Thursday, April 22, 2004
2 Samuel 6 – Dancing
[Note - I took over a week to prepare this post. Part of that was simply a "vacation" from blogging, but part was that I found this story, like so much that has to do with David to be extremely complex. He is not an easy nor a simple man. I hold the Scripture in high regard, and so it seems important to honor the complexity of the stories we read and not reduce them to easy moral platitudes. In this case, I needed extra time just to "sit" with the story. Nevertheless, it remains my goal to blog daily, or close to it.]
David sets out to bring the Ark of the Lord to Jerusalem from its current resting place in Baale-judah.(6:2)
This chapter is charged with emotion. As the ark starts on its journey, David joined the others in "dancing before the Lord with all their might." (6:5) But when Uzzah tried to steady the ark, "the anger of the Lord was kindled" and God killed him (6:7); This caused David to be angry at God (6:8); but he was also afraid (6:9); so he left the ark in the care of Obed-edom (6:10) When he heard that God was blessing Obed-edom, David decided he wanted the ark after all, and caused the ark to be brought to Jerusalem. Again David goes before the Lord, dancing "with all his might" (6:14); Michal (who once loved David (1 Sam. 18:20) now despised him (6:16) and made fun of him for "leaping and dancing" (6:16) and, as she said:
2 Samuel 6:20 "uncovering himself today before the eyes of his servants' maids, as any vulgar fellow might shamelessly uncover himself!"
The chapter concludes with the word of judgment: "And Michal the daughter of Saul had no child to the day of her death." (2 Samuel 6:23)
Both David and Michal act with greater complexity than is often reflected in sermons about this event. David is not simply the unaffected lover of God. He is the lover of God, but he is also angry with God and afraid of God. Sermons need to be preached about this, and, recognition that David's love of God is at least in part self-interested. And sermons might also recognize that Michal is not simply the callous shrew seeking status. She is also someone who has been deeply wounded by this extravagant, pious, and sometimes heartless lover of God who is her husband.
The story of David and Michal deserves to be told in full. Michal was in spirit like her brother Jonathan. They both loved David deeply, despite their father, Saul, who both loved and fear and hatred him. Both Jonathan and Michal risked their lives for David. Whether out of love or to gain status, David had married Michal, but when David went into exile in the wilderness before Saul died, Saul gave Michal "to Palti, son of Laish, who was from Galim." (1 Sam. 25:44) and David proceeded to marry Abigail. When David became king of the southern kingdom in Hebron and was negotiating with Abner for the loyalty of the northern kingdom of Israel, the one condition he named was the return of Michal. Was this from love? More likely, David wished to cement his claim of the united kingdom as the successor to the throne of Saul, Michal's father. Michal’s forced separation from her husband was heart wrenching:
2 Samuel 3:15 Ishbaal [Saul's son, the king of Israel] sent and took her from her husband Paltiel the son of Laish. 16 But her husband went with her, weeping as he walked behind her all the way to Bahurim. Then Abner said to him, "Go back home!" So he went back.
How Michal reacted is unreported. That is the last we hear of either Paltiel or Michal before her bitter comments over David's dancing. She had cause to be bitter.
It may also be significant that, other than this occasion of David's dancing before the ark, the only other significant mention of dancing before the Lord in the Bible is the story of Miriam dancing with the women after God's victory over Pharoah at the Red Sea (Exo 15:20). David was doing something strange, something Michal probably thought appropriate for women and not men.
I don't write this to defend Michal or to put down David. But it is important to realize that Michal had reason to fail to see David's celebration of God for what it was. It is also salutary to realize that David's genuine reverence for God failed to give him a heart of compassion for his first wife. It is with admiration for David’s stance of humility before God mixed with pity for Michal and regret that David failed to show more with love for her that I read David's words to Michal:
2 Samuel 6:21 "It was before the LORD, who chose me in place of your father and all his household, to appoint me as prince over Israel, the people of the LORD, that I have danced before the LORD. 22 I will make myself yet more contemptible than this, and I will be abased in my own eyes; but by the maids of whom you have spoken, by them I shall be held in honor."
