LECTURE XXII. THE YOUTH OF DAVID. The Psalms which, according to their titles or their contents, illustrate this period, are: (1) For the shepherd life, Psalms viii., xix., xxiii., xxix., cli. (2) For the escape, Psalms vi., vii., lix., lvi., xxxiv. (3) For the wanderings, Psalms lii., xl., liv., lvii., lxiii, cxlii., xviii. DAVID. LECTURE XXII. THE YOUTH OF DAVID. Of all the characters in the Jewish history there is none so well known to us as David. As in the case of Cicero and of Julius Cæsar, perhaps of no one else in ancient history before the Christian era, we have in his case the rare advantage of being able to compare a detailed historical narrative with the undoubtedly authentic writings of the person with whom the narrative is concerned. Family of We have already seen the family circle of Saul. That of David is known to us on a more extended scale, and with a more direct bearing on his David. subsequent career. Jesse. His father Jesse was probably, like his ancestor Boaz, the chief man of the place. -the Sheikh of the village.1 He was of great age when David was still young,2 and was still alive after his final rupture with Saul.3 Through this ancestry David inherited several marked peculiarities. There was a mixture of Canaanitish and Moabitish blood in the family, which may not have been without its use in keeping open a wider view in his mind and history than if he had been of purely Jewish descent. His connection with Moab through his great-grandmother Ruth he kept up when he escaped to Moab and intrusted his aged parents to the care of the king.2 Bethlehem. He was also, to a degree unusual in the Jewish records, attached to his birthplace. He never forgot the flavor of the water of the well of Bethlehem. From the territory of Bethlehem, as from his own patrimony, he gave a property as a reward to Chimham, son of Barzillai; and it is this connection of David with Bethlehem that brought the place again in later times into universal fame, when "Joseph went "up to Bethlehem, because he was of the house and "lineage of David." Through his birthplace he acquired that hold over the tribe of Judah which assured his security amongst the hills of Judah during his flight from Saul, and during the early period of his reign at Hebron; as afterwards at the time of Absalom it provoked the jealousy of the tribe at having lost their exclusive possession of him. The Mussulman traditions represent him as skilled in making hair-cloths and sack-cloths, which, according to the Targum, was the special occupation of Jesse, which Jesse may in turn have derived from his ancestor Hur, the first founder, as was believed, of the town," the father of Bethlehem." The origin and name of his mother is wrapt in mysMother of tery. It would seem almost as if she had been 8 the wife or concubine of Nahash, and then David. 1 Such is probably the design of the express mention of Rahab and Ruth in the genealogy in Matt. i. 5. 21 Sam. xxii. 3. 3 1 Chr. xi. 17. 4 2 Sam. xix. 37, 38; Jer. xli. 17. 6 Luke ii. 4. See Exod. xxxi. 2; 1 Chr. iv. 5; and articles on BETHLEHEM and JAARE-OREGIM, in Dict. of Bible. 7 Zeruiah and Abigail, though called in 1 Chr. ii. 16 sisters of David, are not expressly called the daughters of Jesse; and Abigail, in 2 Sam. xvii. 25, is called the daughter of Nahash. • The later rabbis represent David married by Jesse. This would agree with the ract, that her daughters, David's sisters, were older than the rest of the family, and also (if Nahash was the same as the king of Ammon) with the kindnesses which David received first from Nahash, and then from Shobi his son.1 ers and As the youngest of the family he may possibly have received from his parents the name, which first His brothappears in him, of David, the beloved, the darling. nephews. But, perhaps for this same reason, he was never intimate with his brothers. The eldest, whose command was regarded in the family as law, and who was afterwards made by David head of the tribe of Judah,* treated him scornfully and imperiously; and the father looked upon the youngest son as hardly one of the family at all, and as a mere attendant on the rest. The familiarity which he lost with his brothers, he gained with his nephews. The three sons of his sister Zeruiah, and the one son of his sister Abigail, seemingly from the fact that their mothers were the eldest of the whole family, must have been nearly of the same age as David himself, and they accordingly were to him throughout life in the relation as born in adultery. This is probably a coarse inference from Ps. li. 5; but it may possibly have reference to a tradition of the above. On the other hand, in the earlier rabbis we have an attempt to establish an "immaculate conception" in the ancestry of their favorite King. They make Nahash"the serpent" - to be another name of Jesse, because he had no sin except that contracted from the original serpent; and thus David inherited none. (Jerome, Qu. Heb. on 2 Sam. xvii. 26, and Targum to Ruth iv. 22.) 1 2 Sam. x. 1; 1 Chr. xix. 1; 2 5 Sam. xvii. 27. Nahash in LXX., 2 Sam. xvii. 25, is brother of Zeruiah; Nahash king of Ammon was grandfather of Rehoboam's mother, Naamah (LXX. 1 Kings xii. 34, i. e. xiv. 31 Hebr.). 2 The name is given in its shorter Hebrew form in the earlier books of the Old Testament, in its longer form in the later books, as also in Hosea, Amos, Canticles, and 1 Kings iii. 14. The same word in another form appears in the Phoenician DIDO 31 Sam. xii. 28; xx. 29. usually occupied by brothers and cousins. The family burial-place of this second branch was at Bethlehem.1 In most of them we see only the rougher qualities of the family, which David shared with them, whilst he was distinguished from them by qualities of his own, peculiar to himself. Two of them, the sons of his brother Shimeah, are celebrated for the gift of sagacity in which David excelled. One was Jonadab, the friend and adviser of his eldest son Amnon.2 The other was Jonathan, who afterwards became the counsellor of David himself. 5 The first time that David appears in history, at once admits us to the whole family circle. There was a practice once a year at Bethlehem, probably at the first new moon, of holding a sacrificial feast, at which Jesse, as the chief proprietor of the place, would preside, with the elders of the town, and from which no member of the family ought to be absent. At this or such like feast suddenly appeared the great Prophet Samuel, driving a heifer before him, and having in his hand his long horn filled with the consecrated oil preserved in the Tabernacle at Nob. The elders of the little town were terrified at this apparition, but were reassured by the august visitor, and invited by him to the ceremony of sacrificing the heifer. The heifer was killed. The party were waiting to begin the feast. Samuel stood with his horn to pour forth the oil, which seems to have been the usual mode of invitation to begin a feast." He was restrained by a Divine control as son after son passed by. Eliab, the eldest, by his "height" and his 1 2 Sam. ii. 32. 2 Ibid. xiii. 3. 3 Ibid. xxi. 21; 1 Chr. xxvii. 32. 4 1 Sam. xx. 6. 5 Ibid. xvi. 1-3. 6" The oil;" ibid. 18, and so Jo seph. Ant. vi. 8, § 1. 7 Comp. 1 Sam. ix. 1?, 22. |