{"id":60945,"date":"2019-08-11T13:52:14","date_gmt":"2019-08-11T10:52:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=60945"},"modified":"2023-03-05T13:05:27","modified_gmt":"2023-03-05T11:05:27","slug":"david-the-king-david-the-father","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/david-the-king-david-the-father\/","title":{"rendered":"David The King, David The Father"},"content":{"rendered":"
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With the end of the uprising against King David, led by his beloved son Absalom, you might think that David would exult in his triumph. After all, he had been in mortal peril, risking the loss of his own life as well as his crown. At the end of the battle, against David\u2019s explicit instruction, the commander Joab had sought out Absalom for a particularly slow, bloody, and gruesome death. Two runners rushed to inform the king of his victory. The first was cautious enough to report the military triumph but to omit any mention of Absalom\u2019s death. Not to be diverted, David\u2019s question to the second runner was also focused on his rebellious boy. The staccato measure of the three Hebrew words indicates his heightened nerves and anxiety: \u201c<\/span>ha-shalom le-na\u2019ar le-Avshalom<\/span><\/em>?<\/em> Is It well with the youth, Absalom?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Of course, we \u2013 the readers \u2013 know that there is no peace (shalom<\/em>), no wholeness (sh\u2019leimut<\/em>) for Absalom. We also know that, far from being a youth with all the innocence and promise that being a youth conveys, Absalom is an adult man, a warrior, and a traitor. But in the eyes of his father, Absalom is eternally young, innocent, full of potential.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

When he learns of his son\u2019s tragic end, David cries out the saddest three words of the Bible: \u201cAbsalom, my son! My son!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The pathos of David\u2019s broken heart reflects one aspect of the man: he has always been a person of strong feelings. At this moment of political and military triumph, he does not think or act like a cool, calculating monarch, instead he emotes like a bereaved father.<\/span><\/p>\n

And in crying out, he risks losing the very victory his forces gained. After all, they risked (and many lost) their lives for the sake of his crown, his power, his dynasty. For David to focus on his grief would be to demean the sacrifices and struggles of his most faithful followers. So he fakes it. He dresses up like a king, sits himself in public, and offers greetings and congratulations to his troops and people.<\/span><\/p>\n

But his heart grieves, and his timeless words echo the broken hearts of parents across the ages: those whose children have died before them, those whose children have been trapped by their bad choices or by circumstances beyond their control. David knows, and expresses, the truth that for most parents, our lives are so entwined in the lives of our children that we become vulnerable to their foibles, complicit with their plots and plans, and a piece of us sickens and dies if they do.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

David finds a way to go on, but he is not the same David he was before his son\u2019s brutal death. Our souls are wrapped up in the souls of those we love.<\/span><\/p>\n

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