David, the son of Jesse of Bethlehem, in the tribe of Judah, belonged “to the valiant men whom Saul had taken to himself”; he had distinguished himself in the struggle against the Philistines, and the king had made him his armour bearer and sent him out frequently against them; with fortune on his side David’s expeditions succeeded better than those of other captains. Thus he was beloved in the eyes of the people and of the king’s servants, and Jonathan, the brave son of Saul, “made a covenant with David, for he loved him as his own soul.” In Saul’s house David was trusted and honoured before the other warriors. Saul made him a captain of a thousand and gave him the command of the bodyguard. After Abner, David was the first of Saul’s followers and ate at his table. Saul even went farther; he gave David his second daughter Michal to wife, because she loved him, though David had himself refused to take her. “What am I,” said David, “and what is my life or my father’s family that I should be the king’s son-in-law? But I am a poor man and lightly esteemed.”
After this, Saul was seized with a suspicion of David, fearing lest this man whom he had raised so high and had made his son-in-law, and who was the bosom friend of his son, should conspire against him and his house in alliance with Samuel and other priests who had not abandoned their unfriendly attitude towards the newly established throne and the man who filled it.
It is related that Saul thrust at David with a spear, but that the latter avoided the blow and fled to his house. Then Saul commanded that the house should be surrounded, that David might be killed the next day. But Michal let David down in the night from a window, and laid the household god in the bed in his place, covered it up with a cloth, and placed the fly-net of goat’s hair over the face of the image. Meantime David fled to Samuel at Ramah and hid with him at Naioth until Saul learned his whereabouts. Then David escaped to Nob, where the priest Ahimelech inquired of Jehovah for him and gave him provisions and a sword, and thence he fled farther to the Philistine prince, Achish, king of Gath.
Saul blamed his daughter for having helped David out of his difficulties, and said to Jonathan: “As long as the son of Jesse liveth, thou shalt not be established nor thy kingdom.” Then he held a strict trial of the priests, under the tamarisk at Gibeah. When the priests of Nob were brought before him, Saul asked Ahimelech: “Why have ye conspired against me, thou and the son of Jesse, that he should rise against me? Thou shalt surely die. Slay the priests,” he cried to his bodyguard; “their hand is with David and because they knew when he fled and did not shew it to me.” But the servants of the king would not put forth their hand to fall upon the priests of the Lord. And the king said to Doeg, “Turn thou and fall upon the priests.” And Doeg the Edomite turned and fell upon the priests, and slew on that day fourscore and five persons that did wear a linen ephod.
“And Nob, the city of the priests, smote he with the edge of the sword, both men and women, children and sucklings, and oxen, and asses, and sheep, with the edge of the sword.
“And one of the sons of Ahimelech the son of Ahitub, named Abiathar, escaped and fled after David. And Abiathar shewed David that Saul had slain the Lord’s priests.”
DAVID IN REVOLT AGAINST SAUL
We do not know exactly how far Saul’s suspicion of David was justified: from the story which has been revised and worked up with a view to prejudicing us in David’s favour, we can only perceive that the son of Jesse actually was in close alliance with the priests, and David’s own actions after he had broken with Saul are evidence of far-reaching and carefully laid schemes, the means of whose execution were not too scrupulous. But whether Saul had perceived David’s ambitious intentions in good time, or had gone too far in his proceedings against him, in either case he had committed an error: David was by no means content with escaping from the king’s anger; if wrong had been done him he far outdid it by his own acts. The Philistines would neither have received in Gath a dangerous enemy like David, who had done them so much injury, nor have spared his life, if he had not agreed to support them for the future in their struggle against Saul. David also entered into relations with other enemies of his country.
His father and mother he took to the king of Moab, to secure them against Saul’s vengeance. He then threw himself into the desolate tracts of eastern Judea about the Dead Sea, and here he attempted to organise a rising; he probably counted on the adhesion of the tribe of Judah, to which he belonged, as he might reckon on their jealousy of the king from the little tribe of Benjamin, although the tribe of Judah should have been especially grateful to Saul, since it had been the one to suffer longest under the Philistine dominion. His father’s house really gathered round him, “and all the oppressed, and whosoever had a creditor and whosoever had a grievance.” They were for the most part people of the tribe of Judah, with some from Benjamin and others from Gad, beyond Jordan—four to six hundred men, who assembled round David in the cave of Adullam. This was no great result, and David found himself compelled to lead a robber existence with this band, and by so doing he ran the danger of rousing the inhabitants of the neighbourhood against him.
He therefore tried a middle course and sent to a rich man, Nabal of Carmel, who possessed three thousand sheep and one thousand goats, and who was a descendant of that Caleb who had here once founded a lordship for himself with the sword. David sent to say that he had taken nothing from Nabal’s flocks, and to ask if the latter would not, therefore, send him and his the means of subsistence. But Nabal answered David’s messenger: “Who is David and who is the son of Jesse; there be many servants nowadays that break away every man from his master.” Then David set out, by night, to fall on Nabal’s house and flocks. On the way he was met by Nabal’s wife Abigail, who, in her dread of the freebooters, had had some asses laden with slaughtered sheep, bread, jars of wine, figs, and raisin cakes, to take secretly to David’s camp. “Blessed be thy advice, woman,” said David, “for as the Lord God of Israel liveth, hadst thou not met me, surely by the morning light there had been none left of Nabal and his house.” Nabal miraculously died ten days after this incident. David reflected that so rich a possession in this region could not but be useful. Saul’s daughter was lost to him, so he sent some servants to Abigail at Carmel. They said: “David sent us unto thee, to take thee to him to wife.” And Abigail arose and bowed herself on her face to the earth and said, ‘Behold, let thine handmaid be a servant to wash the feet of the servants of my lord.’ Then she arose with five of her maidens, and went after the messengers of David and became his wife. In fact, this marriage seems to have been of great assistance to David’s enterprise. The southern towns of Judah—Aroer, Hormah, Ramoth, Jattir, Eshtemoa, even Hebron itself, declared for him. From here David endeavoured to press forward to the north and made himself master of the fortified city of Keilah.