Today, I am reading and commenting on 2 Samuel 16-17.

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I am always struck by Ziba’s conversation with David.  I know from having read this passage and those which follows repeatedly that when David returns after defeating Absalom Mephibosheth denies what Ziba says about him here.  We are never given any basis to figure out which one lied and which one told the truth.  Which brings me to my thought, why did ZIba say what he did about Mephibosheth?  Did Mephibosheth actually say what Ziba claimed he said?  Or, was ZIba merely taking advantage of the situation to ingratiate himself to David?  If the latter, why did he not instead attempt to ingratiate himself with Absalom?  Perhaps, Mephibosheth did something which Ziba misinterpreted to meaning what he said to David.  I will note that Ziba’s contribution was important to David’s eventual success against Absalom.  Without the food and donkey’s which Ziba brought, David’s forces would have been weakened and slowed down.  If they had been slowed down, Absalom’s forces may have overtaken them.

I sort of feel sorry for Abishai, David’s nephew.  He was offended by Shimei cursing the king, the Lord’s anointed.  I think he was applying here the lesson he had learned from his experience when he accompanied David into King Saul’s camp while Saul was hunting David.  On that occasion, David refused to allow him to kill King Saul because King Saul was God’s anointed.  Here, Abishai thought Shimei deserved to die for cursing God’s anointed.  David was angry with Abishai because Abishai thought the solution to every problem was to kill someone (oversimplifying a bit by saying that).  David knew that God was having Shimei curse him for a reason.  So, he remained humble and did not allow Abishai to kill him.  Perhaps, David’s problem with Abishai and Joab was that they tempted him to lose his humility and vent his anger.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.