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Kerygmania: Was Saul unjustly treated ?
The Lord said to Samuel, 'How long will you grieve over Saul? I have rejected him from being king over Israel. Fill your horn with oil and set out; I will send you to Jesse the Bethlemite, for I have provided myself a king among his sons' (1 Sam 16: 1).
Saul is rejected as king for taking spoil from the Amelekites to offer as a sacrifice to the Lord (1 Sam 15).
But David is forgiven for murdering Uriah the Hittite and committing adultery with his wife Bathsheba (2 Sam 11-12).
Was Saul unfairly treated?
Saul is rejected as king for taking spoil from the Amelekites to offer as a sacrifice to the Lord (1 Sam 15).
But David is forgiven for murdering Uriah the Hittite and committing adultery with his wife Bathsheba (2 Sam 11-12).
Was Saul unfairly treated?
Comments
A counter - history written by Mephibosheth the grandson of Saul might say:
David was a successful general who became ambitious for the throne (1 Sam 18: 7).
He legitimised his claim by marriage to Michal, the daughter of Saul (1 Sam 18: 27).
The prophet Samuel was a conspirator who deposed Saul by setting up David as a rival candidate (1 Sam 16).
David was the leader of a group of rebel bandits who planned a murderous raid upon the household of Nabal until he was appeased by Nabal's astute wife Abigail (1 Sam 25).
He committed treason by serving as the commander of the Philistines (1 Sam 27 - 29).
He slaughtered the seven sons of Saul in order to secure the succession of his own dynasty (2 Sam 21: 1-14).
He murdered Uriah the Hittite - one of his own mighty men (1 Chron 11: 40) - in order to cover up his adultery with his wife Bathsheba (2 Sam 11-12).
No wonder David was disbarred from building the Temple as a 'man of blood' (1 Chron 28: 3).
David is nearly overthrown in a rebellion by Sheba who protests: 'We have no portion in David, neither have we any inheritance in the son of Jesse. Every man to his tents, Israel. So all the men of Israel deserted David' (2 Sam 20: 1-2).
The same protest is taken up in the days of David's grandson Rehoboam and this time the rebellion succeeds and the kingdom is divided into Israel and Judah (1 Kings 12: 16 / 2 Chron 10: 16).
St Paul says of himself that he is 'a man of violence' and 'the chief of sinners' (1 Tim 1: 15), but he becomes the greatest missionary and likely author of 13 books of the NT. Most of the disciples including St Peter are portrayed as being fallible followers.
Our human flaws are not an obstacle to God's grace or God's purposes. Because God likes to glorify Himself by using 'the things that are not' (1 Cor 1: 28).
Here is 1 Samuel 32-34
Most people take quite a while to acknowledge their wrongdoing.
The good King Hezekiah 'did what was right in the sight of the Lord, just as his ancestor David had done' (2 Chron 29: 2).
The wicked king Jehoram 'did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. Yet the Lord would not destroy the House of David, because of the covenant that he had made with David' (2 Chron 21: 7).
The faithfulness of the Lord to David is very moving to read. In the aftermath of the Bathsheba debacle He sends Nathan to tell him the parable of the rich man and the poor man and declare: Thou art the man! 'Did I not give you everything? I anointed you king over Israel... and if that had been too little I would have added as much more. Why have you despised the word of the Lord?' (2 Sam 12: 7-9).
Why, O, why could you not just get it right?
Enter Jesus.
I don't think God withdrew favor from Saul because he took spoil from the Amelekites; I think it was because he made a sacrifice which he was not authorized to make, since he was not a Levite.
Here is 1 Samuel 13:8-14
The bad things that David did were not violations of the laws of sacrifice.
When the Ark of the Covenant was being transported to Jerusalem, a Levite named Uzzah took hold of the Ark to steady it. God's anger burned against Uzzah and He struck him down and he died (2 Sam 6: 1-7; 1 Chron 13: 9-12).
So crossing the sacred boundary was a serious matter in the eyes of God.
His son Solomon did not love God in the same way and in the end he turned away from the worship of God. When he is offered a gift by God he chooses wisdom - but because it is not combined with the love of God it turns sterile and becomes a source of frustration. In Ecclesiastes he writes that he has tried everything to find meaning in life but finally concludes that it is meaningless. Solomon would have done better to have requested the same loving heart for God that his father David had.
In the OT the leaders who are raised through adversity are the ones who handle their responsibilities wisely: Abraham, Moses, Joseph, Samuel, David, Daniel, Mordecai and Nehemiah.