May our love for God be as extravagant as David’s, but not at the cost of compassion for those companions whom God has given us.
David sets out to bring the Ark of the Lord to Jerusalem from its current resting place in Baale-judah.(6:2)
This chapter is charged with emotion. As the ark starts on its journey, David joined the others in "dancing before the Lord with all their might." (6:5) But when Uzzah tried to steady the ark, "the anger of the Lord was kindled" and God killed him (6:7); This caused David to be angry at God (6:8); but he was also afraid (6:9); so he left the ark in the care of Obed-edom (6:10) When he heard that God was blessing Obed-edom, David decided he wanted the ark after all, and caused the ark to be brought to Jerusalem. Again David goes before the Lord, dancing "with all his might" (6:14); Michal (who once loved David (1 Sam. 18:20) now despised him (6:16) and made fun of him for "leaping and dancing" (6:16) and, as she said:
2 Samuel 6:20 "uncovering himself today before the eyes of his servants' maids, as any vulgar fellow might shamelessly uncover himself!"
The chapter concludes with the word of judgment: "And Michal the daughter of Saul had no child to the day of her death." (2 Samuel 6:23)
Both David and Michal act with greater complexity than is often reflected in sermons about this event. David is not simply the unaffected lover of God. He is the lover of God, but he is also angry with God and afraid of God. Sermons need to be preached about this, and, recognition that David's love of God is at least in part self-interested. And sermons might also recognize that Michal is not simply the callous shrew seeking status. She is also someone who has been deeply wounded by this extravagant, pious, and sometimes heartless lover of God who is her husband.
The story of David and Michal deserves to be told in full. Michal was in spirit like her brother Jonathan. They both loved David deeply, despite their father, Saul, who both loved and fear and hatred him. Both Jonathan and Michal risked their lives for David. Whether out of love or to gain status, David had married Michal, but when David went into exile in the wilderness before Saul died, Saul gave Michal "to Palti, son of Laish, who was from Galim." (1 Sam. 25:44) and David proceeded to marry Abigail. When David became king of the southern kingdom in Hebron and was negotiating with Abner for the loyalty of the northern kingdom of Israel, the one condition he named was the return of Michal. Was this from love? More likely, David wished to cement his claim of the united kingdom as the successor to the throne of Saul, Michal's father. Michal’s forced separation from her husband was heart wrenching:
2 Samuel 3:15 Ishbaal [Saul's son, the king of Israel] sent and took her from her husband Paltiel the son of Laish. 16 But her husband went with her, weeping as he walked behind her all the way to Bahurim. Then Abner said to him, "Go back home!" So he went back.
How Michal reacted is unreported. That is the last we hear of either Paltiel or Michal before her bitter comments over David's dancing. She had cause to be bitter.
It may also be significant that, other than this occasion of David's dancing before the ark, the only other significant mention of dancing before the Lord in the Bible is the story of Miriam dancing with the women after God's victory over Pharoah at the Red Sea (Exo 15:20). David was doing something strange, something Michal probably thought appropriate for women and not men.
I don't write this to defend Michal or to put down David. But it is important to realize that Michal had reason to fail to see David's celebration of God for what it was. It is also salutary to realize that David's genuine reverence for God failed to give him a heart of compassion for his first wife. It is with admiration for David’s stance of humility before God mixed with pity for Michal and regret that David failed to show more with love for her that I read David's words to Michal:
2 Samuel 6:21 "It was before the LORD, who chose me in place of your father and all his household, to appoint me as prince over Israel, the people of the LORD, that I have danced before the LORD. 22 I will make myself yet more contemptible than this, and I will be abased in my own eyes; but by the maids of whom you have spoken, by them I shall be held in honor."
May our love for God be as extravagant as David’s, but not at the cost of compassion for those companions whom God has given us.
