that it was like gossamer, and it fitted to his body like his skin, and
it was impenetrable to the thrust of every weapon.
David put upon him his armour, and lay down in his bed. He slept, but
was awakened at midnight by the knife of Saul stabbing at him as he lay.
He sprang up, struck the weapon from the hands of his father-in-law, and
thrust him forth out of the house.[615]
After this, Saul came to Michal and said, “He was not asleep, or I
certainly would have slain him. Admit me again into his chamber at
night.”
Michal went to David and told him all, with many tears.
Then said David, “I must escape from my house, for my life is not in
security here. But do thou fill a leather bottle with wine, and lay it
in my bed.”
Michal did so; she took a large skin of wine and placed it in the bed,
and drew the cover over it. But David fled away to Hebron.
And in the night came Saul, and he felt the clothes, and he thought it
was David in the bed, so he stabbed at him with his knife, and the wine
ran out in the bed. Then Saul smelt it, and he said, “How much wine the
fellow drank for his supper!”[616]
But when he found that David had escaped him once more, he was wroth,
and he gathered men together, and pursued after him; in his anger,
moreover, he sought to kill Michal, but she fled away and concealed
herself.
Saul pursued David in the mountains, but David knew all the caves and
lurking-places, and Saul was unable to catch him. One night, David crept
into the camp and thrust four arrows, inscribed with his name, into the
ground, round the head of Saul. When Saul awoke, he saw these arrows,
and he said, “David has been here; he might have slain me had he willed
it.”
During the day, Saul came upon his enemy in a narrow valley; he was
mounted, and he pursued David, who was on foot. David fled as fast as he
could run, and managed to reach a cave a few moments before Saul could
reach it. Then God sent a spider, which spun a web over the mouth of the
cave; and Saul saw it and passed on, saying, “Certainly David cannot
have entered in there, or the web would be torn.”[617]
One night, Saul and his soldiers lodged in a cavern. And David was
there, but they knew it not. In the night David carried off the sword
and banner and seal-ring of the king, and he went forth out of the cave,
for it had two openings. In the morning, when Saul prepared to continue
his search, he saw him on a mountain opposite the mouth of the cave, and
David had girded the royal sword to his side, and brandished the flag,
and held forth his finger that all might note that he had on it the
king’s signet.[618]
Then Saul said, “His heart is better than mine;” and he was reconciled
with David, and he bade him return with him and live at peace. And he
did so.
3. THE DEATH OF SAUL.
Now when Saul had gone forth against David, the wise men of Israel had
gathered themselves together, and had remonstrated with him. But Saul
was wroth at this interference, and he slew them all, and there escaped
none of them save one wise woman, whom his vizir spared. This vizir was
a good man, and he took the woman into his own house, and she lived with
his family.
Some time after that, Saul had a dream, and in his dream he was
reproached for having slain the wise men. And when he awoke he was full
of remorse, and he went to his vizir and said, “It repents me that I
have put to death all the wise men of my realm; is there none remaining
of whom I might ask counsel how I could expiate my crime?”
Then the vizir answered, “There remains but one, and that is a woman.”
Saul said, “Bring her hither before me.”
Now, when the wise woman was come before Saul, the king was troubled in
mind, and he said, “Show me how I can make atonement for the great sin
that I have committed.”
The woman answered, “Lead me to the tomb of a prophet; I will pray, and
may be God will suffer him to speak.”
They went to the tomb of Samuel, and the woman prayed.
Then Samuel spake out of his sepulchre, and said, “Let his expiation be
this: He shall go down, he and his sons, to the city of Giants, and they
shall fall there.”
Saul had twelve sons. He called them to him and said to them all the
words of Samuel. They then answered, “We are ready, let us go down.”
So they went to the city of Giants, and fought against it, and fell
there, all in one day.[619]
Footnote 606:
Koran, Sura ii. v. 250.
Footnote 607:
Tabari, i. p. 418.
Footnote 608:
Perhaps the passage in Psalm cvii. 35 may refer to this miracle,
unrecorded in Holy Scripture.
Footnote 609:
Weil, pp. 200, 201.
Footnote 610:
Koran, Sura ii. v. 251.
Footnote 611:
Weil, p. 203.
Footnote 612:
Tabari, i. p. 421.
Footnote 613:
Ibid.
Footnote 614:
Tabari, i. p. 422; Weil, pp. 202-4; D’Herbelot, i. p. 362.
Footnote 615:
Weil, pp. 205-8.
