2 Samuel 19-20; Psalm 7

2 Samuel 19

David is crying and mourning for the death of Absalom. He even says things like he would rather have died than have Absalom die. We can understand his emotional dilemma, but he is not acting like the king he needs to be.

Joab brings David back to earth. Joab says that David's mourning for Absalom has demoralized the soldiers that remained loyal to him. Also, if he does not go out and congratulate them, they will not stay loyal to him.

It is words like this that give me a lot of respect for Joab. He is not a great politician, for after all he killed Abner at a politically bad time, but Joab understands the army. It is also possible that Joab is speaking for himself at the moment, but I think the sentiment would be applicable to the rest of the army.

David stops mourning Absalom and goes to congratulate his troops. The people talk about reinstating David as king. David uses the opportunity to replace Joab as general with Amassa. Why? I'm not sure, but I can think of two possible reasons. First, David did not handle the rebuke by Joab well. I think this would have been out of character for David actually. Second, David is starting to speculate that Joab killed Absalom. This would make more sense, but we must speculate to arrive at that conclusion since no one seems to have told David exactly how Absalom died.

David moves around the countryside and encounters Shimei and a thousand Benjamites who beg forgiveness for their part of the rebellion against the king. David spares their lives, although Abichai (Joab's brother) counsels David that they should die. David actually sort of snaps at Abichai and calls him "you sons of Zeruiah.". Joab was also a son of Zeruiah, so I think this implicates his anger towards Joab as well.

Yeah, he knows Joab did something to kill Absalom.

David encounters Jonathan's son Mephibosheth and gives his side of the story. He said that Ziba lied and that he did want to go, but could not because Ziba did not prepare him a donkey. David's response seems to suggest he did not know who to believe, so he says that Ziba and Mephibosheth will split their land.

All the men of Judah and some soldiers from other tribes escort the king around the country. The other tribes start complaining about this and think it is a special favor from the king. My guess is that the political tension has not really settled down yet and the people are afraid of retribution by king David now that he is restored on the throne. That is probably what Saul would have done.

2 Samuel 20
The tension boils over into a secondary revolt. Sheba, a Benjamite, claims that David should not be king.

Meanwhile David arrives back in Jerusalem and dismisses the ten concubines that slept with Absalom.

His attention returns to Sheba. He tells Amassa to muster the men of Judah in 3 days to go after Sheba. It takes him longer than 3 days to assemble the army. So he tells Abichai to go after Sheba, which he does along with Joab.

Joab and Abichai first go to Amasa and the army he was mustering. Joab goes up to kiss Amasa, but then stabs him in the stomach.

A little jealousy for being replaced Joab? That's probably what is going on here. Meanwhile the army that Amasa was mustering then follows Joab after Sheba.

They trap Sheba in the walled city of Abel-beth-maacah. Joab is laying siege to the city when he convinces the inhabitants to throw over the head of Sheba. They do this and Joab withdraws the siege.

Second revolt is over.

Psalm 7 - seems to be associated with this time. It has the common themes of David seeking protection from God when his enemies prowl after him. David also seems to stress his innocence in the psalm and questions whether he did anything to make these people his enemies.