{"id":60979,"date":"2018-07-09T17:44:05","date_gmt":"2018-07-09T14:44:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wall\/wall-2009\/"},"modified":"2020-05-19T10:00:52","modified_gmt":"2020-05-19T07:00:52","slug":"wall-2009","status":"publish","type":"wall","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wall\/wall-2009\/","title":{"rendered":"book-Prophets-II Samuel"},"parent":0,"template":"","acf":{"type":"chapter","wall_id":"2009","book":"II Samuel","books_group":"Prophets","hide_acf":true,"home_image":false,"home_posts":false,"home_posts_title":"","posts_home":[],"static_cube_title":"","static_cube_brief":"","static_cube_color":"","date":"20190819","posts":[{"order":1,"id":"72212","color":"#effaea","size":"2","name":"24 in 24: Samuel (I & II)","post_title":"24 in 24: Samuel (I & II)","slug":"24-in-24-samuel-i-ii","old_id":"72212","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":34245,"post_title":"Rachel Sharansky Danziger","slug":"rachel-sharansky-danziger","old_id":"34245","first_name":"Rachel Sharansky","last_name":"Danziger","description":"Rachel Sharansky Danziger is a Jerusalem-born writer and speaker who blogs about Judaism, parenting, and life in Israel. She currently lives in Boston, where she teaches about storytelling in the bible and the subversive depths of Hebrew words.\r\n","short_description":"Rachel Sharansky Danziger is a Jerusalem-born Boston-based writer and speaker about Judaism, parenting, and life in Israel. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":34246,"alt":"","title":"RSDanziger","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger.jpg","width":1171,"height":1769,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-199x300.jpg","medium-width":199,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-678x1024.jpg","medium_large-width":678,"medium_large-height":1024,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-678x1024.jpg","large-width":678,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger.jpg","1536x1536-width":1017,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger.jpg","2048x2048-width":1171,"2048x2048-height":1769,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-794x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":794,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-278x420.jpg","home_baner-width":278,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"442","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"#8: Samuel (I & II) - A Tale Of Two Families","post_main_content_content":"

In an effort to bring more Torah content to your homes and devices, we are pleased to announce this new initiative.<\/p>\r\n

There are 24 hours in a day, 24 books of Tanakh and \u2013 counting from Monday \u2013 24 days until Pesach. Count up with us at 929!<\/p>\r\n

3.5 years to complete all of Tanakh might feel a bit long. If you are ready to dive into some of the later books of Tanakh, \u201c24 in 24\u201d is for you.<\/p>\r\n

Starting on Monday the 16th<\/sup> of March (click here to see all the videos to date<\/a>), alongside our daily chapter, we will be starting a parallel learning cycle, with the goal of working our way through all 24 books of Tanakh over the next 24 days. Drawing from our community of educators and writers, each day, here on the site, in our daily newsletter and through our social media channels we will be sharing a 20-30 minute video exploring a resonant theme in each of the 24 books of Tanakh, starting with Bereishit\/Genesis on Monday March 16, and ending with Divrei Hayamim\/Chronicles.<\/p>\r\n

Join us for this journey in text \u2013 from the comfort (and appropriately socially distanced semi-isolation) of your own home!<\/p>","post_main_content_image":"","post_main_content_embedded_video":"https:\/\/youtu.be\/e1CC6EkvOUs","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"24 in 24","tile_main_caption":"#8: Samuel (I & II) - A Tale Of Two Families","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"with: Rachel Sharansky Danziger","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":"","tile_preview_video":"https:\/\/youtu.be\/e1CC6EkvOUs","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"42","chapter_main_number":"442","date":"20270510","wall_id":"442"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"332","name":"24 in 24","old_id":"732"}]},{"order":2,"id":"67550","color":"#f7e9e9","size":"2","name":"The Books Of Samuel: Structure and Overview ","post_title":"The Books Of Samuel: Structure And Overview","slug":"the-books-of-samuel-structure-and-overview","old_id":"67550","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":38102,"post_title":"929-English","slug":"929-english","old_id":"38102","first_name":"","last_name":"929-English","description":"","short_description":"","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":38333,"alt":"","title":"\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/png","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5.png","width":1513,"height":860,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-300x171.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":171,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-768x437.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":437,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-1024x582.png","large-width":1024,"large-height":582,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5.png","1536x1536-width":1513,"1536x1536-height":860,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5.png","2048x2048-width":1513,"2048x2048-height":860,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-1200x682.png","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":682,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-739x420.png","home_baner-width":739,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"233","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Click below for insight into the background and structure of the two Books of Samuel","post_main_content_content":"

    \r\n\t
  1. Overview of the Book of Samuel (1&2)<\/a><\/li>\r\n\t
  2. Structure of the Book of Samuel (1&2)<\/a><\/li>\r\n<\/ol>","post_main_content_image":{"id":67563,"alt":"","title":"isam-overview","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview.jpg","width":1280,"height":720,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-300x169.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":169,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-768x432.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":432,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-1024x576.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":576,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview.jpg","1536x1536-width":1280,"1536x1536-height":720,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview.jpg","2048x2048-width":1280,"2048x2048-height":720,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-1200x675.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":675,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-747x420.jpg","home_baner-width":747,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"The Books Of Samuel: Structure And Overview","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Important historical and literary background","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":67563,"alt":"","title":"isam-overview","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview.jpg","width":1280,"height":720,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-300x169.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":169,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-768x432.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":432,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-1024x576.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":576,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview.jpg","1536x1536-width":1280,"1536x1536-height":720,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview.jpg","2048x2048-width":1280,"2048x2048-height":720,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-1200x675.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":675,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/isam-overview-747x420.jpg","home_baner-width":747,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"I Samuel","chapter":"1","chapter_main_number":"233","date":"20260721","wall_id":"233"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"721","name":"Text","old_id":"1121"},{"term_id":"839","name":"Samuel","old_id":"1239"}]},{"order":3,"id":"61323","color":"#f8ebe3","size":"2","name":"The Saga Of Joab ","post_title":"The Saga Of Joab","slug":"the-saga-of-joab","old_id":"61323","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":34891,"post_title":"Miriam Gedwiser","slug":"miriam-gedwiser","old_id":"34891","first_name":"Miriam","last_name":"Gedwiser ","description":"Miriam Gedwiser teaches Talmud and Tanakh at Ramaz Upper Upper school and is a core faculty member at Drisha. 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      \r\n\t
    1. Introducing Joab<\/a><\/li>\r\n\t
    2. Abner, The Anti-Joab<\/a><\/li>\r\n\t
    3. When The Personal is Political: Joab Kills Abner<\/a><\/li>\r\n\t
    4. Joab, David\u2019s Fixer<\/a><\/li>\r\n\t
    5. The King And His General, Intertwined<\/a><\/li>\r\n\t
    6. Powerful, Powerless Joab<\/a><\/li>\r\n\t
    7. Joab\u2019s Choice (The Kingdom or the King?)<\/a><\/li>\r\n\t
    8. David and Joab: An Irreparable Rift?<\/a><\/li>\r\n\t
    9. Joab: Straight Shooter or Loose Cannon?\u00a0<\/a><\/li>\r\n\t
    10. Joab\u2019s Final Obedience<\/a><\/li>\r\n<\/ol>\r\n

      And stay tuned for I Kings chapters 1 and 2, for the dramatic denouement of the Joab saga.<\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":60313,"alt":"","title":"2sam11-david and yoab2","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","width":600,"height":346,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2-300x173.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":173,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","medium_large-width":600,"medium_large-height":346,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","large-width":600,"large-height":346,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","1536x1536-width":600,"1536x1536-height":346,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","2048x2048-width":600,"2048x2048-height":346,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","post_full_size-width":600,"post_full_size-height":346,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","home_baner-width":600,"home_baner-height":346}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"A 929 Character Study","tile_main_caption":"The Saga of Joab","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Click here for the 10 posts that explore David's willful general Joab ","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":60313,"alt":"","title":"2sam11-david and yoab2","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","width":600,"height":346,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2-300x173.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":173,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","medium_large-width":600,"medium_large-height":346,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","large-width":600,"large-height":346,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","1536x1536-width":600,"1536x1536-height":346,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","2048x2048-width":600,"2048x2048-height":346,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","post_full_size-width":600,"post_full_size-height":346,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-david-and-yoab2.jpg","home_baner-width":600,"home_baner-height":346}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":false,"chapter_main_number":false,"date":"20190819","wall_id":"2009"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":false},{"order":4,"id":"61335","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"1","name":"Chapter 10: A Personal Recollection ","post_title":"Chapter 10: A Personal Recollection","slug":"chapter-10-a-personal-recollection","old_id":"61335","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":38986,"post_title":"Philip Stein","slug":"philip-stein","old_id":"38986","first_name":"Philip ","last_name":"Stein ","description":"Philip Stein is the founder and managing partner of Philip Stein & Associates Ltd., the largest U.S. accounting firm in Israel. 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      My maternal grandfather was born in 1902 in Russia in an area that is now Poland. In 1914, the German army occupied their town. On one Shabbat my great grandfather was sitting having lunch in his home. He noticed a group soldiers approaching the front door of their home. He immediately told his children to run out the back door and run into the woods. The soldiers barged into the house, took my great grandfather with other Jewish men to thresh straw on Shabbat.<\/p>\r\n

      As a final humiliation - just like in 2 Samuel chapter 10 -\u00a0\u00a0they shaved off half of their beards.<\/strong><\/p>\r\n

      My\u00a0<\/strong>great grandfather was so humiliated he tied a kerchief around his face for several weeks until his beard grew back. He was not privileged to hang out in Jericho until his beard returned.<\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":61336,"alt":"","title":"2sam-end-beard","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/gif","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","width":238,"height":182,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard-150x150.gif","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","medium-width":238,"medium-height":182,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","medium_large-width":238,"medium_large-height":182,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","large-width":238,"large-height":182,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","1536x1536-width":238,"1536x1536-height":182,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","2048x2048-width":238,"2048x2048-height":182,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","post_full_size-width":238,"post_full_size-height":182,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","home_baner-width":238,"home_baner-height":182}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Chapter 10: My Great-Grandfather - A Personal Recollection","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"The humiliation of a bearded Israelite....","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":61336,"alt":"","title":"2sam-end-beard","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/gif","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","width":238,"height":182,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard-150x150.gif","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","medium-width":238,"medium-height":182,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","medium_large-width":238,"medium_large-height":182,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","large-width":238,"large-height":182,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","1536x1536-width":238,"1536x1536-height":182,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","2048x2048-width":238,"2048x2048-height":182,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","post_full_size-width":238,"post_full_size-height":182,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam-end-beard.gif","home_baner-width":238,"home_baner-height":182}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":false,"chapter_main_number":false,"date":"20190819","wall_id":"2009"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":false},{"order":5,"id":"59556","color":"#f6f5de","size":"1","name":"Saul and Jonathan, The Love Of Father And Son ","post_title":"Saul And Jonathan, The Love Of Father And Son","slug":"saul-and-jonathan-the-love-of-father-and-son","old_id":"59556","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":56118,"post_title":"Tzvi Sinensky","slug":"tzvi-sinensky","old_id":"56118","first_name":"Tzvi ","last_name":"Sinensky ","description":"Rabbi Tzvi Sinensky is the Director of Interdisciplinary Learning and Educational Outreach at the Rae Kushner Yeshiva High School in Livingston, NJ. He holds a graduate certificate degree in Gender Studies from Utah State University, and is pursuing a PhD on the intersection between Jewish thought and gender studies at the Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies. ","short_description":"Rabbi Tzvi Sinensky is the Director of Interdisciplinary Learning and Educational Outreach at the Rae Kushner Yeshiva High School in Livingston, NJ.","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":56119,"alt":"","title":"tzvi_sinensky","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/tzvi_sinensky.jpg","width":240,"height":280,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/tzvi_sinensky-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/tzvi_sinensky.jpg","medium-width":240,"medium-height":280,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/tzvi_sinensky.jpg","medium_large-width":240,"medium_large-height":280,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/tzvi_sinensky.jpg","large-width":240,"large-height":280,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/tzvi_sinensky.jpg","1536x1536-width":240,"1536x1536-height":280,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/tzvi_sinensky.jpg","2048x2048-width":240,"2048x2048-height":280,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/tzvi_sinensky.jpg","post_full_size-width":240,"post_full_size-height":280,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/tzvi_sinensky.jpg","home_baner-width":240,"home_baner-height":280}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"264","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Despite fundamental disagreements, inseparable in life and death","post_main_content_content":"