Footnote 616:
Tabari, i. p. 423. The same story is told of the escape of S. Felix of
Nola, in the Decian persecution.
Footnote 617:
Tabari, i. p. 429.
Footnote 618:
Weil, p. 207.
Footnote 619:
Tabari, i. p. 424.
XXXVII.
DAVID.
David says of himself, “_Behold, I was shaken in wickedness; and in sin
did my mother conceive me._”[620] The Rabbis explain this passage by
narrating the circumstances of the conception of David, which I shall
give in Latin. The mother of David they say was named Nitzeneth.
“Dixerunt Rabbini nostri beatæ memoriæ, quod Isai (Jesse) habebat
ancillam, eamque sollicitabat ad turpia; quæ, cum esset pudica et
fidelis uxori Isai, eidem retulit; quæ seipsam aptavit (loco ancillæ) et
congressa est cum Isai, ex quo concubitu egressus est David. Et quia
Isai intentio fuerat in ancillam, quamquam res aliter evenerat, idcirco
dixit David,—super eum sit pax: Ecce in iniquitate formatus sum, et
peccato calefecit me mater mea.”[621]
On this account, Jesse, having discovered the deception, lightly
esteemed his son David, and sent him to keep sheep, and made him as a
servant to his brethren. And to this David refers when he says, “_The
stone which the builders rejected is become the head of the
corner_;”[622] for, from being the despised brother, put to menial work,
he was exalted before his brethren to be king over Israel.
When David was born he would have died immediately, had not Adam, when
he saw his posterity marshalled before him, taken compassion on David,
and given him seventy years.[623]
However, David was without a soul for the first fourteen years of his
life, and was so regarded by God, as he was uncircumcised;[624] but
other Rabbinic writers say that he was born circumcised.
The Jewish authors relate, as do the Mussulman historians, that David
had red hair. In Jalkut (1 Sam. xvi. 12) it is said, “Samuel sent, and
made David come before him, and he had red hair;”[625] and again in
Bereschith Rabba, “When Samuel saw that David had red hair, he feared
and said, He will shed blood as did Esau. But the ever-blessed God said,
This man will shed it with unimpassioned eyes—this did not Esau. Esau
slew out of his own caprice, but this man will execute those sentenced
to death by the Sanhedrim.”
David was very small, but when Samuel poured the oil upon his head and
anointed him, he grew rapidly, and was soon as tall as was Saul. And
this the commentators conclude from the fact of Saul having put his
armour upon David, and it fitted him. Now Saul was a head and shoulders
taller than any man in Israel; therefore David must have started to
equal height since his anointing.[626]
David was gifted with the evil eye, and was able to give the leprosy by
turning a malignant glance upon any man. “When it is written, ‘_The
Philistine cursed David by his gods_,’[627] David looked at him with the
evil eye. For whoever was looked upon by him with the evil eye became
leprous, as Joab knew to his cost, for after David had cast the evil
glance on him, it is said, ‘_Let there not fail from the house of Joab
one that hath an issue, or that is a leper._’[628]
“The same befell the Philistine when he cursed David. David then threw
on him the malignant glance, and fixed it on his brow, that he might at
once become leprous; and at the same moment the stone and the leprosy
struck him.”[629]
But David was himself afflicted for six months with this loathsome
malady, and it is in reference to this that he says, “_Thou shalt purge
me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; Thou shalt wash me, and I shall be
whiter than snow._” During this period, he was cast out and separated
from the elders of the people, and the Divinity withdrew from him.[630]
And this explains the discrepancy apparent in the account of the number
of years he reigned. It is said that he reigned over Israel forty
years,[631] but he reigned seven years in Hebron, and thirty and three
in Jerusalem. In the Second Book of Samuel, however, it is said, he
reigned in Hebron seven years and six months;[632] though the statement
that he reigned only forty years in all, that is, thirty-three in
Jerusalem, is repeated. Consequently, these six months do not count, the
reason being that David was at that time afflicted with the disorder,
and cut off from society, and reputed as one dead.[633]
The Rabbis suppose that David sinned in cutting off the skirt of Saul’s
robe;[634] and they say that he expiated this fault in his old age, by
finding no warmth in his clothes, wherewith he wrapped himself.[635] For
it is said, “_King David was old and stricken in years; and they covered
him with clothes, but he got no heat._”[636]
To David is attributed by the Rabbi Solomon the power of calling down
the rain, the hail, and the tempest, in vengeance upon his enemies. “Our
Rabbis,” says he, “say that these things were formerly stored in heaven,
but David came and made them to descend on the earth: for they are means
of vengeance, and it is not fitting that they should be garnered in the
Treasury of God.”[637] But the rain and hail fell at the Deluge, in
Egypt, and on the Amorites; therefore the signification to be attributed
to this opinion of the Rabbis probably is, that David was the first to
be able to call them down by his prayer.
