An Atheist Explores the Bible Part 56: Kings shouldn’t dance, Jehosophat doesn’t Jump, but God likes living in a tent (2 Samuel 6-10)

2 Samuel 6-10
Kings shouldn’t dance, Jehosophat doesn’t Jump, but God likes living in a tent.

Welcome to another instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Bible version).

In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the King James Bible, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.

For more detail, see the introductory post http://bit.ly/2F8f9JT

For the online KJV I use, see here http://bit.ly/2m0zVUP

And now:

2 Samuel 6

“And as the ark of the LORD came into the city of David, Michal Saul's daughter looked through a window, and saw king David leaping and dancing before the LORD; and she despised him in her heart.”

I’m afraid that the above quote reminded me of the words of Jake the Poacher from Withnail and I, when he mentions seeing Withnail “prancing like a tit”. But to back track, this chapter basically deals with David moving the ark of the covenant to a new place. As well as Withnail and I it also reminds me a bit of Ice Cold in Alex, and also a French film whose name I can’t recall, that involved moving a truckload of explosives over difficult ground really slowly.

Because the ark is a hazardous cargo (I hope David filled out the correct consignment forms). When it moves a bit on its wagon, a man named Uzzah tries to steady it and is killed for his trouble. David actually has the temerity to become angry at God for this, and leaves the ark with the wonderfully named Obededom the Gittite for a few months, until he sees the Obededom the Gittite has become prosperous, at which point he decides to move it to the new tabernacle he has made for it in Gibeah.

The procession of the ark involves music and dancing, and David himself joins in, to the scorn of his wife Michal. This is not, however, because of his terrible Dad Dancing, but because Michal feels that a king should act with more decorum. David’s response is that kingly decorum is nothing before God, and shuns her from then on.

For much of the books of Samuel I’ve not had much to comment on the theology, as they’ve been more about kingmaking and warfare. The online version of the KJV that I use has some commentary by Matthew Henry in 1710, which quite often tries to draw some kind of Christian allegory out of every chapter. For these historicals it feels like a bit of a stretch to me, and even moral lessons generally are hard to pin-point; they are more realistic in that regard as people act as people do when offered power, with a mix of admirable and less admirable actions. This one, perhaps, does end with more of a direct “thought for the day”, but otherwise I think trying to draw some kind of lesson from these chapters is a dubious endeavour, unless you end up with the moral that you should kill everyone who doesn’t believe as you do. Fortunately, that’s never happened….

2 Samuel 7

“That the king said unto Nathan the prophet, See now, I dwell in an house of cedar, but the ark of God dwelleth within curtains”

David ponders whether it’s right that he lives in a wooden palace whereas the ark is kept in a tent, and sends his prophet Nathan to ask God’s opinion on this. God replies that he’s never complained before and is quite happy to live in a tent, but one will come from David’s line who will build a great house. The rest of the chapter is some glorifying from David concerning this, in which he humbles himself and asks for God’s blessing.

Funny that I mentioned above about Christian allegory (or lack thereof) in previous chapters – here the subtext almost becomes text, where God talks of one to come of whom “I will be his father and he shall be my son”, who will “build a house for my name and I shall stablish his kingdom forever”. I’m pretty sure that in the original intent, and the reading of this in Jewish scripture if it exists, is that the “house” is literal and the “son” is metaphorical, probably pertaining to the temple built by Solomon. However, in the Christian reading of this it, where it is probably used as a reference to Jesus, metaphor and literalism become reversed; Jesus literally is the son of God in Christian belief, and the “house” that he “builds” is the belief system of Christianity. An interesting little section, and a good example of how OT writings can be used as “proof” of the importance of Jesus.

2 Samuel 8
“And after this it came to pass, that David smote the Philistines, and subdued them: and David took Methegammah out of the hand of the Philistines.”

After the brief foray into prophecy and metaphor last chapter, this one returns reassuringly to history and battles. David subdues various enemies of Israel and makes allies of other nations that had been subjugated by enemy nations, gets lots of plunder and tribute and sets up a peaceful and prosperous reign. The chapter ends with a little roll-call of who is who in David’s administration; of note is Zadok the priest, whose name only strikes me because of the piece of music by Handel. Also Jehoshaphat, who is a recorder, but is probably not jumping.

2 Samuel 9

“And David said, Is there yet any that is left of the house of Saul, that I may shew him kindness for Jonathan's sake?”

Because David is a decent sort of king, he looks for any remaining in the line of Saul so that he can show kindness, out of his friendship with Jonathon. A former servant of Saul, named Ziba, mentions that the lame son of Jonathon, the annoyingly named Mephibosheth (remember him, I said he’d be back), who is bought before David. David grants him Saul’s old lands, and puts Ziba in charge of tending them whilst Mephibosheth and his son Micha, live with David. If David had been more old school he would have only been pretending to make amends, and would have had M and M blinded or crushed by stones. But he doesn’t, because he’s a just king.

2 Samuel 10

“Then said David, I will shew kindness unto Hanun the son of Nahash, as his father shewed kindness unto me. And David sent to comfort him by the hand of his servants for his father. And David's servants came into the land of the children of Ammon.”

Evidently this concept of making peace with enemies and showing kindness is a foreign one to most rulers, because when David sends messengers to the Ammonites to see if he can do anything to help, out of memory for Nahash who sheltered him, the Ammonites assume that they are spies and send them back with half their beards shaved off and their robes torn short enough to expose their buttocks.

Obviously there’s only one response to this – a good smiting. The Ammonites hire some Syrians to help them in battle, whilst David and Joab lead the Israelite forces. Israel vs. Syria; we’ve come so far.

There then follows a very poor battle report, but the upshot is (spoiler alert): the Israelites win. The Syrian forces decide that the Ammonites are a bunch of lame ducks and that they will not fight for them again.