Commentaria in II Regum (II Samuelis)
Chapter 3. Synopsis of the Chapter
David’s wives are recounted, and as many sons born in Hebron. Isboseth blames Abner for lust; Abner goes over to David, makes a covenant with him, and subjects all Israel to him. Soon, verse 23, Joab accuses Abner before David of treachery, and treacherously slays him, but David mourns him with love.
1. Now there was a long war between the house of Saul and the house of David: David prospering and growing continually stronger, but the house of Saul decaying every day. 2. And sons were born to David in Hebron: his firstborn was Amnon, of Achinoam the Jezraelitess. 3. And after him Cheleab, of Abigail the wife of Nabal of Carmel: and the third, Absalom the son of Maacha, the daughter of Tholmai king of Gessur. 4. And the fourth, Adonias the son of Haggith: and the fifth, Saphatia the son of Abital. 5. And the sixth, Jethraam of Egla, David’s wife. These were born to David in Hebron. 6. Now when there was war between the house of Saul and the house of David, Abner the son of Ner ruled the house of Saul. 7. And Saul had a concubine named Respha, the daughter of Aia. And Isboseth said to Abner: 8. Why didst thou go in to my father’s concubine? And he was exceedingly angry for the words of Isboseth, and said: Am I a dog’s head against Juda this day, who have shewn mercy to the house of Saul thy father, and to his brethren and kinsmen, and have not delivered thee into the hands of David: and thou hast sought against me this day, to charge me with a fault concerning a woman? 9. May God do so and so to Abner, and add more to it, unless as the Lord hath sworn to David, so I do to him, 10. That the kingdom be translated from the house of Saul, and the throne of David be set up over Israel and over Juda, from Dan to Bersabee. 11. And he could not answer him a word, because he feared him. 12. Abner therefore sent messengers to David for himself, saying: Whose is the land? and that they should say: Make a league with me, and my hand shall be with thee, and I will bring all Israel to thee. 13. And he said: Very well, I will make a league with thee: but one thing I require of thee, saying: Thou shalt not see my face, before thou bring Michol the daughter of Saul: and so thou shalt come, and see me. 14. And David sent messengers to Isboseth the son of Saul, saying: Restore my wife Michol, whom I espoused to me for a hundred foreskins of the Philistines. 15. Isboseth therefore sent, and took her from her husband Phaltiel the son of Lais. 16. And her husband followed her, weeping as far as Bahurim; and Abner said to him: Go, and return. And he returned. 17. Abner also spoke to the ancients of Israel, saying: Both yesterday and the day before you sought for David to be king over you. 18. Now then do it: for the Lord hath spoken to David, saying: By the hand of my servant David I will save my people Israel from the hand of the Philistines, and of all their enemies. 19. And Abner spoke also to Benjamin. And he went to speak to David in Hebron all that was agreeable to Israel, and to all Benjamin. 20. And he came to David in Hebron with twenty men: and David made a feast for Abner, and for the men that came with him. 21. And Abner said to David: I will arise, that I may gather all Israel unto thee, my lord the king, and may enter into a league with thee, and that thou mayst reign over all as thy soul desireth. And when David had brought Abner on his way, and he was gone in peace, 22. Immediately the servants of David and Joab came, after having slain the robbers, with a very great spoil: and Abner was not with David in Hebron, for he had already sent him away, and he was gone in peace. 23. And Joab, and all the army that was with him, came afterwards: and it was told Joab, saying: Abner the son of Ner came to the king, and he hath sent him away, and he is gone in peace. 24. And Joab went in to the king, and said: What hast thou done? Behold Abner came to thee: why didst thou send him away, and he is gone and departed? 