But the leaders who have power handed to them on a plate become corrupted by it because they have not developed mature and resilient characters including the sons of Samuel, Solomon and Rehoboam.
Agreed. "Thou art the man!".
Not quite . Saul’s principal task was to fight the Philistines, the coastal people who sought to conquer the territory of Israel in the 11th and 10th centuries B.C.E. Samuel ordered Saul to wait for him at Gilgal , so Samuel could offer a sacrifice before the war began (I Samuel 13:8-9). Saul waited seven days, but, watching the Israelites melt away day after day, he resolved to take matters into his own hands and offered the sacrifice himself. For this act of insubordination, Samuel says to Saul: “Your kingdom shall not continue; the Lord has sought out a man after his own heart, and the Lord has appointed him to be prince over his people, because you have not kept what the Lord commanded you” (13:14).
Doesn't happen now, does it?
There are theological overtones to this dispute which are mostly lost on modern readers. This is a debate between the priestly tradition (sacrifice) represented in this passage by Saul and the prophetic tradition (obedience to scripture) represented by Samuel. In other words it's not just a political dispute, but also a theological one.
The text does not mention a dynastic struggle.
Or have you never seen a toddler having a hissy fit in spite of his father's attempts to carry him off to bed?
He may not win, but the struggle is a real thing, and he has that much dignity.
ISTM that this is clearly what the text is saying. What is the evidence for a rebellion by David against Saul?
Regarding the danger of taking the text at face value I feel more secure, particularly as to historical accuracy, where probable events are interwoven with myth and legend, and interpretation suffused with theological debate and dogma coupled with political bias. It is sometimes difficult, therefore, to decide whether an event is what we would understand to be an historical fact or fiction, of which the anointing of the boy David is an example. It is important, therefore, to try and identify the purpose(s) of the text and the variable nature of its content (history, myth, legend, theology, political propaganda), to come to some intelligible understanding of the document. That, however, is no simple task, and likely to promote little certainty.
You go on to say, I think within the fairly limited sphere of the story of David (rather than, say, the hexateuch as a whole) the clear purpose of the text is to validate David’s kingship. That, however, gives us no clue as to whether it is ‘what we would understand to be an historical fact or fiction’. There are, furthermore, no clearly identified examples of ‘history, myth, legend, theology, political propaganda’ within the literature of Hebrew narrative which might offer literary or text-critical clues against which to judge this story.
Of course it is possible to see why the story might have been invented if it wasn’t true, but the same extra-textual argument could also be used for the inclusion of the account if it was true.
I thoroughly agree with you that the clear purpose of the text is to validate David's kingship, and that is the reason why I take a sceptical approach to its presentation of the dispute between David and Saul. What seems clear is that David was a popular and successful commander in Saul's army, that there was a falling out between the two, and that David displaced the House of Saul as the ruler of Israel. According to the writer the cause of the rift was the jealousy of Saul, and despite the need to defend himself against the vengeance of the king David refused to kill him when a couple of opportunity arose because he was the anointed, legitimate king. David was not engaged in rebellion, although at one stage he made an alliance with some Philistines, but in self-defence.
The problem I have with this narrative and explanation is that a more simple account could be that at a time when rulers were required to lead their troops into battle Saul was less and less able to do so, and David saw his chance to take the top job through rebellion. Add to that the kingdom of Israel was in its early infancy, having been a theocracy, and the royal house hardly established at all. The legitimacy of the stronger, the legacy of the Judges, was continued in David and repeated by Absalom.
To 'validate David's kingship,' however, it was felt necessary by the author of Samuel to legitimise his usurpation. Consequently, the anointing of the boy David by Samuel, which was linked to the Lord removing his anointing of Saul, and the implication that any actions of David against Saul were morally and religiously legitimate. The questions which arise are several: Why did Samuel not then announce the Lord's negating of Saul's anointing and mobilise support for David? Why the long gap between David's anointing and asserting his claim to the throne? Why did David regard Saul as "the Lord's anointed" for so long?
Thus, although I accept your point that: " it is possible to see why the story might have been invented if it wasn’t true, but the same extra-textual argument could also be used for the inclusion of the account if it was true," I would argue that more simple explanations are generally to be preferred against those which are convoluted and raise more questions than they answer.
Now, if the Saul camp had won out, would there have been a similar adaptation?
As they say, the victors write the history.
David's reign is filled with civil wars and a messed up family.