      In David\u2019s stirring elegy for Saul and Jonathan, is one of the most haunting, yet ambiguous phrases concerns the eternal relationship between father and son. According to the traditional cantillation, David refers to \u201cSaul and Jonathan, beloved and cherished in life, never parted in death.\u201d Yet this reading of the phrase is strange. If father and son never parted in death, weren\u2019t they also united in life?<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Accordingly, numerous contemporary scholars move the comma one word earlier, and read the verse as follows: \u201cSaul and Jonathan, beloved and cherished, never parted in life or in death.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Yet this too seems difficult. Were Saul and Jonathan not bitterly divided during their lifetimes in their treatment of David? Was David not Saul\u2019s sworn enemy, and Jonathan\u2019s beloved friend? Saul sought to kill David; Jonathan saved his life. How could David himself have been blind to the chasm dividing father and son? How dare he be disingenuous while delivering his poignant eulogy?<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Perhaps motivated by this difficulty, some classical commentaries reinterpret this phrase. Targum Yonatan, as elaborated by R. David Kimhi, suggests that David means to say that their bond with God, not one another, was never broken. Metzudat David understands that they were beloved to the nation (again, not one another) not only in life, but also in death. Yet, as R. Kimhi acknowledges, this is not the only plausible interpretation. The simple understanding is that David and Jonathan were inseparable <\/span>from one another<\/span><\/i> in life and death.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Accordingly, we might suggest that David is telling the truth after all. Despite their fierce split in their attitudes toward David, Saul and Jonathan fundamentally enjoyed an extraordinary relationship. That is obscured throughout the narrative in I Samuel, which is focused on the transition of power from Saul to David, and Saul\u2019s intense, near-irrational hatred of David. Yet, apparently, despite the fierce differences in their respective attitudes toward David, David himself was able to see beyond these differences, and recognize the existential bond between father and son. The two were literally inseparable, living together and dying in the same battle on the same day.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      So often in our own lives, we have strong, even fierce disagreements with those closest to us. In capturing the remarkable model of Saul and Jonathan, David\u2019 eulogy reminds us that even when we disagree, we must remain equally committed to maintaining deep relationships with those closest to us.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":59557,"alt":"","title":"2sam1-father-and-son","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son.jpg","width":1920,"height":1280,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-300x200.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-768x512.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":512,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-1024x683.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":683,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1024,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1280,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-1200x800.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":800,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-630x420.jpg","home_baner-width":630,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Saul And Jonathan, The Love Of Father And Son","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Despite fundamental disagreements, inseparable in life and death","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":59557,"alt":"","title":"2sam1-father-and-son","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son.jpg","width":1920,"height":1280,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-300x200.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-768x512.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":512,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-1024x683.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":683,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1024,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1280,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-1200x800.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":800,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam1-father-and-son-630x420.jpg","home_baner-width":630,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"1","chapter_main_number":"264","date":"20260902","wall_id":"264"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"366","name":"Commentators","old_id":"766"},{"term_id":"381","name":"love","old_id":"781"},{"term_id":"383","name":"Death","old_id":"783"},{"term_id":"468","name":"Relationships","old_id":"868"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"},{"term_id":"885","name":"Saul","old_id":"1285"},{"term_id":"891","name":"Jonathan","old_id":"1291"}]},{"order":6,"id":"59633","color":"#efefef","size":"2","name":"Play ","post_title":"Play","slug":"play","old_id":"59633","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":33877,"post_title":"Marc Bregman","slug":"marc-bregman","old_id":"33877","first_name":"Marc","last_name":"Bregman","description":"Marc Bregman received his Ph.D. from The Hebrew University in Jerusalem in 1991. He taught at the Hebrew Union College (Jerusalem), The Hebrew University in Jerusalem, the Schechter Institute for Judaic Studies in Jerusalem, and at the Ben-Gurion University in Beer Sheba, Israel. During 1993 he was Visiting Associate Professor at Yale University, and during 1996 he was the Stroum Professor of Jewish Studies and Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Washington in Seattle. During 2005, Bregman served as the Harry Starr Fellow in Judaica at Harvard University and was awarded a Teaching Fellowship at the Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. He also has served as Forchheimer Visiting Professor in the Faculty of Humanities at The Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He is the author of The Tanhuma-Yelammedenu Literature: Studies in the Evolution of the Versions (Gorgias Press, 2003). In 2006, Bregman was appointed the Herman and Zelda Bernard Distinguished Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of North Carolina in Greensboro, where he also headed the program in Jewish Studies, until 2013. Bregman retired from UNCG as of July 31, 2017. He has now returned to Jerusalem where he is continuing his research and teaching activities.","credit":"","image_url":"","short_description":"Marc Bregman is the Herman and Zelda Bernard Distinguished Professor of Jewish Studies emeritus, at the University of North Carolina in Greensboro.","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":33878,"alt":"Marc Bregman","title":"Marc Bregman","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Marc-Bregman.jpg","width":361,"height":488,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Marc-Bregman-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Marc-Bregman-222x300.jpg","medium-width":222,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Marc-Bregman.jpg","medium_large-width":361,"medium_large-height":488,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Marc-Bregman.jpg","large-width":361,"large-height":488,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Marc-Bregman.jpg","1536x1536-width":361,"1536x1536-height":488,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Marc-Bregman.jpg","2048x2048-width":361,"2048x2048-height":488,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Marc-Bregman.jpg","post_full_size-width":361,"post_full_size-height":488,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Marc-Bregman-311x420.jpg","home_baner-width":311,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"265","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Seriously?\u00a0","post_main_content_content":"

      In our chapter, David with his wives Ahinoam and Abigail and soldiers, settles in Hebron, where the men of Judah anoint him their king (2:1-4). But Abner, Saul\u2019s army commander, has taken Ish-Bosheth, son of Saul and made him king over all Israel (verses 8-9). Abner and the soldiers of Ish-bosheth marched out, meeting Joab son of Zeruiah and the soldiers of David. They confronted one another at the pool of Gibeon. One group sat on one side of the pool, and the other group on the other side of the pool. Abner said to Joab, \u201cLet the young men come forward and play (vi-sahaqu<\/em>) before us.\u201d \u201cYes, let them,\u201d Joab answered. They came forward and were counted off, twelve for Benjamin and Ish-bosheth and twelve of David\u2019s soldiers. Each one grasped his opponent\u2019s head [and thrust] his sword into his opponent\u2019s side and they fell together. And that place was called Helqat Ha-Tzurim <\/em>(\u201cThe Field of Flint Swords\u201d) (verses 12-16). Because all twenty-four young swordsmen died, so that neither side could claim symbolic victory without an engagement of all the two armies, a fierce battle ensued that day, and Abner and the men of Israel were routed by David\u2019s soldiers (verse 17).<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      We have here a dramatic and tragic example of what came to be known as \u201cswordplay\u201d. It is curious that Scripture refers here to this kind of fatal fighting as \u201cplay\u201d (the basis meaning of the root S-H-Q). In many languages, including Hebrew, the word for \u201cplay\u201d is used to refer to the \u201cplaying of children\u201d, \u201cplaying a role\u201d in a \u201cplay\u201d \u2013 all activities that generally have less fatal results.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      On the basis of what Abner says to Joab in our chapter, \u201cLet the young men come forward and play before us\u201d (verse 14), the Midrash (Genesis Rabbah 53:11) comments that \u201cplay\u201d refers to the spilling of blood. An apparently later Midrashic work (Seder Eliyahu Rabbah, Chapter 13) launches into an extensive diatribe against \u201cplay\u201d, which it includes among other bad behaviors such as \u201cidle talk\u201d (sihah<\/em>) and \u201cflippancy\u201d (tiflut<\/em>). For as Rabbi Akiva says (Avot 3:17): \u201cPlayfulness (sehoq<\/em>) and levity (qalut rosh<\/em>) lead a man to sexual transgression (\u2018ervah<\/em>)\u201d. The Midrash goes on to depict God as sitting on His Throne of Glory, one third of the day He reads Scripture and recites Mishnah, one third of the day He imposes judgement and one third of the day He sustains the entire world. Thus, God has little time for \u201cplay\u201d (but compare Psalms 104:26 and Talmud Bavli Avodah Zarah 3b).<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      These aggadot<\/em> clearly take a dim view of \u201cplay\u201d. However, the Aggadah itself is said to have \u201ca playful countenance\u201d (panim sohaqot la-aggadah<\/em> -- Pesiqta\u2019 de-Rav Kahana\u2019, Ba-Hodesh Ha-Shelishi 25). So, let us rejoice in the \u201cplayfulness\u201d of the Aggadah, while avoiding the more destructive and even dangerous possible consequences of \u201cplay\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Image: \u201cIsrael and Judah at War,\u201d The Morgan Crusader Bible of Louis IX (Maciejowski Bible) - Upper register, Folio 36 verso<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":59637,"alt":"","title":"2sam2-joab-abner fighting","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","width":690,"height":444,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting-300x193.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":193,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","medium_large-width":690,"medium_large-height":444,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","large-width":690,"large-height":444,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","1536x1536-width":690,"1536x1536-height":444,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","2048x2048-width":690,"2048x2048-height":444,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","post_full_size-width":690,"post_full_size-height":444,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting-653x420.jpg","home_baner-width":653,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Play","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Seriously?\u00a0","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":59637,"alt":"","title":"2sam2-joab-abner fighting","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","width":690,"height":444,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting-300x193.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":193,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","medium_large-width":690,"medium_large-height":444,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","large-width":690,"large-height":444,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","1536x1536-width":690,"1536x1536-height":444,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","2048x2048-width":690,"2048x2048-height":444,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting.jpg","post_full_size-width":690,"post_full_size-height":444,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam2-joab-abner-fighting-653x420.jpg","home_baner-width":653,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"2","chapter_main_number":"265","date":"20260903","wall_id":"265"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"363","name":"Midrash","old_id":"763"},{"term_id":"897","name":"Killing","old_id":"1297"},{"term_id":"901","name":"Play","old_id":"1301"}]},{"order":7,"id":"59749","color":"#f2e9df","size":"1","name":"The Dream Of A United Kingdom\u00a0 ","post_title":"The Dream Of A United Kingdom\u00a0","slug":"the-dream-of-a-united-kingdom","old_id":"59749","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":34245,"post_title":"Rachel Sharansky Danziger","slug":"rachel-sharansky-danziger","old_id":"34245","first_name":"Rachel Sharansky","last_name":"Danziger","description":"Rachel Sharansky Danziger is a Jerusalem-born writer and speaker who blogs about Judaism, parenting, and life in Israel. She currently lives in Boston, where she teaches about storytelling in the bible and the subversive depths of Hebrew words.\r\n","short_description":"Rachel Sharansky Danziger is a Jerusalem-born Boston-based writer and speaker about Judaism, parenting, and life in Israel. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":34246,"alt":"","title":"RSDanziger","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger.jpg","width":1171,"height":1769,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-199x300.jpg","medium-width":199,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-678x1024.jpg","medium_large-width":678,"medium_large-height":1024,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-678x1024.jpg","large-width":678,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger.jpg","1536x1536-width":1017,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger.jpg","2048x2048-width":1171,"2048x2048-height":1769,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-794x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":794,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-278x420.jpg","home_baner-width":278,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"266","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"But David\u2019s project is full of fault lines","post_main_content_content":"