25. Knowest thou not Abner the son of Ner, that to this end he came to thee, that he might deceive thee, and know thy going out and thy coming in, and know all thou dost? 26. Joab therefore going out from David, sent messengers after Abner, and brought him back from the cistern of Sira, David not knowing it. 27. And when Abner was returned to Hebron, Joab took him aside to the middle of the gate to speak to him treacherously, and there he stabbed him in the groin, and he died, in revenge of the blood of Asael his brother. 28. And when David heard of it, the thing being now done, he said: I am clean, and my kingdom, before the Lord for ever, from the blood of Abner the son of Ner: 29. And let it come upon the head of Joab, and upon all his father’s house: and let there not fail from the house of Joab one that hath an issue of seed, and that is leprous, and that holdeth the distaff, and that falleth by the sword, and that wanteth bread. 30. So Joab and Abisai his brother slew Abner, because he had killed their brother Asael in Gabaon, in the battle. 31. And David said to Joab, and to all the people that were with him: Rend your garments, and gird yourselves with sackcloth, and mourn before the funeral of Abner. And king David himself followed the bier. 32. And when they had buried Abner in Hebron, king David lifted up his voice and wept at the grave of Abner: and all the people wept also. 33. And the king mourning and lamenting for Abner, said: Not as cowards are wont to die hath Abner died. 34. Thy hands were not bound, nor thy feet loaded with fetters: but as men fall before the children of iniquity, so didst thou fall. And all the people repeating it wept over him. 35. And when all the people came to take meat with David, while it was yet broad day, David swore, saying: May God do so and so to me, and add more, if I taste bread or any thing else before the going down of the sun. 36. And all the people heard, and they were pleased, and all that the king did seemed good in the sight of all the people. 37. And all the people, and all Israel understood that day, that it was not the king’s doing that Abner the son of Ner was slain. 38. The king also said to his servants: Do you not know that a prince and a great man is slain this day in Israel? 39. But I am as yet tender, though anointed king. And these men the sons of Sarvia are too hard for me: the Lord reward him that doth evil according to his wickedness.
3. AND THE THIRD, ABSALOM, THE SON OF MAACHA, THE DAUGHTER OF THOLMAI KING OF GESSUR.—God had forbidden the Hebrews to marry Chanaanites, lest they should follow their idolatry; yet David here married Maacha, daughter of the king of Gessur, a Chanaanite, because she became a proselyte and was converted to Judaism, as the Hebrews relate in St. Jerome in the Traditions. So Salmon married Rahab the Chanaanite, and Booz Ruth the Moabitess; Matthew 1. Some think that Maacha was carried off by David in a raid from Gessuri and then taken to wife, according to the rite prescribed by God in Deuteronomy chap. 21, verse 10; although Abulensis denies this, who with Cajetan, Salianus and others excuses David otherwise, saying that God did not forbid the Jews marriages with all the nations, but only with those that inhabited the promised land; but Gessuri was outside it; wherefore this Gessur is other than the Gessuri which Josue, chap. 13, verse 11, assigns to the tribe of Manasses.
5. AND THE SIXTH, JETHRAAM, OF EGLA, DAVID’S WIFE, —namely the chief and first and beloved before the rest. For the other wives of David had already been enumerated; hence Sanchez refers “wife” by zeugma to all the preceding wives of David. Hence the Rabbis, Angelomus, Lyranus, Cajetan and Dionysius think that Egla is Michol, whom David greatly loved: and that she was called Egla, that is, heifer, because she was a young and beautiful girl: but they err: for Egla was fruitful; Michol, however, was barren, chap. 6, verse 23, so that even those adopted by her were slain, 2 Kings 21, and of Michol’s being brought back it is treated below, verse 14. So Josephus, Abulensis, Vatablus, Serarius, Sanchez and others.
8. WHY DIDST THOU GO IN TO MY FATHER’S CONCUBINE?—Either for lust, or that thou mayst take her to wife, and so aspire to the kingdom, and snatch it from me? That this was a calumny, and that Abner was innocent of it, Josephus in the Greek and Vatablus relate.
