The Jealousy of the King

In the initial verses of 1 Samuel 18, the author skips ahead to show how the victory over Goliath yields a number of very positive results for David. Now he backtracks to show his readers one important result that is not so pleasant, but which is yet part of God’s plan to mold David into the prototypical Israelite king.

As Saul, David, and the Israelite armies return from the battle, they are greeted by women singing about the Israelite triumph. In their song, the women take some poetic license, exaggerating both David’s and Saul’s contribution, but David’s more so, since he is the hero of the moment. Saul, the women say, killed thousands of Philistines, but David killed ten thousands. This praise for David does not please Saul, who sees this young man stealing away the affections of his subjects.

The words thousands and ten thousands are used numerous times in Scripture to make comparisons (see Pss. 91:7; 144:13; Mic. 6:7). One very interesting use occurs in Deuteronomy 33:17, where Moses, in his final blessing, speaks of the thousands of Manasseh and the ten thousands of Ephraim. The tribe of Ephraim was actually smaller than Manasseh at the time (Num. 26:34, 37), but it was destined to be the larger and more important of the two (Gen. 48:17–20). Unfortunately, their preferment in Jacob’s prophecy apparently caused the men of Ephraim to have an inflated sense of their importance (Judg. 8:1–3; 12:1–6). David, it seems, never falls into this trap, though he surely hears the women’s song. But Saul already has an inflated sense of his worth, and so the song of the women offends him.

From this day forward, Saul is suspicious of David and begins to work clandestinely against him. The next day, Saul suffers from “the distressing spirit from God,” and David humbly takes up his former role of playing the harp to soothe the king. But Saul, in his madness, tries to kill David. When David twice escapes, Saul grows fearful of him, understanding on some level that while God has departed from him, He is with David. He then demotes David to command of a small military unit, perhaps to get him out of the public eye, perhaps hoping that he will die in battle. But David’s wise behavior and the obvious blessing of God only increase the people’s adulation. Thus, king and people are increasingly divergent on their opinion of David.