David had a lute which he hung up above his head in the bed, and the
openings of the lute were turned towards the north, and when the cool
night air whispered in the room towards dawn it stirred the strings of
the lute, which gave forth such sweet and resonant notes, that David was
aroused from his sleep early, before daybreak, that he might occupy
himself in the study of the Law. And it is to this that he refers when
he cries in his Psalm, “_Awake, lute and harp: I myself will awake right
early._”[638]
When Absalom was slain, David saw Scheol (Hell) opened, and his son
tormented, for his rebellion, in the lowest depths. The sight was so
distressing to the king, that he wrapped his mantle about his face and
cried, “_O my son Absalom! my son, my son Absalom! would God I had died
for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son!_” Here it is to be noted that David
called Absalom either by name or by his relationship seven times. Now in
Hell there are seven mansions, and as each cry escaped the father’s
heart, Absalom was released from one of these divisions of the Pit; and
he thus effected his escape from Gehenna through the love of his father,
which drew him up out of misery.[639]
David was very desirous to build a temple to the Lord, but God would not
suffer him to do so, as he was a man of blood. This is the reason why he
so desired to erect a temple. When he was young, and pastured his
father’s sheep, he came one day upon a rhinoceros (unicorn) asleep, and
he did not know that it was a rhinoceros, but thought it was a mountain,
so he drove his flock up its back, and fed them on the grass which grew
thereon. But presently the rhinoceros awoke, and stood up, and then
David’s head touched the sky. He was filled with terror, and he vowed
that if God would save his life and bring him safely to the ground
again, he would build to the Lord a temple of the dimensions of the horn
of the beast, an hundred cubits. The Talmudists are not agreed as to
whether this was the height, or the breadth, of the horn; however, the
vow was heard, and the Lord sent a lion against the rhinoceros; and when
the unicorn saw the lion, he lay down, and David descended his back,
along with his sheep, as fast as possible; but when he saw the lion, his
spirit failed him again. However he took the lion by the beard, and
smote, and slew him. This adventure the Psalmist recalls when he says,
“_Save me from the lion’s mouth: Thou hast heard me also from among the
horns of the unicorns_;”[640] and to his vow he alludes in Psalm
cxxxii., “_Lord, remember David, and all his trouble: how he sware unto
the Lord, and vowed a vow unto the Almighty God of Jacob._”[641]
One day David was hunting in the wilderness. Then came Satan, in the
form of a stag, and David shot an arrow at him, but could not kill him.
This astonished him, for on one occasion, in strife with the
Philistines, he had transfixed eight hundred men with one arrow.[642]
Then he chased the deer, and it ran before him into the Philistine land.
Now when Ishbi-benob, who was of the sons of the giant, knew this, he
said, “David has slain my brother Goliath; now he is in my power!” and
he came upon him and chained him, and cast him down, and laid a
winepress upon him, that he might crush him, and squeeze all the blood
out of him. But God softened the earth beneath him, so that it yielded
to his body, and he was uninjured; as he says in the Psalms, “_Thou
shalt make room enough under me for to go._”[643] And as David lay under
the press, he saw a dove fly by, and he said, “_Oh that I had wings as a
dove, that I might flee away, and be at rest_;”[644] and he alludes to
his being among the pots, and noting the wings of the dove as silver, in
another Psalm.[645]
Now Abishai, the son of Zeruiah, heard the plaining of the dove, which
had seen the trouble of the king, and came into Jerusalem in grief
thereat. Then Abishai went to the chamber of David to search for him,
but he was not there. Then he knew that the king must be in danger, and
the only means of reaching him with speed was to mount the royal mule,
which was fleet as the wind; but this Abishai did not venture to do
without advice, for he remembered the words of the Mischna, “Thou shalt
not ride the king’s horse, nor mount his throne, nor grasp his sceptre.”