      Michal is traveling to David, and the dream of a united kingdom seems, for one moment, within reach. Saul\u2019s daughter, and Saul\u2019s general, are on their way to join David\u2019s court in Hebron, where they intend to bring all of Israel over to his side. Ishboshet\u2019s court in Mahanaim (\u2018two camps\u2019 in Hebrew, named after Jacob\u2019s decision to divide his wives and children into camps before his confrontation with Esau,) seems destined to dissolve and sink into oblivion, along with the division between competing kings and camps. The united House of Israel, like Michal\u2019s union with David, appear to be on their way to be restored.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      But this optimistic moment is doomed to pass and crumble. And if we step back and look at it in its entirety, the seeds of its destruction are there for us to see.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Michal is traveling to David, but her travels don\u2019t merely restore. David is using Michal to establish his House \u201cover Israel and Judah from Dan to Beer-sheba\u201d. But he can\u2019t build his House without destroying others. Michal is traveling, and there is a man in tears behind her. And he reminds us: the cost of unity is the destruction of Paltiel\u2019s home, and Saul\u2019s house.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      This destruction scars and creates latent divisions. And one day, when David\u2019s son Absalom will rebel against him, these divisions will gape open and undermine David\u2019s reign. On that day, many Israelites will join the rebellion, and force David to escape to Mahanaim, fearing, like Ishboshet, a man who\u2019ll muster in Hebron. David\u2019s concubines will be taken by his rival, much as David took Michal to cement his own reign. And as David will run for his life from Jerusalem, Paltiel\u2019s tragedy will come back to haunt him: a man will walk and curse him where Paltiel walked and wept. \u201cThe LORD is paying you back for all your crimes against the family of Saul, whose throne you seized,\u201d the man will tell him. (2 Samuel 16:8) And David will go on running with these words upon his heels.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Absalom will fail, but David will face other rebellions. And within two generations, the unity he seeks will be undone.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Michal is traveling to David, and Paltiel is following in tears. The dissolution of their union foreshadows the brittleness of David\u2019s project. It underscores the fault lines of the unity he builds.<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":59750,"alt":"","title":"2sam3-fault","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault.jpg","width":1920,"height":1080,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-300x169.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":169,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-768x432.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":432,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-1024x576.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":576,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":864,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1080,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-1200x675.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":675,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-747x420.jpg","home_baner-width":747,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"The Dream Of A United Kingdom\u00a0","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"But David\u2019s project is full of fault lines","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":59750,"alt":"","title":"2sam3-fault","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault.jpg","width":1920,"height":1080,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-300x169.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":169,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-768x432.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":432,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-1024x576.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":576,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":864,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1080,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-1200x675.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":675,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam3-fault-747x420.jpg","home_baner-width":747,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"3","chapter_main_number":"266","date":"20260906","wall_id":"266"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"594","name":"Unity","old_id":"994"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"},{"term_id":"894","name":"Michal","old_id":"1294"}]},{"order":8,"id":"61091","color":"#f6edf6","size":"1","name":"The Third Anointing: Shepherd, Warrior, Leader ","post_title":"The Third Anointing: Shepherd, Warrior, Leader","slug":"the-third-anointing-shepherd-warrior-leader","old_id":"61091","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":60052,"post_title":"Alon Meltzer","slug":"alon-meltzer","old_id":"60052","first_name":"Alon ","last_name":"Meltzer ","description":"Rabbi Alon Meltzer is the Rabbi of Or Chadash and Director of Programs at Shalom in hte Sydney, Australia Jewish Community. Alon holds ordination from Yeshiva University\u2019s RIETS, a Masters in Medieval Jewish History from Bernard Revel Graduate School, and a Masters in Sociology from the University of Auckland. ","short_description":"Rabbi Alon Meltzer is the Rabbi of Or Chadash and Director of Programs at Shalom in hte Sydney, Australia Jewish Community. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":60053,"alt":"","title":"alon meltzer","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer.jpg","width":1383,"height":1583,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-262x300.jpg","medium-width":262,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-768x879.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":879,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-895x1024.jpg","large-width":895,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer.jpg","1536x1536-width":1342,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer.jpg","2048x2048-width":1383,"2048x2048-height":1583,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-1048x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":1048,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-367x420.jpg","home_baner-width":367,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"268","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"He is able to transcend his battlefield experience, into a vision that encompasses all of the people of Israel","post_main_content_content":"

      In the book of Deuteronomy (17:15) we see the instruction of how to appoint a king. It is up to the Jewish people yet dependent on God choosing the right candidate. It is the perfect blend of popular monarchy whereby the monarch is the ruler of people, and the divine right of kings, where God is the sole authority to the monarch.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      In the book of Samuel II, chapter 5, we see this concept play out. The tribes of Israel come to David in Hebron and declare loyalty to him. They acknowledge God\u2019s desire to have David as king, and then the elders make a pact and anoint David as king of Israel.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      This is the third anointing David goes through \u2013 first by Samuel (Samuel I, Chapter 16) and then by Judah (Samuel II, Chapter 2) and now here by all of Israel. Each anointing expands David\u2019s power, first he is anointed by God\u2019s instruction, then he fulfills the blessing of Jacob to his paternal ancestor Judah, whereby his descendents would appoint from their midst a King, and then by the entire people of Israel.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      In some ways we see these anointings as correlating to the life of David. Shepherd. Warrior. Leader. The shepherd wanders in solitude, caring for his flock but oftentimes going unnoticed. Moshe was also a shepherd, and like David, the only one who was following the journeys of the flock was God. Moses was divinely appointed in his act of shepherd, so too David.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Then David acts as warrior, commander of the battlefield. He does not yet have the ability to rally an entire nation around him. Like a warrior, he commands the respect of those who are nearest to him, and so it makes sense that he is anointed by his tribe mates, exalted to lead over them.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Finally, he moves from being warrior to leader. He is able to transcend his battlefield experience, into a vision that encompasses all of the people of Israel; he is articulate, visionary, and unifying. So he is finally anointed by the elders of all the land.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      He is the king with divine right. But his actions endear him to the people, and in doing so he doesn\u2019t become the King of the land of Israel, rather the King of the people of Israel, a continuous kingship that is sung about through the ages.<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":61098,"alt":"","title":"Oil Splash 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She currently lives in Boston, where she teaches about storytelling in the bible and the subversive depths of Hebrew words.\r\n","short_description":"Rachel Sharansky Danziger is a Jerusalem-born Boston-based writer and speaker about Judaism, parenting, and life in Israel. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":34246,"alt":"","title":"RSDanziger","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger.jpg","width":1171,"height":1769,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-199x300.jpg","medium-width":199,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-678x1024.jpg","medium_large-width":678,"medium_large-height":1024,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-678x1024.jpg","large-width":678,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger.jpg","1536x1536-width":1017,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger.jpg","2048x2048-width":1171,"2048x2048-height":1769,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-794x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":794,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/RSDanziger-278x420.jpg","home_baner-width":278,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"268","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"A decisive defeat of the Philistines from the perspective of 3000 years","post_main_content_content":"

      If you walk west on Emek Refaim street in Jerusalem, there\u2019s a spot where the street ends, the ground seems to drop off from beneath you, and you find yourself looking down.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      A sharp right turn will keep you on elevated ground; in fact, you\u2019ll soon find yourself walking uphill towards the San Simon Monastery. Turn left, and you will remain on elevated ground as well, and eventually walk uphill towards neighborhoods like Arnona and Talpiot. But right ahead of you, there is no way but down: down into what was once known as the valley of Rephaim, and through it down to the Brook of Sorek, and through it all the way down to Israel\u2019s coastal plain.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Had you stood in this very spot sometime between 1892-1998, you might have seen a train chugging up the valley towards you, bearing goods and passengers form Jaffa\u2019s port. When the Jerusalem businessman Yosef Navon first approached the Ottoman government with his plan to build a Jaffa-Jerusalem railway, he followed in the footsteps of many others who tried, for millennia, to connect Israel\u2019s fertile coastal plain with its forbidding mountain range. The route he picked wasn\u2019t original either; long before Navon\u2019s train, the Philistines marched up this valley to make war against King David.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      The Philistines could have picked other routes for their attack. Yet they preferred the Valley of Rephaim, and probably for the same reason Navon chose it for his railway: unlike other passages, this valley is broad enough to accommodate heavy machinery. It allowed Navon to build a rail, and it allowed the Philistines to march up with their heavy iron weapons and their chariots. But these preparations ultimately failed them: by circling around the Philistines and forcing them to flee to the coastal plain through a narrower route, David turned their heavy weapons into a liability. The boy who killed an armored giant with a stone became the king who deprived well-armed armies from what they saw as their advantage. And so the Philistines retreated, never to make a serious stand again.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      The site of this final defeat lies roughly where Navon\u2019s railway ended, in what became, in recent years, a hub of restaurants, live concerts and cultural events. If you follow in the Philistines\u2019 footsteps all the way there can enjoy a classic Jerusalem-esque juxtaposition, and sip iced coffee in the very place where a war that spanned three biblical books and several centuries had come to a decisive end.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Image: Emek Refaim St., photo: Avishai Teicher, 2007 \/ wikimedia<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":59934,"alt":"","title":"2sam5-emek_refaim_st","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st.jpg","width":800,"height":600,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st-300x225.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":225,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st-768x576.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":576,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st.jpg","large-width":800,"large-height":600,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st.jpg","1536x1536-width":800,"1536x1536-height":600,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st.jpg","2048x2048-width":800,"2048x2048-height":600,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st.jpg","post_full_size-width":800,"post_full_size-height":600,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st-560x420.jpg","home_baner-width":560,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Emek Refaim: From Battlefield to Boulevard","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"A decisive defeat of the Philistines from the perspective of 3000 years","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":59934,"alt":"","title":"2sam5-emek_refaim_st","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st.jpg","width":800,"height":600,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st-300x225.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":225,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st-768x576.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":576,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st.jpg","large-width":800,"large-height":600,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st.jpg","1536x1536-width":800,"1536x1536-height":600,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st.jpg","2048x2048-width":800,"2048x2048-height":600,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st.jpg","post_full_size-width":800,"post_full_size-height":600,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam5-emek_refaim_st-560x420.jpg","home_baner-width":560,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"5","chapter_main_number":"268","date":"20260908","wall_id":"268"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"434","name":"War","old_id":"834"},{"term_id":"539","name":"Israel","old_id":"939"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"},{"term_id":"864","name":"Philistines","old_id":"1264"}]},{"order":10,"id":"59964","color":"#faeed8","size":"2","name":"One Woke Queen ","post_title":"One Woke Queen","slug":"one-woke-queen","old_id":"59964","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":59587,"post_title":"Benjamin Morse","slug":"benjamin-morse","old_id":"59587","first_name":"Benjamin ","last_name":"Morse ","description":"Dr. Benjamin Morse studied religion and art history at Vassar, Oxford, and the Courtauld before completing a PhD in biblical interpretation. 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","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":59588,"alt":"","title":"Benjamin Morse by Lenka Opalena","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/Benjamin-Morse-by-Lenka-Opalena.jpg","width":1069,"height":1576,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/Benjamin-Morse-by-Lenka-Opalena-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/Benjamin-Morse-by-Lenka-Opalena-203x300.jpg","medium-width":203,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/Benjamin-Morse-by-Lenka-Opalena-695x1024.jpg","medium_large-width":695,"medium_large-height":1024,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/Benjamin-Morse-by-Lenka-Opalena-695x1024.jpg","large-width":695,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/Benjamin-Morse-by-Lenka-Opalena.jpg","1536x1536-width":1042,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/Benjamin-Morse-by-Lenka-Opalena.jpg","2048x2048-width":1069,"2048x2048-height":1576,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/Benjamin-Morse-by-Lenka-Opalena-814x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":814,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/Benjamin-Morse-by-Lenka-Opalena-285x420.jpg","home_baner-width":285,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"269","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Why Michal denied David an heir","post_main_content_content":"

