The Mysterious Childhood of King David - Unknown Facts

 

KING DAVID'S CHILDHOOD

We see in the book of psalms by David, few chapters were written with lot of depression & calling for help.  Have we ever thought about it what could be the situation behind it? Why it is always King David feel so alone, so disgraced, and so undeserving of love and friendship?

We don’t have a proper scriptures on David’s childhood in the Bible but history has it, that he was born under controversial circumstances. From historical source, we now know that he was born to Jesse by his wife Nitzevet, a name which is not mentioned in the Bible but which nevertheless was real.

Jesse (Yishai) who has served as the head of the Sanhedrin (supreme court of Torah law), and one of the most notable leaders of his generation. At a stage in his life, he came to realize that, he was not qualified to marry Nitzevet since she was not from the same tradition. As a member of the judiciary, he believed that he had the moral duty to redress the situation even though she had been in the marriage for many years and had been blessed with children. Based on this, he decided to do restitution and hence, he was separated from Nitzevet.

Jesse had a housemaid within the same tradition who was eligible to have a relationship. He, therefore, planned to marry her and she readily agreed. However, the maid had a soft spot towards Nitzevet and sympathized for her difficulties that she was going through. Hence she collaborated with Nitzevet to switch place with her for a night and Nitzevet became pregnant but she covered the fact from her husband and the community, to avoid humiliating him.

When the husband and the other children became aware of the pregnancy, they thought she had committed adultery, an offense that was punishable by death. But Jesse intervened for her and thus saved her life even without knowing that he was responsible for the pregnancy. However, the family began to treat  her with disregard and decided to make the coming child an exile(Outsider). That child was David.

David bought up as an individual. Until he was 28 years old, he suffered innocently over the troubles imposed on him by forces, beyond his control. In the course of time, David wrote Psalm 69 to describe his terrible condition. As we see, mentioned in Psalms 69:20

Insults have broken my heart

and has left me helpless;

I looked for sympathy, but there was none,

for comforters, but I found none

“This psalm describes the life of a poor, despised and lowly individual, who lacks even a single friend to comfort him. It is the voice of a distressed soul who has experienced untold humiliation and disgrace. Through no apparent cause of his own, he is surrounded by enemies who wish to cut him down; even his own brothers are strangers to him, ravaging and reviling him . . . .”

 Also it seems that, David was not permitted to eat with the rest of his family like his brothers do and he was not supposed to be called as the son of Jesse, In fact he was assigned to a separate table in the corner. He was given the task of shepherd because ‘they hoped that a wild beast would come and kill him while he was performing his duties,’ and for this reason was sent to pasture in dangerous areas full of lions and bears.

David himself testified to this when on getting to the battlefield, his daring request to be allowed to face Goliath was being rejected by king Saul. He had declared that: “I take care of my father’s sheep. Whenever a lion or a bear carries off a lamb, I go after it, attack it, and rescue the lamb. And if the lion or bear turns on me, I grab it by the throat and beat it to death. I have killed lions and bears, and I will do the same to this heathen Philistine, who has defied the army of the living God. The Lord has saved me from lions and bears; he will save me from this Philistine.” (1 Sam. 17.34-37)

Moral : 

Similarly, we go through many challenges every day, we feel alone, rejected, disgraced, and undeserving of love and friendship and also some trails and difficulties which are beyond our control.

We go through many insults and people may hurt us & leave us at the point of time we would need them. But let’s believe in God, who has proved that “NOTHING IS IMPOSSIBLE FROM HIM” and also fulfilled the promise did with us "I WILL NEVER LEAVE YOU NOR FORSAKE YOU” Hebrews 13:5.