But as the danger was pressing, Abishai went to the school, and
consulted the doctors of the Law, who said, “In an emergency all things
are lawful.” Then he mounted the mule of King David, and rode into the
desert, and the earth flew under him, and he reached the house of
Ishbi-benob. Now the mother of Ishbi-benob—her name was Orpha—sat
without the door, spinning. And when she saw Abishai galloping up, she
brake her thread and flung the spindle at him, with intent to strike him
dead. But the spindle fell short of him. So Orpha cried to him, “Give me
my spindle, boy.” Abishai stooped and picked it up, and cast it at her
with all his force, and it struck her on the brow, and broke her skull,
and she fell back and died.
Then, when Ishbi-benob saw what was done, he said, “These two men will
be too much for me!” so he drew David from under the winepress, and
flung him high into the air, and set his lance in the ground, that David
might fall upon it, and be transfixed. But Abishai cried the Sacred
Name, and David was arrested in his fall, and hung between heaven and
earth, and gradually was let down, not on the spear, but at a distance.
Then Abishai and David slew Ishbi-benob.[646]
When David’s life was run out, the Angel of Death came to fetch his
soul. But David spent all his time in reading the Law. The angel stood
before him, and watched that his lips should cease moving, for he might
not interrupt him in this sacred work. But David made no pause. Then the
angel went into the garden which was behind the house, and shook
violently one of the trees. David heard the noise, and turned his head,
and saw that the branches of one of his trees were violently agitated,
but no leaf stirred on the other trees; so he closed the book of the
Law, and went into his garden, and set a ladder against the tree and
ascended into it, that he might see what was agitating the leaves. Then
the angel withdrew the ladder, but David knew it not; so he fell and
broke his neck, and died. It was the Sabbath day. Then Solomon doubted
what he should do, for the body of his father was exposed to the sun,
and to the dogs; and he did not venture to remove it, lest he should
profane the Sabbath; so he sent to the Rabbis, and said, “My father is
dead, and exposed to the sun, and to be devoured by dogs; what shall I
do?”
They answered, “Cast the body of a beast before the dogs, and place
bread or a boy upon thy father, and bury him.”[647]
David had such a beautiful voice, that, when he sang the praises of God,
the birds came from all quarters and surrounded him, listening to his
strains. The mountains even and the hills were moved at his notes.[648]
He could sing with a voice as loud as the most deafening peal of
thunder, or warble as sweetly as the tuneful nightingale.
He divided his time, say the Mussulmans, into three parts. One day he
occupied himself in the affairs of his kingdom, the second day he
devoted to the service of God, and the third day he gave up to the
society of his wives.
As he was going home from prayer, one day, he heard two of his servants
discussing him and comparing him with Abraham.
“Was not Abraham saved from a fiery furnace?” asked one.
“Did not David slay the giant Goliath?” asked the other.
“But what has David done that will compare with the obedience of
Abraham, who was ready to offer his only son to God?” asked the first.
When David reached home, he fell down before God and prayed: “Lord!
Thou, who didst give to Abraham a trial of his obedience in the pyre,
grant that an opportunity may be afforded me of proving before all the
people how great also is mine.”[649]
But others relate this differently. They say that David besought the
Lord to endue him with the spirit of prophecy. Then God answered, “When
I give great gifts, he who receives them must suffer great trials. I
proved Abraham by the fire, and by the sacrifice of one son, and
separation from others; Jacob by his children; Joseph by the well and
the prison; Moses by Pharaoh; Job by the worms. I afflicted all these,
but thee have I not afflicted.” But David said, “O Lord, prove me and
try me also, that I may obtain the same degree of celebrity as
they.”[650]
One day, as David sang psalms before God and the congregation, a
beautiful bird appeared at the window, and it attracted his whole
attention, so that he could scarcely sing. David concluded his
recitation of the psalms earlier than usual, and went in pursuit of the
bird, which led him from bush to bush, and from tree to tree, till it
suddenly disappeared near a secluded lake. Now this bird was Eblis, and
he came to tempt David into evil.
When the bird vanished, David saw in the water a beautiful woman,
bathing, and when she stood up, her hair covered her whole person.
David hid behind the bushes, that he might not startle her, till she was
dressed; then he stood forth, and asked her her name.
“My name,” said she, “is Bathsheba,[651] daughter of Joshua, and wife of
Uriah, son of Hanan, who is with the army.”[652]
Then David departed, but his heart was inflamed with love, and he sent a
message to Joab, the captain of his host, to set Uriah before the ark in
every battle. Now those who went before the ark must conquer or fall.
Three times Uriah came out of battle victorious, but the fourth time he
was killed.