      The showdown between this royal couple has elements of a soap opera. As the only woman in the Hebrew Bible who is said to love a man (1 Sam. 18.20), Michal has by now seen through David\u2019s press smile. She peers down from her window at his acrobatic reveries over the arrival of the ark in Jerusalem, and her love has turned to disdain.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      David makes offerings and passes out celebratory cakes to his fans before returning home to bless his household. Michal has witnessed the womenfolk apparently admiring more than his piety and has had enough: \u201cHow the king of Israel glorified himself today, exposing himself before the slave girls of his servants, disrobing like some vulgar dancer\u201d (v. 20, translation my own). David is indignant and scores of interpreters have written her off as an ice queen who was too bitter to swoon from the majesty, but I\u2019m with her.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      His reply validates precisely the arrogance Michal is calling him out for: it was before the <\/span>LORD<\/span><\/i> he was dancing, the same LORD \u201cwho chose me above thy father, and above all his house, to appoint me prince over the people\u201d (v. 21). He lords his election over her in an effort to put her in her place and eradicate the memory and authority of his predecessor. He will be as \u201cvile\u201d and as \u201cbase\u201d as he wants and achieve honor from the handmaids she dared to mention. The chapter then closes with a thunk: \u201cAnd Michal the daughter of Saul had no child unto the day of her death\u201d (v. 22).<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      David\u2019s supporters\u2014his southern base and those who followed throughout history\u2014would have no reason to doubt that the obstruction of motherhood was a sentence against Michal. Even feminist scholars who describe this scene as her suicide proliferate commentary that confines, erases, and murders her.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      But nowhere in the Hebrew Bible is barrenness ever equated with punishment. And nowhere in this chapter (or in the one that follows in which God puts a damper on David\u2019s ambitions to build him a house) does it say God closed her womb or that David denied Michal children by refusing to have sex with her. On the contrary. It seems more likely that Michal closed the door on David so that he could not have an heir her father\u2019s northern tribes would recognize.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Samuel and Kings tell the story of the people\u2019s mistake to put power in human hands when they should have worshiped God alone\u2014a mistake that ends in the Exile. Michal\u2019s attack on David\u2019s hubris is theologically shrewd. Her denial of an heir disrupts his political hegemony. Michal wasn\u2019t an ice queen; she was a prophet.<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":59977,"alt":"","title":"2sam6-David-dancing window","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window.jpg","width":1296,"height":1390,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-280x300.jpg","medium-width":280,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-768x824.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":824,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-955x1024.jpg","large-width":955,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window.jpg","1536x1536-width":1296,"1536x1536-height":1390,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window.jpg","2048x2048-width":1296,"2048x2048-height":1390,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-1119x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":1119,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-392x420.jpg","home_baner-width":392,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"One Woke Queen","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Why Michal denied David an heir","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":59977,"alt":"","title":"2sam6-David-dancing window","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window.jpg","width":1296,"height":1390,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-280x300.jpg","medium-width":280,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-768x824.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":824,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-955x1024.jpg","large-width":955,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window.jpg","1536x1536-width":1296,"1536x1536-height":1390,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window.jpg","2048x2048-width":1296,"2048x2048-height":1390,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-1119x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":1119,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam6-David-dancing-window-392x420.jpg","home_baner-width":392,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"6","chapter_main_number":"269","date":"20260909","wall_id":"269"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"483","name":"Feminism","old_id":"883"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"},{"term_id":"894","name":"Michal","old_id":"1294"}]},{"order":11,"id":"60283","color":"#e6f5f3","size":"1","name":"Abuse of Power ","post_title":"Abuse Of Power","slug":"abuse-of-power","old_id":"60283","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":60052,"post_title":"Alon Meltzer","slug":"alon-meltzer","old_id":"60052","first_name":"Alon ","last_name":"Meltzer ","description":"Rabbi Alon Meltzer is the Rabbi of Or Chadash and Director of Programs at Shalom in hte Sydney, Australia Jewish Community. 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","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":60053,"alt":"","title":"alon meltzer","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer.jpg","width":1383,"height":1583,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-262x300.jpg","medium-width":262,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-768x879.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":879,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-895x1024.jpg","large-width":895,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer.jpg","1536x1536-width":1342,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer.jpg","2048x2048-width":1383,"2048x2048-height":1583,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-1048x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":1048,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/alon-meltzer-367x420.jpg","home_baner-width":367,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"274","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew ya...","post_main_content_content":"

      \u201cYour faith was strong but you needed proof<\/span>
      \r\n<\/span>You saw her bathing on the roof<\/span>
      \r\n<\/span>Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew ya<\/span>
      \r\n<\/span>She tied you to a kitchen chair<\/span>
      \r\n<\/span>She broke your throne, and she cut your hair<\/span>
      \r\n<\/span>And from your lips she drew the hallelujah\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Leonard Cohen, in his famous song Hallelujah, speaks of one of the low points of King David. Immortalized as the psalmist, the one with the greatest connection to the Almighty, we see David abuse the power that he was divinely given. He sees Bathsheba bathing. He desires her. He demands her presence. He sleeps with her. She falls pregnant. And immediately after, her husband Uriah is sent to the front lines whereby he is killed by a lethal arrow.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Post #MeToo, the revelation of abuses of power, whereby the powerful, usually male, engages in abusive or coercive techniques, usually sexual, against subordinates or those with less power, usually female, has seen the downfall of many a personality.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      The Daat Zekenim, a compilation of 13<\/span>th<\/span> and 14<\/span>th<\/span> century writings, in its commentary on Bereshit, seems to place blame on Bathsheba. The Babylonian Talmud seems to absolve David\u2019s sin (Shabbat 56a). While we will explore the response of God and the prophet Nathan in our analysis of Chapter 12<\/a>, at first glance these responses would rightly outrage any moral person in the post #MeToo era.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      The human condition is to place our leaders on a pedestal, to glorify them and ensure that they always appear squeaky clean. The Torah, however, has never tried to color our leadership with rose-tinted glasses. Each mistake, each challenge, each misstep is there in black and white, and our job is to think about what we can learn from the many examples. In this case, we shouldn\u2019t have needed a social movement to realize the issues that arise between those in power and those without, especially between the sexes. We should have been the ones to ensure it never happened from the very start.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":"","post_main_content_embedded_video":"https:\/\/youtu.be\/YrLk4vdY28Q","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Abuse Of Power","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew ya...","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":60284,"alt":"","title":"2sam11-leonard cohen","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-leonard-cohen.jpg","width":1024,"height":768,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-leonard-cohen-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-leonard-cohen-300x225.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":225,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-leonard-cohen-768x576.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":576,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-leonard-cohen-1024x768.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":768,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-leonard-cohen.jpg","1536x1536-width":1024,"1536x1536-height":768,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-leonard-cohen.jpg","2048x2048-width":1024,"2048x2048-height":768,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-leonard-cohen.jpg","post_full_size-width":1024,"post_full_size-height":768,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-leonard-cohen-560x420.jpg","home_baner-width":560,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"11","chapter_main_number":"274","date":"20260916","wall_id":"274"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"362","name":"Poetry","old_id":"762"},{"term_id":"512","name":"Music","old_id":"912"},{"term_id":"574","name":"Sex","old_id":"974"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"},{"term_id":"911","name":"Bathsheba","old_id":"1311"}]},{"order":12,"id":"60323","color":"#f7f7f5","size":"1","name":"Whoever Says David Sinned is Mistaken ","post_title":"Whoever Says David Sinned is Mistaken","slug":"whoever-says-david-sinned-is-mistaken","old_id":"60323","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":34243,"post_title":"Moshe Sokolow","slug":"moshe-sokolow","old_id":"34243","first_name":"Moshe","last_name":"Sokolow","description":"Dr. Moshe Sokolow is Associate Dean of the Azrieli Graduate School of Jewish Education and Administration, Yeshiva University, and teaches a weekly class in parashat hashavu`a at Lincoln Square Synagogue. 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      Preface: I once attended a conference on teaching Tanakh at Bar Ilan University. The subject of David and Bathsheba came up, and before the moderator could even call on her, Nehama Leibowitz was on her feet, from the audience, proclaiming: \u201cIt is prohibited to teach chapter 11, without teaching chapter 12.\u201d In deference to Nehama, I recommend reading my observations on this chapter in conjunction with tomorrow\u2019s post: \u201cYou are the Man\u2026 I have Sinned against the Lord<\/a>.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      On the one hand, the Talmud reports the opinion of R. Shmuel bar Nahmani in the name of R. Yonatan: \u201cWhoever says that David sinned is mistaken\u201d (Shabbat 56a). On the other hand, we have the evidence of the text, which records his tryst with Bathsheba, a married woman, and his complicity in the death of her husband, Uriah, at the hands of the Ammonites. The rabbis deflected the challenge of these verses, claiming that they imply only an intent to sin, without the actual commission.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Full disclosure<\/b>: The Talmud acknowledges that the impulse to exonerate David came primarily from Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi who was descended from David and who manipulated the text (<\/span>mehapekh vedaresh<\/span><\/em>) to absolve him of two capital crimes\u2014adultery and murder.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Woven together, the tapestry of the rabbinic version of the episode reads as follows. David was practicing archery when one of his arrows went astray and knocked over the screen behind which Bathsheba was bathing. Overcome by her beauty, and somehow recognizing her as the intended mother of the son who was to succeed him, he instructed Joab to put her husband, Uriah, in jeopardy, so as to leave his ultimate fate, as it were, to God. As to the charge of adultery, they maintained that \u201cwhosoever went to war in David\u2019s army gave his wife a conditional divorce\u201d so that in case a soldier died, his wife was released retroactively. Therefore, Uriah\u2019s eventual death made Bathsheba a single woman even at the time she dallied with David. (They found an absolution from the murder charge, too, but we plan to confront that when we get to 1 Kings 2.)<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      In contrast to the talmudic attempt to exonerate David, we have the self-evident testimony of Scripture that David, confronted by the parable of Nathan the Prophet (12:1-4), admitted his guilt (12:13), and accepted its consequences, which included the death of the infant son born of that union\u2014although Solomon, a subsequent child by Bathsheba, does succeed him.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      For more on that - see tomorrow\u2019s 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Samuel","chapter":"11","chapter_main_number":"274","date":"20260916","wall_id":"274"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"366","name":"Commentators","old_id":"766"},{"term_id":"400","name":"Sin","old_id":"800"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"},{"term_id":"911","name":"Bathsheba","old_id":"1311"}]},{"order":13,"id":"60345","color":"#effaea","size":"1","name":"You Are The Man\u2026 I Have Sinned Against The Lord ","post_title":"You Are The Man\u2026 I Have Sinned Against The Lord","slug":"you-are-the-man-i-have-sinned-against-the-lord","old_id":"60345","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":34243,"post_title":"Moshe Sokolow","slug":"moshe-sokolow","old_id":"34243","first_name":"Moshe","last_name":"Sokolow","description":"Dr. Moshe Sokolow is Associate Dean of the Azrieli Graduate School of Jewish Education and Administration, Yeshiva University, and teaches a weekly class in parashat hashavu`a at Lincoln Square Synagogue. He is the author of TANAKH: An Owner\u2019s Manual (Jerusalem: Urim\/Ktav, 2015).\r\n\r\n","short_description":"Dr. Moshe Sokolow is Associate Dean of the Azrieli Graduate School of Jewish Education and Administration, Yeshiva University","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":34244,"alt":"","title":"sokolow","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","width":302,"height":300,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow-300x298.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":298,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","medium_large-width":302,"medium_large-height":300,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","large-width":302,"large-height":300,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","1536x1536-width":302,"1536x1536-height":300,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","2048x2048-width":302,"2048x2048-height":300,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","post_full_size-width":302,"post_full_size-height":300,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","home_baner-width":302,"home_baner-height":300}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"275","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"But why then does Solomon get to build the Temple?","post_main_content_content":"

