“Thou knewest not where to lay thy head;
When over the twilight sea
The birds of the mountain homeward sped,
There was no home for thee.
And thou, an outcast in Abram’s land,
On the midnight mountains lone,
Didst look to the Home where thy feet should stand
When the long day’s work was done.”
FINDING his place of refuge with Samuel no longer a safe one, because of the way in which the now apostate king had cast off the last shadow of respect for the prophet of Jehovah, and thus for Jehovah Himself, David now leaves Naioth and goes to Jonathan, for he sees that never again can he return to Saul. To serve him now would be to ally himself with one who despised the witness of God, and better far to be an outcast in the earth than do that. Before he finally severs all connection with the court he must once more see Jonathan face to face, so he goes to him and tells him what has happened. Unable to comprehend such a terrible state of things, the son of Saul seeks to persuade him that he must be mistaken, thinking that his father would not break his promise—made, too, with a solemn oath—that David should not be slain. He cannot conceive the depths of evil Saul has fallen into, though David says, “as Jehovah liveth.... there is but a step between me and death.”
His own fidelity to his friend comes out as strongly as ever. Though he must have known that David’s coming to the throne of the kingdom meant the exclusion of himself and his family, yet in entire self-abnegation he thinks only of his glory, and of his present safety, and does all he can to forward them.
Now a test is agreed on between them: if Saul shall say it is well when Jonathan speaks of David to him, then they will both know that there is no further reason to fear; but if, on the contrary, he is angry, and answer his son roughly, then it will be a proof that the time for David to forsake Saul’s service has really come. On the third day Jonathan is to meet his friend at the place agreed upon and tell him all. And then Jonathan, foreseeing what would inevitably come, makes a fresh covenant with David, causing him to swear that he would ever show kindness to the house of Jonathan, even when Jehovah had cut off all his enemies from the face of the earth. Then he causes David to pronounce a solemn confirmation of this covenant or agreement, by the love he had for him, for he loved him as he loved his own soul.
Two days after this when the king and his household are assembled for the usual evening meal Saul asks Jonathan why the son of Jesse is not present, ignoring completely his own deadly attack upon him so short a time before. Jonathan replies that David had asked leave of absence from him in order to go to Bethlehem. Now the wrath of his father is turned upon himself, and he says to him, “Thou hast chosen the son of Jesse to thine own shame.... For as long as the son of Jesse lives upon earth, thou shalt not be established, nor thy kingdom. And now send and fetch him to me, for he must die.” Impossible for Jonathan to do this! He would lose his own life rather, so he expostulates once again, “Why should he be put to death? What has he done?”
Then for the first time the spear in the hand of Saul is flung at his own once loved son. This tells him that the death of his friend is indeed resolved upon, and “in fierce anger” he rises from the table and refuses to eat that day, for “he was grieved for David, because his father had done him shame.” In the morning he goes to the place they had appointed and there the friends meet. It was a sorrowful meeting, for it was keen pain to both to go their separate ways and live their lives apart from each other as strangers would. In these cold matter-of-fact days we can hardly understand perhaps the strong bond between these two young men. If we think of it simply as a matter of personal affection we certainly shall fail to do so.
We must see the faith that lit up Jonathan’s heart to understand it; he saw in David much that marked him out as “a man after God’s own heart,” one whom He had appointed to feed His people Israel, and whose fitness for this place was so fully owned by him. Faith in Israel’s God was the undying bond between David and Jonathan.
“And they kissed one another, and wept one with another, until David exceeded.” Then Jonathan said to David, “Go in peace, we have sworn both of us in the name of Jehovah, saying, Jehovah be between me and thee, and between my seed and thy seed forever.” This farewell is their last word—David turns away to find shelter where he can, but Jonathan goes back to his father.