AM I A DOG’S HEAD AGAINST JUDA THIS DAY?—Some explain “head of a dog” so that Abner calls not himself but Isboseth a dog, as if to say: Am I the head and leader of a vile and abject man, who is like a dog? Namely of Isboseth, who with his vile followers, like dogs, barks at David and his kingdom of Juda, and shamelessly, like a dog, charges me, innocent as I am, with so infamous a lust. Others judge better that Abner speaks of himself and calls himself “a dog’s head” (for the head cannot be separated from the dog), and that on account of the lust and shamelessness which dogs chiefly display in the head, as if to say: Am I so lustful and shameless as to defile the wife of the king and my kinsman Saul, when I am striving with all my strength to defend his honour and thine and the kingdom? Again, as if to say: Am I so vile and quarrelsome as to be, as it were, thy dog, who, to defend thy kingdom, bark continually in fighting against David and the Jews? So St. Jerome in the Traditions, Angelomus, Abulensis and Vatablus. Hear St. Jerome: “For thee and for the house of thy father, I am said to be a dog’s head against Juda, because I do not bring the house of Israel back to David, whom I know to be anointed king, and to reign over all Israel.” He says he is “a dog’s head,” that is, vile, because by the house of Juda he was so regarded, like the barking of a dog, being the prince of dogs, that is, of foolish men.
14. RESTORE MY WIFE MICHOL, WHOM I ESPOUSED TO ME FOR A HUNDRED FORESKINS.—David claimed Michol back, both because he loved her, and because she had been unjustly taken from him by Saul, and because she was the daughter of King Saul, whom he had bought of him by the slaughter of a hundred enemies, that in this way, through her, the king’s daughter, bought by him at so dear a price, he might be raised by the Israelites to the kingdom, and be the more willingly received as king, as one already grafted into the royal stock,
18. FOR THE LORD HATH SPOKEN TO DAVID (of David) SAYING: BY THE HAND (through the hand) OF MY SERVANT DAVID I WILL SAVE MY PEOPLE ISRAEL.—It is probable that God said this through Samuel, when he anointed David king at God’s command, although these words are not expressed above in the account of his anointing. Abner, however, knew that God had said them, from common talk and report which he gradually heard, especially when he saw that God everywhere prospered David and adorned him with victories against himself and Isboseth: wherefore on the occasion of this insult received from Isboseth he resolved to obey God and to transfer the kingdom from Isboseth to David.
27. IN REVENGE OF THE BLOOD OF ASAEL HIS BROTHER.—This was the true reason why Joab slew Abner, namely because Abner had slain Asael, Joab’s brother, chap. 2, verse 23. Josephus, Theodoret and Procopius, Dionysius, Lyranus, Serarius and Salianus add another reason, namely, that Joab feared lest David, if he removed him, would set Abner, now reconciled to himself, as a distinguished general, over his camp, as Saul had set him: so that in this way he would bind to himself all the soldiers and Israelites to whom Abner was dear; for he knew, says Theodoret, that he would command the army who brought all Israel to the king; for this reason also Joab slew Amasa, chap. 20.
The Hebrews fable that Joab bade Abner teach him the way in which he who refused to marry the wife of his brother who had died childless was accustomed to take off his shoe; and that when Abner obligingly bent his head to the shoe, he was treacherously beheaded by Joab.
29. AND LET THERE NOT FAIL FROM THE HOUSE OF JOAB ONE THAT HATH AN ISSUE OF SEED, AND THAT IS LEPROUS, AND THAT HOLDETH THE DISTAFF, AND THAT FALLETH BY THE SWORD, AND THAT WANTETH BREAD.—David seems, as a prophet, to curse Joab and his posterity prophetically, and to foretell the punishment which God was about to inflict on them for the killing of Abner; unless thou prefer with some to say that these words sound not so much a curse as Joab’s desert, namely that he deserves to be chastised with these punishments, that is, that he deserves disease of the seed and leprosy, likewise disgrace, slaughter and poverty. Now “one that hath an issue of seed” is one who suffers from gonorrhea, which is a foul disease, and infamous among the Hebrews, and made the sufferer legally unclean and irregular in many ways, as is clear from Leviticus 15. Add that one suffering from an issue of seed is useless for generation, because he pours out the seed. Joab is therefore punished here with sterility and poverty, and that fittingly and suitably, namely that his children should give life to no sons of their own, as he had taken life from Abner.