      Preface: Nechama Leibowitz once claimed that\u00a0 \u201cIt is prohibited to teach chapter 11, without teaching chapter 12.\u201d In deference to Nehama, this post is a direct continuation of yesterday\u2019s \u201cWhoever Says David Sinned is Mistaken.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      In contrast to the talmudic attempt to exonerate David, we have the self-evident testimony of Scripture that David, confronted by the parable of Nathan the Prophet (12:1-4), admitted his guilt (12:13), and accepted its consequences, which included the death of the infant son born of that union\u2014although Solomon, a subsequent child by Bathsheba, does succeed him.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      It is that confession to which Nehama Leibowitz alluded in her remarks about chapter twelve, and her argument that David\u2019s acknowledgment of wrongdoing outweighs rabbinic attempts to find him innocent is persuasive.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      But it is to Solomon that we turn, here, in order to fathom how God could allow the child of an adulterous union to occupy so prominent a role in building the Temple from which David himself was precluded (see chapter 7). The answer, astonishingly, is that it is precisely Solomon\u2019s checkered past that made him the ideal candidate for that imposing task, because David had several other \u201cskeletons\u201d in his closet alongside which it was content to rattle. Here, to illustrate the point, is another pointed rabbinic remark.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      [God instructed Lot] \u201cLeave the city with your wife and your two daughters who are to be <\/span>found<\/span><\/i>.\u201d R. Tobiya and R. Yitzhak said: Two <\/span>findings<\/span><\/i>, Ruth the Moabite and Na`amah the Ammonite. R. Yitzhak [also] said: \u201cI <\/span>found<\/span><\/i> My servant David\u201d (Ps. 89:21). Where did I <\/span>find<\/span><\/i> him? In Sodom.\u201d (Bereishit Rabba 41)<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      David, on his mother\u2019s side, was descended from Ruth who\u2014apart from the questionable nature of her liaison with Boaz\u2014was a Moabite, and Moab was the product of the incestuous union between Lot and his elder daughter that took place right after the destruction of Sodom (Genesis 19:37). Lot\u2019s younger daughter bore him Ammon (op.\u00a0 cit.:38), who was the ancestor of Naamah the Ammonite, wife of Solomon and mother to Rehoboam, his successor (1 Kings 14:21), so the Davidic line, of which the Messiah is intended to derive, is marked all along the way by incest, adultery, and, to say the least, highly questionable and inappropriate behavior. (Recall, too, that David was descended from Judah via his dalliance with his daughter-in-law, Tamar.)<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      One last rabbinic adage completes the hermeneutic circle.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Yohanan said in the name of R. Simeon b. Yehotzadak: One should not appoint any one administrator of a community, unless he carries a basket of vermin on his back, so that if he became arrogant, one could tell him: Look behind you!<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":60324,"alt":"","title":"\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","width":250,"height":190,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","medium-width":250,"medium-height":190,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","medium_large-width":250,"medium_large-height":190,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","large-width":250,"large-height":190,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","1536x1536-width":250,"1536x1536-height":190,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","2048x2048-width":250,"2048x2048-height":190,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","post_full_size-width":250,"post_full_size-height":190,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","home_baner-width":250,"home_baner-height":190}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"Continuation 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Temple?","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":60324,"alt":"","title":"\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","width":250,"height":190,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","medium-width":250,"medium-height":190,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","medium_large-width":250,"medium_large-height":190,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","large-width":250,"large-height":190,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","1536x1536-width":250,"1536x1536-height":190,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","2048x2048-width":250,"2048x2048-height":190,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","post_full_size-width":250,"post_full_size-height":190,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/\u05e0\u05d7\u05de\u05d4_\u05dc\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5\u05d1\u05d9\u05e5.jpg","home_baner-width":250,"home_baner-height":190}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II 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She taught feminist Torah study and creative writing at Brooklyn College, Tel Aviv University, and Temple Israel of the City of New York. She holds a Master of Fine Arts from Brooklyn College and a Juris Doctorate from Golden Gate University School of Law and is the Managing Editor of the Saturday Poetry Series on As It Ought To Be. ","short_description":"Sivan Rotholz is a joint rabbinical and MARE student at Hebrew Union College, where she is a Wexner Graduate Fellow and a New Israel Fund Elissa Froman Fellow. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":41526,"alt":"","title":"sivan rotholz","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sivan-rotholz.jpg","width":320,"height":312,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sivan-rotholz-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sivan-rotholz-300x293.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":293,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sivan-rotholz.jpg","medium_large-width":320,"medium_large-height":312,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sivan-rotholz.jpg","large-width":320,"large-height":312,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sivan-rotholz.jpg","1536x1536-width":320,"1536x1536-height":312,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sivan-rotholz.jpg","2048x2048-width":320,"2048x2048-height":312,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sivan-rotholz.jpg","post_full_size-width":320,"post_full_size-height":312,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sivan-rotholz.jpg","home_baner-width":320,"home_baner-height":312}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"274","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Consent requires the very ability to say \u201cyes\u201d or \u201cno,\u201d which Bathsheba the king\u2019s subject did not have","post_main_content_content":"

      Bathsheba appears soon after the demise of Michal, David\u2019s last wife arriving on the heels of his first. But where Michal\u2019s journey brings her from promise to obscurity, Bathsheba rises from anonymity to power.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      As formidable as she will become in 1 Kings, when we encounter Bathsheba in 2 Samuel, she is nearly silent. This woman, who will one day orchestrate Solomon\u2019s unlikely ascension to the throne, says just three words in this installment of her story, and they are not \u201cI give consent.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      One warm spring night, a restless King David rises to his rooftop and gazes out over his city. From his hilltop palace overlooking the surrounding valleys he can see the roofs of his subjects that populate the hillside slopes below. The animal lust of spring is in the air when David spots a bathing beauty on one of the rooftops beneath him.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      This is how it happens. A man spots a woman. He desires her, and therefore feels entitled to have her. And with this David contributes to an era of objectifying women that remains commonplace to this day.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      \u201cAnd David sent messengers to fetch her and she came to him and he lay with her\u2026\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      David is the king, Bathsheba his subject. When we think about abuses of power carried out by movie moguls against actors, by college professors against students, by clergy against flock, we are barely touching upon the degree of power inequity inherent in David\u2019s transgressions against Bathsheba.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      David does what he likes with her, but Bathsheba does not give consent. Consent requires not only positive affirmation, which is patently missing here, but also the very ability to say \u201cyes\u201d or \u201cno.\u201d Lacking power, status, or authority, Bathsheba is as incapable of giving consent as an intoxicated person or a minor. In its historical moment, one might have called David\u2019s act an acquisition. Today, we would likely call it rape.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      What follows is tragedy upon tragedy. Bathsheba discovers she is pregnant. When he cannot pass the child off as her husband\u2019s, David has Bathsheba\u2019s husband killed. David then marries the pregnant and recently-widowed Bathsheba. Soon after, the child dies\u2014as punishment for the sins of his father.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Throughout her story in 2 Samuel, Bathsheba is acted upon. Objectified. Taken into David\u2019s bed. In silence she suffers the deaths of her husband and her firstborn son. Throughout this saga, she says only three words: \u201cI am pregnant.\u201d Lacking the power to protect herself or those she loves, she speaks only when she has no choice, her voice a warning that our actions have consequences, that even for those at the top, there will be a reckoning.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      image:\u00a0Bethsab\u00e9e, by Jean-L\u00e9on G\u00e9r\u00f4me, 1889 \/ wikimedia<\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":60306,"alt":"","title":"2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e,_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me.jpg","width":1024,"height":615,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me-300x180.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":180,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me-768x461.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":461,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me-1024x615.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":615,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me.jpg","1536x1536-width":1024,"1536x1536-height":615,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me.jpg","2048x2048-width":1024,"2048x2048-height":615,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me.jpg","post_full_size-width":1024,"post_full_size-height":615,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me-699x420.jpg","home_baner-width":699,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"The Objectification And Sexual Assault Of Bathsheba","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Consent requires the very ability to say \u201cyes\u201d or \u201cno,\u201d which Bathsheba the king\u2019s subject did not have","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":60306,"alt":"","title":"2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e,_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me.jpg","width":1024,"height":615,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me-300x180.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":180,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me-768x461.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":461,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me-1024x615.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":615,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me.jpg","1536x1536-width":1024,"1536x1536-height":615,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me.jpg","2048x2048-width":1024,"2048x2048-height":615,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me.jpg","post_full_size-width":1024,"post_full_size-height":615,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam11-Bethsab\u00e9e_by_Jean-L\u00e9on_G\u00e9r\u00f4me-699x420.jpg","home_baner-width":699,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"11","chapter_main_number":"274","date":"20260916","wall_id":"274"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"457","name":"Rape","old_id":"857"},{"term_id":"483","name":"Feminism","old_id":"883"},{"term_id":"491","name":"Suffering","old_id":"891"},{"term_id":"503","name":"Power","old_id":"903"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"},{"term_id":"911","name":"Bathsheba","old_id":"1311"}]},{"order":15,"id":"60347","color":"#e8ecf6","size":"1","name":"But Who Is The Sheep?\u00a0 ","post_title":"But Who Is The Sheep?\u00a0","slug":"but-who-is-the-sheep","old_id":"60347","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":39842,"post_title":"Avigayil Halpern","slug":"avigayil-halpern","old_id":"39842","first_name":"Avigayil ","last_name":"Halpern ","description":"Avigayil Halpern graduated from Yale in May of 2019 and is beginning study toward rabbinic ordination at the Hadar Institute. 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Halpern headshot","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/A.-Halpern-headshot-e1536749058221.jpg","width":1612,"height":1935,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/A.-Halpern-headshot-e1536749058221-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/A.-Halpern-headshot-e1536749058221-250x300.jpg","medium-width":250,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/A.-Halpern-headshot-e1536749058221-768x922.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":922,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/A.-Halpern-headshot-e1536749058221-853x1024.jpg","large-width":853,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/A.-Halpern-headshot-e1536749058221.jpg","1536x1536-width":1280,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/A.-Halpern-headshot-e1536749058221.jpg","2048x2048-width":1612,"2048x2048-height":1935,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/A.-Halpern-headshot-e1536749058221-1000x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":1000,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/A.-Halpern-headshot-e1536749058221-350x420.jpg","home_baner-width":350,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"275","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"","post_main_content_content":"

