Chapter 22
David escapes from Gath, apparently deciding that he cannot stay there with his identity so well known. He goes to the cave of Adullam. This verse:
1 David departed from there and escaped to the cave of Adullam. And when his brothers and all his father's house heard it, they went down there to him. [1Sa 22:1 ESV]
So David is "in hiding" but he's not doing a very good job of it. His family back in Bethlehem learns where he is, and they go to see him. If they were being watched, they'd have led spies straight to David's location. Further, another four hundred distressed people go to David there, and he becomes commander over them. So now his location is known, and there is indication that he is building an army, and in his state of mind, Saul will see this as the start of a rebellion intent on his demise. Even a rational king might well think that's what this was.
2024 - Look at the kind of people who gravitated to David:
2 And everyone who was in distress, and everyone who was in debt, and everyone who was bitter in soul, gathered to him. And he became commander over them. And there were with him about four hundred men. [1Sa 22:2 ESV]. Discontented, financially distressed, bitter men came to David. It might be argued that no one else would be likely to volunteer to go on the run with a man the King wants dead, but even so, there probably was not much singing around the campfire! These were more or less all outlaws before they joined David.
David moves on from there, apparently pretty quickly, and goes to Mizpeh in Moab and talks to the king of Moab. David entrusts his parents to the keeping of the King of Moab. He moves on to some stronghold, not well specified. The MSB note says that Gad, a prophet, advised David to leave this stronghold. Gad will be "David's seer" later. David now moves to the forest of Hereth. MSB note says we don't know where that really is.
The scene shifts to Gibeah, where Saul is wallowing in self pity with all his servants around him. He accuses them of disloyalty as if they are being bribed with positions of authority by David. He is angry they didn't tell him that Jonathan had made a covenant with David. Angry that Jonathan is closer to David than to him. Then this Doeg, who was at Nob when David came there, speaks up. He refers to Ahimelech as the son of Ahitub. Doeg rats out Ahimelech big time, even mentioning that Ahimelech gave David Goliath's sword.
Saul calls all the priests of Nob, along with Ahimilech and his family, to Gibeah. Saul accuses Ahimelech of conspiring with David, and says that David lays in wait to kill him (Saul), and that Ahimelech had inquired of God on David's behalf. Ahimelech reminds the King that David is his son-in-law, the captain of the King's guard, and so on - arguing that David is NOT trying to unseat Saul at all but is loyal to him.
2023 - And remember, David didn't tell Ahimilech that he was on the run from Saul, but that he was on a secret mission from Saul. And as captain of the King's guard, it would have been Ahimilech's duty to assist David in any way that David requested. There should have been no guilt here.
Saul does not take this well. This priest has chastened the King, and told Saul that he is mistaken about David. Saul is angry and orders Ahimelech and all his family killed. Saul's men will not kill them when ordered to do so, but Doeg will and he kills 85 priests, then kills man woman and child in Nob, the city of priests. He also kills the animals. This is a terrible thing. Saul has reached a new low. Ahimelech's son Abiathar escapes though. He's the only one, and he goes to David.
2021 - 18 Then the king said to Doeg, "You turn and strike the priests." And Doeg the Edomite turned and struck down the priests, and he killed on that day eighty-five persons who wore the linen ephod. 19 And Nob, the city of the priests, he put to the sword; both man and woman, child and infant, ox, donkey and sheep, he put to the sword. [1Sa 22:18-19 ESV]
This is a case that seems very unfair. For one thing, Ahimelech had helped David far in the past, before things had come to such an adversarial situation. Even so, for Saul to not only kill the one he was mad at but all his family, from his father down, and then all the residents of Nob, the city of priests...why would God let this happen? And it is done by Doeg, a nobody, a sheep herder at best, and God allows it. This is another of those "different culture" things, where what Saul ordered was probably commonly ordered for traitors and enemies of the King. We've already seen that David feared for his own parents. David is powerless to do anything about this, and God doesn't do anything. Saul is saturated with sin by this time, with hate, and resentment. Saul is an example for us all of the depravity that man has inside him. Perhaps this is why God allowed it. So that future generations would see, and fear, the results of unbridled sin in a person of power. It is the same with Hitler, with Stalin, with Pol Pot, with Idi Amin, and so on. Sinners in power show us the true depths, the still unplumbed depths of fallen man. Saul, Doeg, and all these others should urge us to our knees to plead for salvation, lest such evil also be unleashed in us. We should pray that we have no power save that God bestows, and have none that man would bestow. Perhaps this is the whole key to God choosing the humble, the simple, the peons, because only these are uncorrupted by power and the deeper sins that come with being able to do evil with impunity. Hmm...It seems like I am onto something here. But not a FB post. This is a website lesson.
2022 - Even more, after listening to John MacArthur's sermons on 1 Tim 2, we ought to be praying for our leaders, because they are consumed with power, and surely the temptation to use it as Saul does here is always there. We need to pray for unsaved leaders that they will not fall into such a state as this, and we need to pray for the saved that they not succumb to the constant temptation.
This really might be a FB post after all...especially after the post on 6/8/23, with the point being that there is a good reason for God saying "vengeance is mine".