Then David took Uriah’s wife to his own house and made her his own wife.
And she consented upon the condition that should she bear him a son,
that son was to succeed him in the kingdom. Now David had, before he
married her, ninety-nine wives. The day after his marriage, Michael and
Gabriel appeared before him in human form, as he was in his court, and
Gabriel said to him: “This fellow here possesses ninety and nine sheep,
but I have only one, and that I love, and cherish in my bosom. This man
claims my little ewe lamb, and will take it from me, and, if I will not
give it him, he says that he will slay me; and take my lamb from me by
force.”
Then David’s anger was kindled against Michael, and he said, “Thou who
hast so many sheep, wherefore lustest thou after the poor man’s ewe
lamb? Thou hast an evil heart and an insatiable spirit.”
Then Michael exclaimed, “Thou hast given judgment against thyself; what
thou rebukest in this man, thou hast allowed thyself to do!”[653]
And David knew that God had sent His angels to rebuke him, and he fell
upon his face to the ground. But, some say, he drew his sword and rushed
upon Michael: then Gabriel held him back, and said, “Thou didst ask to
be tried; now thou hast fallen under the temptation.”[654]
Then the angels vanished, and David fell to the ground, tore off his
purple robe, cast aside his golden crown, and wept for forty days and
forty nights. And his tears flowed in such abundance, that every now and
then he plunged a cup into them and drank it off.
At the expiration of forty days Gabriel came to him, and said, “The Lord
salutes thee!” But David felt this was an additional reproach, and he
wept still more. It is said that during the ensuing forty days and
nights David shed more tears than Adam and all his descendants had, and
will, shed from the day of the Fall to the day of the Resurrection.
Then God sent Gabriel to him again, and Gabriel said, “The Lord salutes
thee!” But David lifted his tearful face and said, “O Gabriel, what will
Uriah say to me on the day of the general Resurrection?”
Gabriel answered, “The Lord will give him so great an inheritance in
Paradise, that he will not have the heart to reproach thee.”
Then David knew that he was pardoned, and he rejoiced greatly. But he
never forgot his sins. He wrote them on the palm of his hand, that he
might have them always before him; therefore he says, “My shame is ever
before mine eyes.”
Nevertheless David’s heart was lifted up with pride, when he considered
that he was a king, a prophet, and a great general. And one day he said
to Nathan, “I think I am perfect, I have everything.”
“Not so,” answered Nathan, “thou exercisest no handicraft.”
Then David was ashamed, and he asked God to teach him a craft; and God
made him skilful in fabricating coats of mail of rings twined together;
his trade therefore was that of an armourer, and his disgrace was wiped
away.
After his judgment between the two angels, David had no confidence in
giving sentence in cases pleaded before him; therefore God sent him, by
the hand of Gabriel, a reed of iron and a little bell, and the angel
said to him, “God is pleased with thy humility, and He has sent thee
this reed and this bell to assist thee in giving judgment. Place this
reed in thy judgment-hall, and hang up the bell in the middle, and place
the accuser on one side, and the accused on the other, and give sentence
in favour of him who makes the bell to tinkle when he touches the reed.”
David was highly pleased with this gift, and he gave such righteous
judgment, that men feared, throughout the land, to do wrong to one
another.
One day, two men came before David, and one said, “I left a goodly pearl
in the charge of this man, and when I asked for it again, he denied it
me.”
But the other said, “I have returned it to him.”
Then David bade each lay his hand on the reed, but the bell gave the
same indication for both. Then David thought, “They both speak the
truth, and yet that cannot be; the gift of God must err.”
Then he bade the men try again, and the result was the same. However, he
observed that the defendant, when he went up to the reed to lay his hand
upon it, gave his walking staff to the plaintiff to hold, and this he
did each time, so that David’s suspicion was awakened, and he took the
staff, and examined it, and found that it was hollow, and the stolen
pearl was concealed in the handle. Thus the bell had given right
judgment, for when the accused touched the reed, he had returned the
pearl into the hand of the accuser; but David by his doubt in the reed
displeased Him who gave it, and the reed and the bell were taken from
him.
After that, David often gave wrong judgment, till Solomon, his son, was
of age to advise him.
One day, when Solomon was aged thirteen, there came two men before the
king. The first said, “I sold a house and cellar to this man, and on
digging in the cellar he found a treasure hidden there by my
forefathers. I sold him the house and cellar, but not the treasure. Bid
him restore to me what he has found.”