      Nathan\u2019s parable of the poor man\u2019s sheep is well-known as an example of subtlety and even pastoral wisdom. Through his allegory, Nathan illuminates to David the error of his actions in seducing Bathsheba and having Uriah killed. But Nathan\u2019s tale is not itself unproblematic.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      In casting David as a rich man and Uriah as poor, Nathan starkly captures the difference in power between the two men. Though it is true that David is, as the king, genuinely wealthier than Uriah, there is no evidence that Uriah is destitute. The economic status of the men in the story is a metaphor that conveys the ability of David, like a rich man living near a poor man, to act with impunity towards his less powerful neighbors and suffer no automatic consequence.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      But who is the sheep here? Of course, the ovine character in the story is a stand-in for Bathsheba. Unlike the two men in the parable, though, the sheep of course takes no actions. The rich man steals the sheep, which the poor man has lavished with care and attention. The sheep has no agency. Bathsheba\u2019s comparison to this sheep casts her as sheeplike: in this narrative, she too has made no choices, but only been subjected to the whims of men.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      The silence and lack of agency of Nathan\u2019s imaginary sheep is disappointingly echoed by the rest of the Biblical narrative itself. Bathsheba barely speaks, and her wants and motivations are opaque. Does she, too, desire the affair with David, or is it entirely coercive? How does she feel about marrying him immediately after the mourning period for Uriah has ended? About these and other questions we can only speculate.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      The text of the Bible, as pointed out by centuries of commentators, is always sparse. We must turn to imagination and interpretation to attempt to understand the internal lives of the characters who animate the pages of the sacred text. In doing so, it is critical to ask: Which characters do we know even less about than we ought to? Who is unheard but important? Asking\u00a0 these questions about the Tanach can train us to ask them in the rest of our lives as well.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":60348,"alt":"","title":"2sam12-lamb","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb.jpg","width":1920,"height":1280,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-300x200.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-768x512.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":512,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-1024x683.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":683,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1024,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1280,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-1200x800.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":800,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-630x420.jpg","home_baner-width":630,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"But Who Is The Sheep?\u00a0","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Bathsheba\u2019s comparison to a sheep casts her as sheeplike","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":60348,"alt":"","title":"2sam12-lamb","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb.jpg","width":1920,"height":1280,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-300x200.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-768x512.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":512,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-1024x683.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":683,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1024,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1280,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-1200x800.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":800,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/2sam12-lamb-630x420.jpg","home_baner-width":630,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"12","chapter_main_number":"275","date":"20260917","wall_id":"275"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"483","name":"Feminism","old_id":"883"},{"term_id":"704","name":"Parable","old_id":"1104"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"},{"term_id":"911","name":"Bathsheba","old_id":"1311"},{"term_id":"912","name":"Uriah","old_id":"1312"},{"term_id":"913","name":"Nathan","old_id":"1313"}]},{"order":16,"id":"60529","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"1","name":"Considering Tamar In The Age Of #MeToo ","post_title":"Considering Tamar In The Age Of #MeToo","slug":"considering-tamar-in-the-age-of-metoo","old_id":"60529","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":46656,"post_title":"Molly Morris","slug":"molly-morris","old_id":"46656","first_name":"Molly ","last_name":"Morris ","description":"Molly Morris holds a Masters degree in Leadership and Community Engagement. 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      The rape of Tamar, so vividly depicted in 2 Samuel Chapter 13, is heartbreaking and infuriating. Here is a young woman, raised in a cosseted royal household, likely under the microscope of public opinion, in an environment of male dominance, who, while trying to help her brother through a supposed illness, becomes his rape victim.\u00a0 But besides relating a horrific event of sexual violence, the narrative also illustrates Tamar\u2019s courage, way ahead of her time, and demonstrates an example of victim response that only now, in 21<\/span>st<\/span> century society, is becoming normalized.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      First, Tamar verbally and without any mistake refuses consent. \u201cCome lie with me\u201d asks her brother. \u201cDon\u2019t force me\u201d is her unequivocal reply (13:12).\u00a0 While her refused consent didn\u2019t help Tamar, we know today that consent is key in judging guilt of sexual violence.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Second, she fought. Following the attack, we hear about Amnon\u2019s sudden hatred of Tamar.\u00a0 Many commentaries suggest that Amnon\u2019s hatred is a projection of his self-hatred with the knowledge that forever more every time he sees Tamar he\u2019ll be reminded of his own degeneracy. But many commentaries, including Rashi, are less charitable to Amnon and speculate that he was really expressing anger over the fight Tamar put up. Evidently, when Amnon had finished with Tamar and before he had thrown her out, she managed to tie something (a hair, a string\u2026it doesn\u2019t really matter) around Amnon\u2019s organ, mutilating him for life. Good for you, Tamar! It might not have served her well in today\u2019s judicial system but would surely play well in the court of public opinion.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      And thirdly, she didn\u2019t try to hide the truth or protect her aggressor. Amnon tried to dispose of Tamar, ordering his attendant to \u201cGet that woman out of my presence and bar the door behind her (13:17).\u201d But Tamar did not slink home and try to bury the crime that had been committed against her. Instead she outed Amnon to all, putting dust on her head, tearing her royal princess robe and \u201cwalked away, screaming loudly as she went (13:19).\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      If only it hadn\u2019t taken more than 3,000 years for Tamar\u2019s example to become entrenched in a movement.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Image: #metoo by Wolfmann \/ wikipedia<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":60530,"alt":"","title":"2sam13-metoo","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo.jpg","width":1024,"height":575,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo-300x168.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":168,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo-768x431.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":431,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo-1024x575.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":575,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo.jpg","1536x1536-width":1024,"1536x1536-height":575,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo.jpg","2048x2048-width":1024,"2048x2048-height":575,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo.jpg","post_full_size-width":1024,"post_full_size-height":575,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo-748x420.jpg","home_baner-width":748,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Considering Tamar In The Age Of #MeToo","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Despite the horror and shame, a model of female courage and response","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":60530,"alt":"","title":"2sam13-metoo","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo.jpg","width":1024,"height":575,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo-300x168.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":168,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo-768x431.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":431,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo-1024x575.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":575,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo.jpg","1536x1536-width":1024,"1536x1536-height":575,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo.jpg","2048x2048-width":1024,"2048x2048-height":575,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo.jpg","post_full_size-width":1024,"post_full_size-height":575,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam13-metoo-748x420.jpg","home_baner-width":748,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"13","chapter_main_number":"276","date":"20260920","wall_id":"276"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"457","name":"Rape","old_id":"857"},{"term_id":"503","name":"Power","old_id":"903"},{"term_id":"567","name":"Tamar","old_id":"967"},{"term_id":"600","name":"Women","old_id":"1000"}]},{"order":17,"id":"60659","color":"#f8ebe3","size":"2","name":"Tamar's Coat of Many Colors ","post_title":"Tamar's Coat Of Many Colors","slug":"tamars-coat-of-many-colors","old_id":"60659","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":41916,"post_title":"Sandra E. Rapoport","slug":"sandra-e-rapoport","old_id":"41916","first_name":"Sandra E. ","last_name":"Rapoport ","description":"Sandra E. Rapoport is an attorney, Bible teacher, and award-winning author whose books give voice to the women of the Bible. Her third book, Biblical Seductions, was a National Jewish Book Awards Finalist and a Boston Globe Top-Ten Bestseller. Her fourth and most recent book, The Queen & The Spymaster, is a novel based on the story of Esther.","short_description":"Sandra E. Rapoport is an attorney, Bible teacher, and award-winning author of four books on Bible and Midrash.\r\n\r\n","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":41917,"alt":"","title":"sandra rapoport","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sandra-rapoport.jpg","width":150,"height":175,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sandra-rapoport-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sandra-rapoport.jpg","medium-width":150,"medium-height":175,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sandra-rapoport.jpg","medium_large-width":150,"medium_large-height":175,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sandra-rapoport.jpg","large-width":150,"large-height":175,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sandra-rapoport.jpg","1536x1536-width":150,"1536x1536-height":175,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sandra-rapoport.jpg","2048x2048-width":150,"2048x2048-height":175,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sandra-rapoport.jpg","post_full_size-width":150,"post_full_size-height":175,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sandra-rapoport.jpg","home_baner-width":150,"home_baner-height":175}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"276","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"And when Tamar rends her royal tunic, symbolizing her lost honor and the violence done to her, she prefigures the future rending of the Davidic kingdom","post_main_content_content":"

      \"She was wearing a <\/span>kutonet passim<\/span><\/em>, for maiden princesses were customarily dressed in such robes. And his servant brought her outside, and barred the door after her. And Tamar put dust upon her head, and she rent the <\/span>kutonet passim<\/span><\/em> that she was wearing. She put her hands on her head as she walked about, crying aloud as she went.\"\u00a0 II Sam. 13:18\u201319.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      The tunic Tamar was wearing announced her royal and virgin status. A <\/span>kutonet passim<\/span><\/em> was a multi-colored, striped tunic or cloak that maiden princesses wore over their clothing. This finely flowing and identifiable garment functioned as both a badge and a shield, and bore an implicit warning: \u201cHere walks one of the king\u2019s beloved virgin daughters. Let no one molest her in any way, for she is under the protection of the king.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      We have encountered such a distinctive coat of many colors once before; the only other time such a garment is mentioned, in Genesis 37:3, when Jacob gives his beloved son, Joseph, a <\/span>kutonet passim<\/span><\/em>. Much has been written about Joseph's special cloak. It was a mark of Jacob\u2019s special love for the boy, his son from his beloved wife, Rachel. Jacob gifted the cloak to him because it was known in the ancient Near East as a princely garment. The cloak singled the boy out above his brothers and prompted envy and rage in them, and cockiness and braggadocio in Joseph himself.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Joseph\u2019s bloody and torn <\/span>kutonet passim<\/span><\/em> was the final proof that his brothers presented to their aged father to demonstrate unequivocally that their brother \u201cwas no longer.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      The <\/span>kutonet passim<\/span><\/i> links the Joseph and Tamar stories. In both stories the cloak is considered \u201croyal\u201d raiment, calculated to point out the wearer\u2019s favored status. In both stories the coats are torn, providing mute evidence of brutal violence perpetrated against the wearer. And in both stories the violence was done to the wearer by his or her siblings. Finally, in both stories the wearer is exiled or an outcast.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      After she is raped by her brother Amnon and thrown bodily out of Amnon's house, Tamar displays mourning and agony. She rubs dirt onto her head, crying out for her lost maiden self and for her lost future. She will never be a virgin bride; no Israelite man will wed her now; she may never bear children, never be a mother in Israel. She has been violated and shamed. With dust trickling down her face, she stands and grasping the neckline of her striped tunic -- the <\/span>kutonet passim<\/span><\/em> -- tears it apart in one pull. This, too, is an act of public mourning. In the words of the Malbim, she has been stripped of her honor as she now strips herself of her cloak.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      As the author of Samuel intended, when Tamar rends her royal tunic -- her <\/span>kutonet passim <\/span><\/em>-- <\/span><\/i>she is the Tanach's clarion voice, prefiguring the future rending of the Davidic kingdom.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      image: by Elisheva Horowitz courtesy of the artist (see her representation of Joseph's tunic here<\/a>).<\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":60821,"alt":"","title":"2sam13-tamar-elisheva 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Coat Of Many Colors","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"And when Tamar rends her royal tunic, symbolizing her lost honor and the violence done to her, she prefigures the future rending of the Davidic kingdom","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":60821,"alt":"","title":"2sam13-tamar-elisheva 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Samuel","chapter":"13","chapter_main_number":"276","date":"20260920","wall_id":"276"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"484","name":"Mourning","old_id":"884"},{"term_id":"523","name":"Joseph","old_id":"923"},{"term_id":"567","name":"Tamar","old_id":"967"},{"term_id":"576","name":"Clothes","old_id":"976"},{"term_id":"771","name":"Honor","old_id":"1171"}]},{"order":18,"id":"60568","color":"#f6f5de","size":"1","name":"Absalom\u2019s Return: Oedipal Struggle and Dynastic Succession\u00a0 ","post_title":"Absalom\u2019s Return: Oedipal Struggle and Dynastic Succession\u00a0","slug":"absaloms-return-oedipal-struggle-and-dynastic-succession","old_id":"60568","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":56443,"post_title":"Moshe Halbertal","slug":"moshe-halbertal","old_id":"56443","first_name":"Moshe ","last_name":"Halbertal ","description":"Prof. Moshe Halbertal is a professor of Jewish thought and philosophy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and a professor of law at New York University (NYU) and the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya. His latest book, co-authored with Stephen Holmes, The Beginning of Politics: Power in the Biblical Book of Samuel was published by Princeton University Press in 2017. Halbertal was the recipient of the Michael Bruno Memorial Award of the Rothschild Foundation and the Goldstein-Goren Book Award for the best book in Jewish thought in the years 1997 to 2000. In 2010, Halbertal was named a member of Israel\u2019s Academy for the Sciences and the Humanities.","short_description":"Prof. Moshe Halbertal is a professor of Jewish thought and philosophy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and a professor of law at New York University (NYU) and the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":56444,"alt":"","title":"Moshe-Halbertal","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/png","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Moshe-Halbertal.png","width":500,"height":500,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Moshe-Halbertal-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Moshe-Halbertal-300x300.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Moshe-Halbertal.png","medium_large-width":500,"medium_large-height":500,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Moshe-Halbertal.png","large-width":500,"large-height":500,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Moshe-Halbertal.png","1536x1536-width":500,"1536x1536-height":500,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Moshe-Halbertal.png","2048x2048-width":500,"2048x2048-height":500,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Moshe-Halbertal.png","post_full_size-width":500,"post_full_size-height":500,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Moshe-Halbertal-420x420.png","home_baner-width":420,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"277","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"The author critically examines the deep conflict between the logic of power and the logic of love","post_main_content_content":"