Alone, and sad at heart, wearied too probably by the wanderings of the previous days, which the comparative luxury of his life as the king’s son-in-law would ill fit him for, the son of Jesse now turns his face southward and goes to the city of Nob, the place where the tabernacle was, and where the priestly family resided. As he leaves Gibeah behind him the hills around Jerusalem come into view, and from the hill on which the city of the priests was built would be plainly visible. At another time the sight of the encircling mountains reminded David of the care of Jehovah for His people, but now his confidence has become less vigorous, and his faith is dimmed by the bitterness of being forced to leave all he loved and wander, a homeless stranger, in his own land.
He goes to the priest, and from him obtains food, the bread that had been the shewbread on the holy table before the Lord, and which was for the priests alone. But David was the anointed king, though now rejected and persecuted, and his need was enough to warrant his asking for even this bread; for God cared more for him than for what must be merely a form, when the one on the throne openly disowned God’s king and God’s prophet. Years before the son of Jesse had known no other weapons than his sling and stone, but now they have long been unused by him, and he is utterly defenseless, having been forced to flee without armor. He asks the priest if he has any weapon there that he can take, and strange as it may seem, he is offered the huge sword of Goliath, that sword which he had once wielded with such effect in the valley of Elah.
What a rush of memories must have come over the mind of David as he hears of this sword again, kept by the priests as a memorial of a great deliverance wrought for the land! “There is none like that; give it me,” he said, and soon the huge weapon is in his hand.
That sword would have been his death on that day when he met the giant, had not faith enabled him to overcome, and then to turn his own weapon against the foe. It should now have been an encouragement to him to persevere in the same path of faith and confidence in God, but there has only been One in this world who ever trod that path without swerving a hair’s breadth.
David was truly a type of the Son of God when He in grace passed through this world as a lowly dependent Man, but we see continually how vast a chasm was between them. After receiving the sword, which in his ability to wield it is a proof of his great physical strength as well as his skill, his heart seems to have failed him, and apparently without any reference to the mind of God he determines to cast himself upon the generosity of the king of Gath—chief of the Philistines. It was an utterly false step as he soon finds. The servants of Achish say to him, “Is not this David the king of the land? did they not sing of him.... Saul hath slain his thousands, and David his ten thousands? “
No wonder that their mention of this fills their captive—for he appears to have been this—with terror; and that he should feign madness before the king is a sad proof of how his faith in God had failed. The very greatness of his danger and distress may have been used to recall him to his usual trust in the One who had so defended and kept him hitherto, and in Psalm 56 we see him once more returning to the walk of faith, which for a time he had left. There we find what his heart endured during that sad time at Gath, as we hear his words, “Be merciful unto me, O God: for man would swallow me up.... many that fight against me, O Thou most High. What time I am afraid, I will trust in Thee.... Thou tellest my wanderings: put Thou my tears into thy bottle: are they not in Thy book?.... In God have I put my trust: I will not be afraid what man can do unto me.... For Thou hast delivered my soul from death: wilt not Thou keep my feet from falling, that I may walk before God in the light of the living? “
His pretense of madness may have been the means of his leaving Gath, for Achish asks his servants why they had brought a mad man to him; and in accordance with the eastern custom, David, as such, was allowed to go where he chose. Once more in his native land, but not daring to go to his own home, he finds a refuge in one of the caves, of which there are so many in Palestine. The cave of Adullam, which now became for a time his only shelter, lies between Bethlehem and the Dead Sea, in the limestone cliffs which overhang a deep gorge. A narrow path or shelf runs along the face of this cliff, and the cave itself can now only be reached by traversing this giddy height for some distance, till a projecting rock is reached just opposite the entrance, and from this a leap has to be taken into the cavern. Once there, all the power of Saul and his army could not have forced David and his followers from it, for one man could guard the entrance against a host.
