader and he knew it. So three of David's chief men, each with his own band of adherents, joined in pursuit of the rebel Sheba.

But Joab had another score to settle first. He must have followed the whole process very closely and knew just when to introduce himself into the picture. Chapter 20 tells the story. Joab caught up with Amasa at a point in the pursuit when it seems they were temporarily separated from the rest. He greeted his cousin in a friendly voice and with a sword in his left hand hidden behind his back. Amasa responded to the greeting: taken for a moment off his guard, he was suddenly transfixed by Joab's sword and fell to the ground a dying man. First, Abner; then, Absalom; now, Amasa. Joab allowed no man to stand in the way of his ambition, and the fact that his latest victim was his own cousin and David's nephew made no difference.

So Amasa died, but the pursuit continued, by common consent under the leadership of Joab. No better guarantee of success could be given. It was not long before Joab had got Sheba at bay in a walled town in the extreme north of the country and with his usual thoroughness he proceeded to tear down the walls in order to capture his quarry. Responding to an appeal from a "wise woman", a prophetess, he promised to spare the city if Sheba was given up, whereby the citizens promptly cut off Sheba's head and threw it to Joab over the wall. So the insurrection collapsed and Joab returned in triumph to Jerusalem and to David.

What David thought about all this is not recorded. Right at the beginning of his reign, at the time of the murder of Abner, he had complained that the sons of Zeruiah—Joab, Abishai and Asahel, sons of David's sister Zeruiah - were "too hard" for him, and he, although king, was weak in their presence. They seem to have been a turbulent family whose one redeeming feature was their utter loyalty to David himself. It looks as though at this time, following the death of Amasa, David resigned himself to the inevitable and allowed Joab to resume command of the army. There was probably no one else immediately available for the position, and with Joab's reputation, no volunteers.

Once again, with all enemies apparently defeated, David took his place on the throne of the Lord at Jerusalem. It was a rather insecure throne. He must have been conscious that he had lost the allegiance of the major part of Israel; it was probably upon the fighting men of his own clan, of Judah, that he had to rely in the main. Much of the glory and euphoria of the early part of his reign had passed away. For the first time there had emerged among the people of the Lord a division into two classes, the rich and the poor. Under Saul they had been a pastoral people where opportunities for the accumulation of wealth did not exist. Under David, largely in consequence of his alliance with Hiram king of Tyre and his people, they had been introduced to the refinements and luxuries of what we would today call the industrialized society. Merchants and manufacturers flourished; ornate buildings were erected, then filled with luxurious embellishments. Men left, or were enticed from their farms to work for other men who employed them on these high flown schemes. A new era was opened which Solomon brought to its peak of magnificence. The words of the Lord to Samuel when Israel first asked for a king had become fearfully true. "He will take your sons, and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horsemen, and to run before his chariots; and he will appoint for himself commanders of thousands, and commanders over fifties, and some to plough his ground and to reap his harvest, and to make his implements of war, and the equipment of his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks, and bakers. He will take the best of your fields and your vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his servants. He will take the tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give to his officers and to his servants. He will take your menservants and your maidservants and the best of your cattle and your asses and put them to his work. He will take the tenth of your flocks and you shall be his slaves. And in that day you will cry out because of your king whom you have chosen for yourselves. . . ." (1 Sam. 8. 11-13). All of this, and more, was realised by Israel under the rule of David and the kings who succeeded him, just as it has been realised by men of many nations in all the generations since. And so there was discontent throughout the land.