      Absalom\u2019s rebellion constitutes the longest narrative unit in the Book of Samuel. Through its detailed and complex structure, manifold characters and subplots, the author critically examines the deep conflict between the logic of power and the logic of love. In the dramatic events recounted in 2 Samuel 14-19, the price of sovereignty -- of striving to seize and keep it -- reached its most calamitous heights. In Absalom\u2019s rebellion against David, the family as a unit responsible for smoothly transferring sovereign power on the incumbent ruler\u2019s death ended up plunging Israel back into civil war. Within a relatively long stretch of six chapters, the author of the Book of Samuel meticulously lays out the relationship between this arguable oedipal struggle and the inner logic of dynastic succession. The first step in this devastating sequence was Absalom\u2019s return to Jerusalem from Geshur, where he has fled in forced exile after he had killed Amnon.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Absalom\u2019s return was initiated by Joab, who had been David\u2019s unswervingly loyal general all along. Within David\u2019s circle, Joab represents the voice of clearheaded and farseeing realpolitik. He therefore must have calculated that allowing Absalom to stay away from the court too long could become a source of trouble for David. Absalom should be brought back not only to appease him but also to keep him under surveillance. Otherwise, unmonitored in his banishment, the angry and ambitious prince, whose assassination of David\u2019s firstborn son could easily be interpreted as an attack on the king\u2019s own authority, might well begin to plot subversion while slowly developing a power base to help him carry it out. Joab also knew that despite David\u2019s wistful longing for Absalom, the king could not simply invite back to Jerusalem and rehabilitate the murderer of an heir to the throne. An indirect approach thus had to be fashioned to persuade David to allow Absalom\u2019s return. For this purpose, the savvy Joab enlisted a very wise woman from the village Tekoa, a few miles south of Jerusalem.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      She was sent by Joab to soften up the king and to elicit from him an authoritative verdict that could then be shrewdly recycled as an argument against the banishing of Absalom. It was a clever ploy and a masterful performance of personal persuasion by a gifted tragedienne, following Joab\u2019s script and extracting an explicit ruling sealed by an oath from a powerful yet initially hesitant sovereign. The ruling was elicited by her bold and iconic presentation of the unbearable price of relentlessly adhering to the revenge ethos within the family. The verdict might have been very different if presented in the abstract or by a less talented emissary.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Excerpts from The Beginning of Politics: Power in the Biblical Book of Samuel<\/em> \u2013 Moshe Halbertal and Stephen Holmes, Princeton University Press, 2017, pp. 118-119.<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":56668,"alt":"","title":"halbertal-book 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from:\u201cThe Beginning of Politics: Power in the Biblical Book of Samuel\u201d ","tile_main_caption":"Absalom\u2019s Return: Oedipal Struggle and Dynastic Succession\u00a0","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"The author critically examines the deep conflict between the logic of power and the logic of love","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":56668,"alt":"","title":"halbertal-book 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From 2011-16 he was Vice President for Research and Senior Economist at Energiya Global, a Jerusalem-based solar energy company focused on the developing world and he continues to consult on renewable energy and climate change preparedness. In 2014 he published together with Hazon, a translation of Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook's great work on shmitta, the Sabbatical year, \"Introduction to Shabbat Ha'aretz.\" Yedidya holds a BA from Oxford University, an MPA from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and lives with his family in Jerusalem.","short_description":"Yedidya Sinclair is a Jerusalem-based rabbi and economist, and is Senior Rabbinic Scholar at Hazon. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":36278,"alt":"","title":"yedidya sinclair","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","width":200,"height":200,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","medium-width":200,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","medium_large-width":200,"medium_large-height":200,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","large-width":200,"large-height":200,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","1536x1536-width":200,"1536x1536-height":200,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","2048x2048-width":200,"2048x2048-height":200,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","post_full_size-width":200,"post_full_size-height":200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","home_baner-width":200,"home_baner-height":200}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"278","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"People yearned for connection, and who could resist personal recognition?","post_main_content_content":"

      How could Absalom's rebellion against his father, the mighty and revered King David, have come so close to succeeding?<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Yes, we know about Absalom's good looks and glossy hair. We see him posing as a social justice warrior, promising to right all the wrongs of the kingdom if only he were appointed judge. We observe the skills through which he \"won away the hearts of the people of Israel\" (v.6) -\u00a0 as a flesh pressing, baby kissing populist, making every person he meets feel that he, Absalom, though a privileged scion of the royal house, feels their pain and frustration. But these factors, though invaluable to a rising politician, are external, and do not touch on the essential sources of Absalom's appeal.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      A fascinating comment by Rashi gives a deeper perspective. Verse 11 says that \"200 men of Jerusalem accompanied Absalom (when he went to Hebron to launch his revolt); they were invited and went in good faith, suspecting nothing.\" Commenting on these men's good faith and lack of suspicion, Rashi says, based on the Talmud Yerushalmi, Sotah (1:8) \"Absalom requested that his father write him a document that any two people that he request should go. He showed this document to two people, then to another two people and in this way, to many.\" Absalom implied to David that only two men would go with him; by recycling the document he enlisted 200.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Rashi's comment suggests that Absalom drew supporters by making individuals feel important. His first followers did not think they of themselves as an anonymous mob; they were honoured confederates, each asked individually to accompany Absalom on a special mission.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Even more importantly, this was not any old honour; it was a request that came, so they were led to believe, directly from the king. King David had latterly withdrawn from his people. He no longer went out to war at their head. The bible repeatedly uses the phrase \"and David sent,\" to describe his agency in this period, exercising power at arm's length through a web of intermediaries. And now regular men of Jerusalem were approached two at a time with a letter signed by the king himself requesting their aid. After years when David had become ever more remote from people, who could resist such personal recognition?<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Absalom's brilliance was to recognize this and to turn people's yearning for a renewed connection with David into a force that would nearly unseat him.<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":60642,"alt":"","title":"2sam15-populism","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism.jpg","width":1024,"height":601,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism-300x176.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":176,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism-768x451.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":451,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism-1024x601.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":601,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism.jpg","1536x1536-width":1024,"1536x1536-height":601,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism.jpg","2048x2048-width":1024,"2048x2048-height":601,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism.jpg","post_full_size-width":1024,"post_full_size-height":601,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism-716x420.jpg","home_baner-width":716,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Absalom The Populist","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"People yearned for connection, and who could resist personal recognition? \u00a0","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":60642,"alt":"","title":"2sam15-populism","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism.jpg","width":1024,"height":601,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism-300x176.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":176,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism-768x451.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":451,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism-1024x601.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":601,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism.jpg","1536x1536-width":1024,"1536x1536-height":601,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism.jpg","2048x2048-width":1024,"2048x2048-height":601,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism.jpg","post_full_size-width":1024,"post_full_size-height":601,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam15-populism-716x420.jpg","home_baner-width":716,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"15","chapter_main_number":"278","date":"20260922","wall_id":"278"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"423","name":"Politics","old_id":"823"},{"term_id":"503","name":"Power","old_id":"903"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"},{"term_id":"914","name":"Absalom","old_id":"1314"}]},{"order":20,"id":"60856","color":"#f2e9df","size":"1","name":"Was Absalom a Lannister? ","post_title":"Was Absalom A Lannister?","slug":"was-absalom-a-lannister","old_id":"60856","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":39058,"post_title":"Samuel Stern","slug":"samuel-stern","old_id":"39058","first_name":"Samuel ","last_name":"Stern ","description":"Samuel Stern is a fourth-year rabbinical student at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Los Angeles and has received an MA in Jewish Communal Service from Baltimore Hebrew Institute at Towson University and an MA in Hebrew Letters from HUC-JIR. He currently serves as the Rabbinic Intern of the Hillel at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. Prior to attending HUC, he had worked as a Youth Professional in synagogues for 8 years.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n","short_description":"Samuel Stern is a rabbinical student at HUC-JIR, and serves as the Rabbinic Intern of the Hillel at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. . ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":39059,"alt":"","title":"samuel stern","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/samuel-stern-e1535867738995.jpeg","width":460,"height":443,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/samuel-stern-e1535867738995-150x150.jpeg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/samuel-stern-e1535867738995-300x289.jpeg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":289,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/samuel-stern-768x740.jpeg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":740,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/samuel-stern-e1535867738995.jpeg","large-width":460,"large-height":443,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/samuel-stern-e1535867738995.jpeg","1536x1536-width":460,"1536x1536-height":443,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/samuel-stern-e1535867738995.jpeg","2048x2048-width":460,"2048x2048-height":443,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/samuel-stern-e1535867738995.jpeg","post_full_size-width":460,"post_full_size-height":443,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/samuel-stern-e1535867738995-436x420.jpeg","home_baner-width":436,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"281","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"And could Joab have acted differently and saved Absalom, from death and from himself?","post_main_content_content":"

      It\u2019s like something out of Game of Thrones. The rebellion shatters after a pivotal battle and the king\u2019s general murders the son of the king. Absalom meets an ignominious end as he is suspended from a terebinth and then once he is found he is stabbed and bludgeoned to death. Absalom may not have been destined through prophecy to be king, but we saw in him the potential to be a bridge-builder and an important figure. He was able to win over the leaders of Israel and Judah through a mixture of sympathy and cunning, showing political talent and leadership ability. He was willing to take counsel. The fall of Absalom is a tragedy, not because a person should cheer Absalom and his followers but because of the spoiled potential represented by Absalom.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      And what of Joab, the general who becomes the Pinchas of his generation? Indeed, much as the zealotry of Pinchas led to murder, so too did Joab\u2019s zealous support for David\u2019s claim lead him to murder the captive Absalom. Joab will remind David that Absalom stood against peace, but the wise course would have been to heed David\u2019s command and to bring the captive Absalom before David. Joab could have helped Absalom live up to his name (<\/span>avshalom - <\/span><\/i>\u201cfather of peace\u201d) if Absalom had been convinced to renounce his rebellion. Instead, the reign of David takes longer to stabilize.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      In dramatic storytelling Absalom\u2019s end is fitting, but what should we glean from this? That hubris leads to wasted potential, and that we all have a role to play in our lives. If we proceed in our dealings with others in a respectful way (both respectful of individuals and of the Torah), then we shall succeed in our endeavors.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      If not, we may just be caught up in a terebinth of our own without any way to move forward.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Image: <\/span>Absalom, by Albert Weisgerber, 1912 \/ wikimedia<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":60857,"alt":"","title":"2sam18-Absalom_Albert_Weisgerber","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam18-Absalom_Albert_Weisgerber.jpg","width":405,"height":500,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam18-Absalom_Albert_Weisgerber-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam18-Absalom_Albert_Weisgerber-243x300.jpg","medium-width":243,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam18-Absalom_Albert_Weisgerber.jpg","medium_large-width":405,"medium_large-height":500,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam18-Absalom_Albert_Weisgerber.jpg","large-width":405,"large-height":500,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam18-Absalom_Albert_Weisgerber.jpg","1536x1536-width":405,"1536x1536-height":500,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam18-Absalom_Albert_Weisgerber.jpg","2048x2048-width":405,"2048x2048-height":500,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam18-Absalom_Albert_Weisgerber.jpg","post_full_size-width":405,"post_full_size-height":500,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam18-Absalom_Albert_Weisgerber-340x420.jpg","home_baner-width":340,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Was 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Artson is married to Elana Shavit Artson, and they are the parents of twins, Shira and Jacob.\r\n","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"short_description":"Rabbi Dr Bradley Shavit Artson is the Dean of the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies and is Vice President of American Jewish University in Los Angeles.","link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":33993,"alt":"","title":"Rabbi Dr Bradley Shavit Artson","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/png","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Rabbi-Dr-Bradley-Shavit-Artson-e1532029361140.png","width":204,"height":199,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Rabbi-Dr-Bradley-Shavit-Artson-e1532029361140-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Rabbi-Dr-Bradley-Shavit-Artson-256x300.png","medium-width":256,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Rabbi-Dr-Bradley-Shavit-Artson-e1532029361140.png","medium_large-width":204,"medium_large-height":199,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Rabbi-Dr-Bradley-Shavit-Artson-e1532029361140.png","large-width":204,"large-height":199,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Rabbi-Dr-Bradley-Shavit-Artson-e1532029361140.png","1536x1536-width":204,"1536x1536-height":199,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Rabbi-Dr-Bradley-Shavit-Artson-e1532029361140.png","2048x2048-width":204,"2048x2048-height":199,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Rabbi-Dr-Bradley-Shavit-Artson-e1532029361140.png","post_full_size-width":204,"post_full_size-height":199,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/Rabbi-Dr-Bradley-Shavit-Artson-e1532029361140.png","home_baner-width":204,"home_baner-height":199}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"282","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"In crying out in anguish, he risks losing the very victory his forces gained","post_main_content_content":"

