own household. The three eldest of his sons, Amnon, Chileab, and Absalom being dead, the fourth-ADONIJAH -resolved to put forth his pretensions to the kingdom. Like Absalom, whom he resembled in personal beauty, he began by surrounding himself with chariots and horsemen, and succeeded in drawing over to his side not only the high-priest Abiathar, but even Joab, the commander-in-chief, whose loyalty at last wavered. Confident in the support of such old servants of the king, the pretender proclaimed a great sacrificial festival at the Stone of Zoheleth, south of Jerusalem, near the fountain of En-rogel, and invited to it all the royal princes, except Solomon, and not a few of the captains of the royal army (1 K. i. 5—9). While they assembled at Zoheleth, Nathan the prophet persuaded Bath-sheba to seek an interview with the king, and inform him of what was going on. Bathsheba did so, and had hardly concluded her tale, when Nathan himself entered, confirmed her account, and demanded to know whether Adonijah's actions had the royal approval. Though old and feeble, David had sufficient energy to rise to the present emergency, and solemnly assured Bath-sheba of his unalterable determination that Solomon should succeed to the throne. Then summoning Zadok and Benaiah he bade them, together with Nathan, convey Solomon in state down to Gihon, and there formally anoint and proclaim him king. Accordingly these officers, accompanied by the royal guards, escorted Solomon thither, mounted on the royal mule (1 K. i. 38), and there Zadok anointed him with oil from the sacred horn of the Tabernacle, amidst the sound of trumpets and loud shouts of God save the King. Thence the new monarch was escorted in triumph back through the city, and sat on the royal throne amidst general applause, in the sight of his aged father, who blessed God that during his own lifetime he had been permitted to behold his successor (1 K. i. 45—48). Intelligence of these transactions was conveyed to the conspirators, in the midst of their festivities at En-rogel, by Jonathan the son of Abiathar. They had already heard the noise of the people shouting as Solomon passed in procession through the city, and no sooner learnt the cause than, seized with alarm, they instantly dispersed, and every man went his way (1 K. i. 49). Dreading the vengeance of the new king, Adonijah now fled to the Tabernacle, put himself in sanctuary by grasping the horns of the altar, and refused to quit the spot till Solomon had promised with an oath to spare his life. The young and politic monarch, on being informed of this, abstained from binding himself by any oath, and simply assured Adonijah of safety so long as he shewed himself a worthy man, but threatened him with death, if wickedness should be found in him (1 K. i. 49—52). On these conditions he quitted his place of refuge, and, having made obeisance to the new king, returned to the privacy of his own house (1 K. i. 53). The days of David were now rapidly drawing to a close. He therefore convened a solemn assembly of all the chiefs and elders of his people, the royal princes, the captains of his army, and his public officers, and standing up, aged as he was, gave them his last charge, and exhorted his son to constancy in the service of Jehovah. He then solemnly delegated to him the accomplishment of the desire of his life, the erection of the Temple, and committed to him in trust the abundant materials he had amassed for this purpose, as well as a pattern of the building, and of everything belonging to it. This address, confirmed as it was by the sight of the gold and silver, the brass and iron and precious stones, which the royal prudence had collected, had a great effect upon the people, and they also joyfully contributed to the execution of their sovereign's design. Then, in language of unequalled pathos and beauty, the aged monarch solemnly thanked God for all His goodness, and prayed that He would bestow upon his son "a perfect heart," enabling him to keep His testimonies and statutes, and build the Temple for which he had made provision, Amidst sacrifices of unusual abundance and great feastings and rejoicings, Solomon was then for the second time anointed king, and received the formal submission of all the royal princes, and the chiefs of the nation. In another and more secret interview David gave his son his last counsels, not only concerning his own deportment as ruler, but also respecting Joab and Shimei, who were committed to his vigilance, and Barzillai the Gileadite, who was entrusted to his regard. Then after a reign of 7 years at Hebron, and of 33 years at Jerusalem, in a good old age, full of years, riches, and honour, the son of Jesse, the Shepherd, the Warrior, the King, the Psalmist, was gathered to his fathers, and buried in the city which had been once the fortress of the heathen Jebusites, but was now the capital of an empire that realised the loftiest ideal of prophecy, stretching from the "river of Egypt" to the Euphrates, and from the range of Lebanon to the gulf of Akaba1. 