AND LEPROUS.—Leprosy was frequent among the Jews, and was a horrible disease, which made a man plainly unclean and irregular. See what is said at Leviticus 13.
AND THAT HOLDETH THE DISTAFF.—The Septuagint has skytale, that is, a whip or scourge such as herdsmen and drivers carry, or a leather wallet such as beggars carry, or a rod and staff, which the blind and the gouty, who labour under disease of the feet, hold so as not to stumble on stones and walls: hence Aquila renders, a blind man. But in Proverbs 31:19, pelech—the Septuagint, our version, Pagninus, Vatablus, Marinus and others commonly render, a spindle, as our version does here. Hugo takes “spindle” as a drum, which the leper beats from time to time to keep passers-by from touching him, and to ask alms. The Master of the Scholastic History takes “spindle” as a fan to drive away the flies that infest lepers: for flies fly to putrid and festering flesh, such as lepers’, to suck the matter. But a spindle is properly an instrument of women, with which they spin and twist threads, as if to say: Because Joab killed Abner not as a man in open battle, but secretly and treacherously, as a woman, his descendants are condemned by way of disgrace to the vile services of women, to handle the spindle and distaff and serve the women in spinning, as did the womanish Sardanapalus, king of the Assyrians, according to Justin, book I, and as eunuchs afterwards do, to whom the care of royal women is entrusted: nay, as Hercules did, who by the daughter of the king of Aetolia, with whom he was madly in love, was so effeminated that at her bidding he turned the spindle and spun, as the poets relate or fable. Moreover David did not put Joab to death, as he deserved, because Joab held the army in his hand, as Abner had rebelled against Isboseth and taken the kingdom from him. He therefore deferred the vengeance, and when dying commanded Solomon to kill Joab, 3 Kings chap. 2, verse 33. So Theodoret and Josephus, who asserts that Joab with his brother had more power in the kingdom than David himself.
33. AND THE KING MOURNING AND LAMENTING FOR ABNER,—although before he had been his adversary and the leader of his enemies. “By which act, says St. Ambrose in the Apology of David, chap. 7, he taught that faith once promised must be kept even to adversaries, and virtue honoured even in an enemy.”
35. AND WHEN ALL THE PEOPLE CAME TO TAKE MEAT WITH DAVID.—In Hebrew, to feed David with bread, that is, to compel him to eat. So Vatablus; but our version renders better, to take meat with David, because the whole city with David mourned the death of Abner, and therefore held a funeral banquet, which the Septuagint calls paramythion, on which see Pollux, Suidas and Athenaeus, book 7 of the Deipnosophists: for that the Jews celebrated a funeral feast is clear from Tobias chap. 4:18, and from Josephus, book II On the War; and that the Gentiles did the same is very well known from histories. Of Christians the thing is very clear. So the Hebrews, Serarius, Sanchez and others. The same is plain from Jeremias chap. 16:7, and Ezechiel chap. 24:17. See here in David the antiquity of this rite and of the banquet by which the dead were helped through the food of the poor. To this belong the Parentalia of the Romans, by which they offered funeral rites to their parents.
39. BUT I AM AS YET TENDER, AND ANOINTED KING.—that is, I am a tender king, newly anointed, and therefore weak and infirm in the kingdom and in power. By killing Abner, the leader of the war of Israel, thou hast created a danger for me, lest all Israel should reject me as king, and on account of this slaughter, as if I were privy to it, exclude me from the kingdom for ever. Others, with Vatablus, render: I am gentle and merciful, although I am anointed and made king; but Joab and Abisai, who are my nephews, are harsher than I. For I had spared Abner, but they killed him; for “gentle” is directly opposed to “hard,” which follows.