When wandering over all this region to find pasture for his father’s sheep, the shepherd lad would be sure to know all these caves, and as they often became shelters from storm or robbers then, it was natural he should turn to them now. It was out in the wildest part of the country, where Saul himself would rarely go, and large enough to become the refuge of hundreds of men. It soon became known that the son of Jesse was driven from his home by the jealous hatred of Saul; and, as under his oppressive rule many were subjected to cruel wrongs, it is not wonderful that there were some of his subjects who were in distress, and discontented, and in debt, from the heavy taxation it may be, and gradually these men began to realize that David was the anointed of Jehovah and the hope of His people as to any better government in the kingdom. So day after day saw first one and then another come to range themselves under him as their chief, till at last there were four hundred following him. His aged father and mother, and his brethren also came to him.
Not a very distinguished set of men were his followers then; but they needed David, and we can say David needed them. Nor did they remain as they were when they first went to him. They were so molded and influenced by living with him, and sharing his place of rejection, that they became imbued with his spirit in a measure, and in the day of his glory they were not unworthy to share it with him. When the Lord Jesus was here on earth it was not the rich or mighty or learned who were attracted to Him, but the poor and sorrowful and sinful and outcast. Whether poor or rich, He never turned one away who sought Him in faith, and He is the same today. Now in the glory of heaven He is as accessible to all who go to Him as in His lowly days of rejection on earth. Never does a soul honestly seek Him now but finds Him, and finds far more than the heart can desire in finding Him, the Son of God in the glory.
The cave of Adullam, though a shelter, and a safe one for David and his hardy band of followers, may hardly have been a very fit place for his aged father and mother. His thoughtful love for them urges him to find some better refuge for them, but where can he find it? Many a prayer may David’s heart have flashed up to Jehovah on their behalf, as silent and more rapid than the electric messages we are familiar with, and the place was at last found where they could be in safety, and without the many discomforts of the cave.
Through his ancestress, the much-loved Ruth, he had a link with Moab, and now David takes his father and mother there, to the king of the country, and without any hiding of his own outcast condition he speaks to the king in a kingly fashion, saying, “Let my father and my mother, I pray thee, come forth, and be with you, till I know what God will do for me.” God is once more everything to him. Then he presents his parents to the king of Moab, who receives them at once, and they remain with him as long as he is in the hold.
They were not only those who were in distress, or debt, or sorrow who had been attracted to David, for now we find that the prophet Gad is with him, and through him the word of divine guidance comes: “Abide not in the hold; depart, and get thee into the land of Judah. Then David departed, and came into the forest of Hareth.” This forest being in the mountains or hills of Judah was not so inaccessible as the cave, and many others now came to David to share his rejection and sufferings, but looking on to the time when the glory of his kingdom should compensate for all. Indeed, many would probably have said that to be with him—to share his shelter, and his food, or may be his hunger—to win his loving regard and care was all that they wanted. David himself made up for the loss of all else. How much more is this true of the One who condescends to call Himself “the root and offspring of David, the bright and morning star.”
How long David and his band had been in the forest when Abiathar, the son of the priest Ahimelech, came down to him, we do not know, but most likely it was not long. A terrible story had the sorrow-stricken priest to tell the fugitives; and he himself, priest of Jehovah though he was, came to them as a fugitive also. When Saul, with his servants around him, heard that the son of Jesse and his followers were in the forest of Hareth, he had questioned them about David, and then heard from Doeg, his herdman, of his having been supplied with food and the sword of Goliath when he went to the priests at Nob.
Sending for Ahimelech and also for all the priests that were in Nob, the king had them brought before him, and in spite of being assured that they knew nothing of David’s fleeing from the court, he determines that they shall all be slain for having shown him kindness.
Even his own servants might have hindered him from daring to carry out this frightful revenge, for when he commands them to slay the priests of Jehovah, not one of them will be guilty of the deed. There was one man there as cruel and full of hatred for the people of God as Saul was for his innocent son-in-law. This was Doeg the Edomite, who had informed against David, and he obeys the command, and slew that day of the priests of the Lord “eighty-five persons that did wear a linen ephod.” Nor was this all. The very place where they had dwelt was to be made a desolation and the whole race of the priests annihilated, as, urged on by Satan, the king would have not one of them left to reproach him with this deed of darkness and guilt.