      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>\r\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>\r\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>\r\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>\r\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>\r\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>\r\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>\r\n

      image:\u00a0David mourning the death of Absalom, by Gustave Dor\u00e9, 1866\u00a0 \/ 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      In 2 Samuel David famously cries, \u201cAbsalom, Absalom!\u201d But when I read this book, I grieve for the women. For<\/span> Michal, who falls victim to men\u2019s political power<\/span><\/a>. For<\/span> Bathsheba, who suffers in silence<\/span><\/a>. For<\/span> Tamar, whose life ends where male entitlement begins<\/span><\/a>. For these women\u2014and for all of us\u2014I have dedicated this eight-part series to the women of 2 Samuel. Today I conclude this project with one of the book\u2019s most heartbreaking tales\u2014as faced by one of its most stalwart women\u2014Rizpah the mother.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      When we enter 2 Samuel 21, David\u2019s kingdom has been suffering a famine for three years. The remedy, David is told, is to hand over seven of Saul\u2019s sons to the Gibeonites to be sacrificed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      And the king took the two sons of Rizpah\u2026 whom she had born to Saul... and the five sons of Merab daughter of Saul\u2026 And he gave them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they impaled them on the hill before the LORD... And they were put to death in the first days of the harvest\u2026<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Focusing on the personal, 2 Samuel 21 tells the story of two mothers who lose every last one of their sons.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      And Rizpah\u2026 took sackcloth and [made a little tent for herself] from the beginning of the harvest till the waters poured down on them from the heavens, and she did not allow the fowl of the heavens to settle on them by day nor the beasts of the field by night.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Rizpah\u2019s sons were brutally murdered. Impaled and strung up for all to see. And when no one took their bodies down\u2014when the Gibeonites and David alike failed to honor the dead by interning their bodies\u2014Rizpah sat vigil. The grieving mother made herself a home on the hillside beneath her dead sons and stayed by their side, protecting them.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Biblical scholar Robert Alter points out that \u201cthe beginning of the barley harvest,\u201d when the murders took place, \u201cwould be in April. The bereaved Rizpah then watches over the corpses throughout the hot months of the summer, until the rains return\u2026 in the fall.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      From spring until fall, a mother sits beside the bodies of her murdered sons. Beneath their shadows, bearing the unimaginable weight of a mother\u2019s grief, she sits until she sees justice done for them.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Today, Rizpah might be<\/span> Sybrina Fulton dedicating her life to fighting for justice<\/span><\/a> after the senseless murder of her son Trayvon Martin. She could be any mother who lost her child to gun violence, to police brutality or homophobia, to forced separations at the hands of ICE. In the wake of the greatest loss a mother can experience\u2014and amidst unimaginable suffering\u2014Rizpah was at once a tragic figure and a hero, her mother\u2019s love quietly proving to be the most powerful force in a book about men\u2019s power.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

       <\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":61050,"alt":"","title":"2sam21-grief","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief.jpg","width":1440,"height":1920,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-225x300.jpg","medium-width":225,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-768x1024.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":1024,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-768x1024.jpg","large-width":768,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief.jpg","1536x1536-width":1152,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief.jpg","2048x2048-width":1440,"2048x2048-height":1920,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-900x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":900,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-315x420.jpg","home_baner-width":315,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"To Suffer A Mother\u2019s Grief","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"And to prove a mother\u2019s love to be the most powerful force in a book about men\u2019s power","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":61050,"alt":"","title":"2sam21-grief","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief.jpg","width":1440,"height":1920,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-225x300.jpg","medium-width":225,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-768x1024.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":1024,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-768x1024.jpg","large-width":768,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief.jpg","1536x1536-width":1152,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief.jpg","2048x2048-width":1440,"2048x2048-height":1920,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-900x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":900,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam21-grief-315x420.jpg","home_baner-width":315,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"21","chapter_main_number":"284","date":"20260930","wall_id":"284"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"381","name":"love","old_id":"781"},{"term_id":"484","name":"Mourning","old_id":"884"},{"term_id":"503","name":"Power","old_id":"903"},{"term_id":"604","name":"Mothers","old_id":"1004"},{"term_id":"700","name":"Grief","old_id":"1100"}]},{"order":23,"id":"61035","color":"#faeed8","size":"1","name":"A Story Of Multiple Covenants ","post_title":"A Story Of Multiple Covenants","slug":"a-story-of-multiple-covenants","old_id":"61035","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":60873,"post_title":"Rori Picker Neiss","slug":"rori-picker-neiss","old_id":"60873","first_name":"Rori Picker ","last_name":"Neiss ","description":"Maharat Rori Picker Neiss serves as the Executive Director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of St Louis. 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","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":60874,"alt":"","title":"rory picker neiss","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/rory-picker-neiss.jpg","width":2400,"height":3000,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/rory-picker-neiss-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/rory-picker-neiss-240x300.jpg","medium-width":240,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/rory-picker-neiss-768x960.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":960,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/rory-picker-neiss-819x1024.jpg","large-width":819,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/rory-picker-neiss.jpg","1536x1536-width":1229,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/rory-picker-neiss.jpg","2048x2048-width":1638,"2048x2048-height":2048,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/rory-picker-neiss-960x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":960,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/rory-picker-neiss-336x420.jpg","home_baner-width":336,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"284","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Covenants that endure despite foundations of deceit, beyond individual lives, that take into account both faults and afflictions","post_main_content_content":"

      The famine seems to come out of nowhere.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      David, after three years of seeking the cause of this tribulation, turns to God to inquire. And God tells him, \u201cIt is on account of Saul and on account of his blood-stained house; it is because he put the Gibeonites to death.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Rashi expounds upon this answer. <\/span>On account of Saul<\/span><\/i>, he states, who sinned and who was buried secretly and thus not eulogized with the respect due to him. <\/span>On account of his bloody house<\/span><\/i>, because he wiped out Nob, city of priests. And <\/span>because he put the Gibeonites to<\/span><\/i> death<\/span><\/i>, that when he wiped out the city of Nob he killed seven people from among the Gibeonites.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Our story then actually begins in Joshua chapter 9. The people of Gibeon, appearing destitute, approached Joshua and proclaimed themselves to be foreigners, offering themselves as servants in exchange for a pact to spare their lives. Joshua agreed. Yet, the people soon learned that the Gibeonites were not actually from a distant country but were among their neighbors that they had set out to conquer. Nevertheless, the leaders of the community honored their treaty\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Saul, hundreds of years later, then violated this pact. While the text itself never tells the story explicitly, the verse, in referencing it here, tells us that it was in his zeal for the people of Israel and Judah that Saul sought to wipe out the Gibeonites.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      David seeks to appease the Gibeonites and asks them what he can do to make expiation for the sin of Saul. The people claim that they want nothing but seven of Saul\u2019s descendants. An eye for an eye, it seems. David gives them over and the Gibeonites impale Saul\u2019s descendants on stakes.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      And yet, David does not give all of Saul\u2019s immediate descendants. The text explicitly points out that he spares Mephiboshet because of David\u2019s covenant with his father, Jonathan (I Samuel 20).<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      However, the appeasement of the Gibeonites alone is not sufficient to end the famine. It is only when David properly buries the remains of Saul and Jonathan that God heeds the plea of the land. God, in allowing retribution for the sin of Saul, also demands redress for the injustice done against Saul.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      And so we have a story of covenants: covenants that endure despite foundations of deceit, covenants that endure beyond the lives of those who sealed them, and covenants that persist despite factors some might assume to be grounds for termination. And the story of a God who can recognize one\u2019s merits amidst one\u2019s failings, hold simultaneously one\u2019s faults and one\u2019s afflictions, and not only not allow one to cancel the other, but to seek remedy for both.<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":51917,"alt":"","title":"dt29-covenant","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant.jpg","width":1600,"height":900,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-300x169.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":169,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-768x432.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":432,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-1024x576.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":576,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":864,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant.jpg","2048x2048-width":1600,"2048x2048-height":900,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-1200x675.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":675,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-747x420.jpg","home_baner-width":747,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"A Story Of Multiple Covenants","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Covenants that endure despite foundations of deceit, beyond individual lives, that take into account both faults and afflictions","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":51917,"alt":"","title":"dt29-covenant","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant.jpg","width":1600,"height":900,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-300x169.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":169,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-768x432.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":432,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-1024x576.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":576,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":864,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant.jpg","2048x2048-width":1600,"2048x2048-height":900,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-1200x675.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":675,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/dt29-covenant-747x420.jpg","home_baner-width":747,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"21","chapter_main_number":"284","date":"20260930","wall_id":"284"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"395","name":"Covenant","old_id":"795"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"},{"term_id":"885","name":"Saul","old_id":"1285"}]},{"order":24,"id":"61284","color":"#effaea","size":"1","name":"A Census Can Be A Controversial Thing- Then And Now ","post_title":"A Census Can Be A Controversial Thing- Then And Now","slug":"a-census-can-be-a-controversial-thing-then-and-now","old_id":"61284","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":60755,"post_title":"Katja Vehlow","slug":"katja-vehlow","old_id":"60755","first_name":"Katja ","last_name":"Vehlow ","description":"Dr. Katja Vehlow is a rabbinical student at JTS in New York City. 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      God\u2019s anger, usually directed against David\u2019s enemies, is a prominent theme in Samuel. In today\u2019s chapter, David surfaces both as an object and an instrument of this divine ire when he carries out a census, ostensibly a sensible act at a time of constant warfare. Not everybody agrees with David\u2019s assessment, though. Joab, the very man who had sent Uriah, Bathsheba\u2019s husband into certain death on the battlefield, objects immediately: \u201cMay God increase the number of the people a hundredfold, while your own eyes see it! But why should my lord King want this?\u201d (3)<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      So why would God first tell David to do something, only to then punish him for the very act? In contrast to other divine retributions, here, God\u2019s ire is not even the result of one of David\u2019s many missteps. So, what is this? Is this a test, a moment where David is given free rein to make the right decision, and fails? Or, writing from the US where aspects of next year\u2019s national census are bitterly disputed, is the very idea of a census dangerous? Perhaps this episode, and Joab\u2019s warning, cautions us to not reduce humans to numbers, or to their legal status. Instead of assessing the potential size of his military, the army commander Joab implies, David should focus on the reasons for the census (that are not given in the text).<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Rashi confesses that he, too, is unsure what this means, and Radak notes the dilemma David finds himself in, pointing to the parallel text in Chronicles where it is Satan who incites David to carry out the census. But the key for understanding God\u2019s acts in Samuel, I think, lies in the punishments themselves. Famine, flight, or pestilence, the choices given to David as tools of penitence are all events in which his own strength, and that of the armies whose future might the census just asserted, would be useless.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      This, then, is the lesson for David, one that reverberates through so much of Tanakh: to rely on God, and God alone. One might think that David had learned this lesson earlier, ideally when God chose him, the youngest and least powerful son, to be king. But David, throughout his lifetime, is at the same time a spectacularly successful and frequently stumbling king, one who keeps making mistakes. Perhaps, if David had heeded the lessons doled out to him throughout his life, he might have been able to act according to the values they imparted.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

      Of course, God\u2019s acts here remain puzzling and are ultimately unknowable in our world. But this chapter reminds us that living with a divine presence in our lives means that day after day, we are called to examine our values, and to act accordingly.<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":61285,"alt":"","title":"2sam24-census","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census.jpg","width":800,"height":549,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census-300x206.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":206,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census-768x527.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":527,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census.jpg","large-width":800,"large-height":549,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census.jpg","1536x1536-width":800,"1536x1536-height":549,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census.jpg","2048x2048-width":800,"2048x2048-height":549,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census.jpg","post_full_size-width":800,"post_full_size-height":549,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census-612x420.jpg","home_baner-width":612,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"A Census Can Be A Controversial Thing- Then And Now","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Many people can be hurt","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":61285,"alt":"","title":"2sam24-census","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census.jpg","width":800,"height":549,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census-300x206.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":206,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census-768x527.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":527,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census.jpg","large-width":800,"large-height":549,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census.jpg","1536x1536-width":800,"1536x1536-height":549,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census.jpg","2048x2048-width":800,"2048x2048-height":549,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census.jpg","post_full_size-width":800,"post_full_size-height":549,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/2sam24-census-612x420.jpg","home_baner-width":612,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"II Samuel","chapter":"24","chapter_main_number":"287","date":"20261005","wall_id":"287"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"366","name":"Commentators","old_id":"766"},{"term_id":"384","name":"God","old_id":"784"},{"term_id":"689","name":"Census","old_id":"1089"},{"term_id":"834","name":"David","old_id":"1234"}]}],"chapter":"","chapter_main_number":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wall\/60979"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wall"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/wall"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60979"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}