Then came famine. It is a little difficult to determine the precise sequence of the remaining events in David's life as narrated in 2 Sam. 21-24. It is fairly obvious that chapters 22 and 23 come from an earlier stage of his life. In any case they add nothing to the story, only repetitions of some of his Psalms and lists of the names of the mighty men of his early life in the wilderness. It does seem though that the famine came soon after the successful crushing of the rebellion of Sheba. It might well be that Nature was not altogether to blame. Since about the thirteenth year of David's reign for something like a period of twenty years the nation had been practically continuously engaged in war and conflict, either with external foes like the Ammonites or Philistines or the internal rebellions of Absalom and Sheba. Only about seven years out of that twenty were free from war. In those circumstances it would not be surprising if the land was progressively neglected, with many of the men away fighting, so that at last it refused to yield its crops and famine resulted. Chapter 21 opens at a point where the famine had lasted three years and the people were reduced to desperate straits and David went to the Lord to find out what was wrong and what could be done about it.

The Lord's reply, according to the narrator, was short and to the point. The famine had come from his hand as reprisal for Saul's slaughter of the Gibeonites half a century previously. The Gibeonites were one of the native peoples encountered by Joshua when he invaded the land. In order to avoid the fate of the other conquered tribes, they secured a treaty of toleration by Joshua by means of a trick (Joshua 9) whereby they were guaranteed safety and life; so they remained in the midst of Israel into the days of the kings. This "slaughter of the Gibeonites" is nowhere referred to in the Old Testament and nothing is known of what Saul did or his motive and it is surmised that in his early zeal for the purity of Israel he tried to exterminate the Gibeonites to cleanse the land. If so, he failed, for here in David's time there were still the descendants of the Gibeonites in Gibeon. David sent for them and asked them what he should do to pacify them and satisfy the Lord so that the famine could be lifted. Their reply was that David should hand over seven of Saul's male descendants for them to 'hang up', which meant impalement or crucifixion, "before the Lord in Gibeah". David selected the five sons of Merab, the eldest daughter of Saul (2 Sam. 21.8 says "Michal", the younger, one of David's wives, but this is an obvious scribal error for Merab, who was the one married to Adriel) and two sons of Saul by his concubine Rizpah. He handed them over apparently without compunction to suffer this appalling fate. "And after that" says the narrator in 2 Sam. 21.14 "God heeded supplications for the land".

To imagine that the Lord would in fact devise such fiendish treatment of inoffensive men for a crime half a century old must denote a very limited view of the Divine character. We may be sure that, whoever originated the answer to David's question, it was not the Lord. There is more below the surface of this story than appears above.

The narrative says that David "enquired of the Lord" (21.1). Though king, he could not go to the Lord direct; he must enquire through the High Priest who would then ascertain the Divine reply by means of the mysterious (and still little understood) "Urim and Thummin". There were two High Priests at the time. Zadok of the line of Eleazar was at Gibeah where the Tabernacle stood with the Brazen Altar. Abiathar of the line of Ithamar was at Jerusalem ministering before the Ark of the Covenant in the "tent" which David had erected for it. David would obviously go to Abiathar whose office it was to enquire before the Ark. And Abiathar himself had a grudge against Saul who had sent warriors to slay his father Ahimelech, the serving High Priest, his sons and the entire priesthood, Abiathar alone escaping. Is it possible that Abiathar seized this opportunity to have his revenge on the house of the man who had all but extirpated his own father's house? It would seem a lot more feasible to pin the responsibility for this savage deed on the creature rather than the Creator.

So the condemned men went to their fate and hung on stakes "before the Lord", that is in honour of the Lord, probably in front of the Tabernacle that was at Gibeah. It is not likely that the Lord felt honoured. More likely He pitied His people for their hardness of heart and failure to understand His ways. He must have looked with greater tenderness upon the unhappy Rizpah, who sat by those stakes day and night for six months, from the beginning of harvest to the time of the winter rains, keeping the vultures and carrion beasts away from the bodies. When David heard about that he did at least have the decency to have the remains taken away and given decent burial. Only after that was done is it said that God "heeded supplication for the land". The famine continued throughout that six months, which looks as though God did not acknowledge or accept the sacrifice after all. It may be then that it was the woman Rizpah, and not David, who ended the famine. Perhaps He did for her what He would not do for the man of blood.

(to be continued) AOH