“And Nob, the city of the priests, smote he with the edge of the sword, both men and women, children and sucklings, and oxen, and asses, and sheep, with the edge of the sword.” Well can we enter somewhat into David’s words, as we hear this sad story! “My heart is sore pained within me: and the terrors of death are fallen upon me. Fearfulness and trembling are come upon me, and horror hath overwhelmed me. And I said, Oh that I had wings like a dove for then would I fly away, and be at rest.... Give ear to my prayer, O God; and hide not Thyself from my supplication” (Psa. 55:4; 6:14My heart is sore pained within me: and the terrors of death are fallen upon me. (Psalm 55:4)
1<<To the chief Musician on Neginoth upon Sheminith, A Psalm of David.>> O Lord, rebuke me not in thine anger, neither chasten me in thy hot displeasure. (Psalm 6:1)).
To God David could pour out the deep distress he felt at Abiathar’s account of the terrible tragedy, from which he had only escaped as preserved of God, and hidden of Him from the cruel Doeg. To the priest himself he said, “I have occasioned the death of all the persons of thy father’s house. Abide thou with me, fear not: for he that seeketh my life seeketh thy life: but with me thou shalt be in safeguard.” Terrible as was the cause of it, it must have been a great cheer to him that both the prophet and chief priest of Jehovah were with him, and with him through all his wanderings, and then when he was crowned king over Israel they shared in his glory. Many a name is put down in the list of David’s mighty men, after he came to the kingdom, who were among the despised band in the cave of Adullam, and he delighted then in recording their brave and loving acts for him. He speaks of the Gadites who went there to him, and calls them “men of might, fit for the battle.... whose faces were like the faces of lions; and they were as swift as the roes upon the mountains.” When their leader became ruler over the land we may be quite sure he was as glad as they when he made them officers in his army, for he records then “of the sons of Gad, captains of the host: one of the least was over an hundred, and the greatest over a thousand” (1 Chron. 12:1414These were of the sons of Gad, captains of the host: one of the least was over an hundred, and the greatest over a thousand. (1 Chronicles 12:14)).
There was one act of special devotedness to him which David had special delight in, and the Spirit of God has twice recorded it in the scriptures. It was the sultry harvest time when these men, who became great chiefs afterward, went down to the cave to him. The heat in the sultry Jordan valley is very great, and it is possible that there was a lack of water, for the hundreds of his followers would need a great deal. At any rate, a longing for a cool draft of the water from the well of his birthplace, and of what had been his peaceful home for many years, came over the spirit of their captain, and they heard him say, “Oh that one would give me drink of the water of the well of Bethlehem, which is by the gate!” David may not always have been in the full flush of health and vigor. It is quite possible that sickness at times came upon him, a touch of the Syrian fever, perhaps, which few travelers in Palestine now wholly escape from.
Whatever it was, the three men who heard the longing of their leader determined to do all they could to gratify it, but how? Sad to say, Bethlehem itself was now in the hands of the enemy, and a Philistine garrison guarded the gate and the well. To these fearless followers of a generally fearless captain this was not an insuperable difficulty, and without a word to any the three stole away from the cave and made a rapid march to the city of David—took the garrison so by surprise that they broke through their cordon of sentinels, reached the well and filled their skins and bottles with the pure, cold water, and made good their retreat all unharmed and untouched, hurrying back to their captain triumphant.
The tender heart of David was most deeply touched by this devotion; but much as he had longed for this water from Bethlehem’s well, he could not, would not drink it, for he valued it at the untold value of the lives of these three men. To none but Jehovah, God of Israel, could such a costly drink offering be poured out. To the soul of David that water became the cause of real worship, of thanksgiving, too, doubtless, for he poured it out as an oblation to Jehovah, in the faith and grace that would renounce it for himself. What a link was formed that day between those three men and their king!