2 Samuel 14:1

ABSALOM FORGIVEN AND BROUGHT BACK TO JERUSALEM

This chapter and through 2 Samuel 19 relate the tragic account of Absalom's rebellion against David, which ended in Joab's killing the evil rebel as he hung by that gorgeous head of hair tangled in the branches of a tree. Following his murder of Amnon, Absalom had fled to Geshur where he remained three years, and King David would have done very well to let him rot in Geshur, but one of the weaknesses of the great king was his sentimental attachment to his children, whose sins he would not punish and whose lives he refused to discipline. Joab detected the longing in David's heart for the return of Absalom and actually achieved it by the ruse described in this chapter.

JOAB ENLISTED THE HELP OF A WOMAN OF TEKOA

"Now Joab the son of Zeruiah perceived that the king's heart went out to Absalom. And Joab went to Tekoa, and fetched from there a wise woman, and said to her, "Pretend to be a mourner, and put on mourning garments; do not anoint yourself with oil, but behave like a woman who has been mourning many days for the dead; and go to the king, and speak to him." So Joab put the words in her mouth."

Joab's motivation here was very likely personal. "Absalom had the best prospect of succeeding David to the throne; and Joab thought that this action on his part would be the best way to secure himself against the punishment which he deserved for the murder of Abner."[1] Joab's procedure was similar to that of Nathan who brought before David an alleged court case, but which was actually a parable. A significant fact which emerges here is that any wronged person in the entire kingdom had the right to appeal to the king himself for judgment.

"The king's heart went out to Absalom" (2 Samuel 14:1). The KJV reads, "The king's heart went out toward Absalom," but, "The proposition here does not really mean either TO or TOWARD, but AGAINST, and it is so rendered in 2 Samuel 14:13."[2] Furthermore, David's refusal to see Absalom's face for two whole years after his return to Jerusalem is very difficult to reconcile with the common translations of this verse.

"Joab sent to Tekoa" (2 Samuel 14:2). "Tekoa is the modern Khirbet Taqua about ten miles south of Jerusalem. Since Joab was reared near Tekoa, he probably knew the wise woman whom he asked to help him, at least by reputation."[3] Tekoa was famous as the residence of the great prophet Amos.

"Pretend to be a mourner" (2 Samuel 14:2). Adam Clarke believed that, "The principal facts in the wise woman's story could have been real and that Joab found a person whose circumstances conformed to that which he wished to present."[4] Such opinions appear to be unacceptable because of Joab's instructions to the woman that she should PRETEND to be a mourner. We believe that her entire story was a clever fabrication.