1 The life of David admits of a fivefold division. (i) His shepherd life at Bethlehem; (ii) His courtier life with Saul at Gibeah; (iii) His life as an outlaw; (iv) His Kingly life at Hebron during 73 years, and (v) at Jerusalem during 33 years, in all 40. His history will be ever memorable, whether we regard the work he achieved, or his own personal character. (i) His work. "He had succeeded to a kingdom distracted with civil dissension, environed on every side, or occupied by powerful and victorious enemies, without a capital, almost without an army, without any bond of union between the tribes. He left a compact and united state, stretching from the frontier of Egypt to the foot of Lebanon, from the Euphrates to the He had crushed the power of the Philistines, subdued sea. CHAPTER VI. ACCESSION OF SOLOMON. 1 KINGS II.-VIII. I CHRON. I.-IX. B. C. 1015. THE THE new king was hardly seated on the throne before he was called upon to repress with a high or curbed all the adjacent kingdoms; he had formed a lasting and important alliance with the great city of Tyre. He had organized an immense disposable force: every month 24,000 men, furnished in rotation by the tribes, appeared in arms, and were trained as the standing militia of the country. At the head of his army were officers of consummate experience, and, what was more highly esteemed in the warfare of the time, of extraordinary personal activity, strength, and valour*.” He had also given especial attention to the management of public worship, as the most efficacious means of promoting religion and morality, and, consequently, obedience to the Invisible, Supreme Monarch. The solemn transfer of the Ark of the Covenant, at which almost all the people were present, had made a deep impression on their minds, and had awakened them to a sincere adoration of Jehovah. These favourable dispositions he had upheld and strengthened by suitable regu. lations in the service of the priests and Levites, and especially by the instructive and animating Psalms, which were com posed partly by himself, and partly by other poets and prophets. "In comparison with the hymns of David, the sacred poetry of all other nations sinks into mediocrity. They have embodied so exquisitely the universal language of religious emotion that they have entered, with unquestioned propriety, into the ritual of the holier and more perfect religion of Christ. The songs which cheered the solitudes of the desert caves of Engedi, or resounded from the voice of the Hebrew people as they wound along the glens or the hill-sides of Judea, have been repeated for ages in almost every part of the habitable world, in the remotest islands of the ocean, among the forests of America or the sands of Africa ‡." (ii) His character. Obedience to the Divine commands * Milman's History of the Jews, I. 305. hand a second and dangerous attempt of Adonijah to obtain the kingdom. As is usual in Oriental countries, the influence of Bath-sheba the queen-mother was very 66 was ever with David the axiom of his life, and in every step he took he shewed the greatest anxiety to act as God's servant (2 Sam. ii. 1; 1 Sam. xxiii. 2, 4). All deliverance from danger, and all victories from first to last, he ascribed to the Divine aid, and neither in the hour of danger, nor the more trying hour of prosperity, did he go after "strange gods," or introduce any idolatrous rites. It was, probably, to this feature of his administration that God referred, when He described him as a man after His own heart (1 Sam. xiii. 14, Comp. Acts xiii. 22), rather than to his private virtues. And yet these were of no mean order. Shepherd, soldier, poet, king, the romantic friend, the chivalrous leader, the devoted father," he was eminent alike for his exalted piety, and his noble patriotism. "During a war of seven years he never lifted his sword against a subject, and at the end of it he punished no rebels, and remembered no offence but the mur. der of his rival (2 Sam. iv. 10-12)." The adultery with Bath-sheba, the murder of Uriah, the numbering of the people, with a view, probably, to foreign conquests, are the deep blots on his fame, and the chief instances in which he forgot alike himself and his God. "And yet when we look at the piety of his youth, the depth of his contrition, the strength of his faith, the fervour of his devotion, the loftiness and variety of his genius, the largeness and warmth of his heart, his eminent valour in any age of warriors, his justice and wisdom as a ruler, and, above all, his adherence to the worship and will of God, we may well regard him as a model of kingly authority and spiritual obedience"." Moreover, not only was he the ancestor of Christ after the flesh, not only was the blessing of the Promise expressly transferred to his family, but in his humiliation and exaltation, as the king of the people of God, and as the vanquisher of heathen nations, he was a type of HIM whose coming he foretold in many of the Psalms, and who is not called the son of Abraham, or of Jacob, or of Moses, but the "Son of David." Kurtz's Sacred History, p. 189; Article David, in Smith s Bib, Dict. Angus, Bible Handbook, p. 437; Jahn's Hebrew Commonwealth, p. 76; Chandler's Life of David, pp. 582-587. |