Week 13 2 Samuel
The last chapter of 2 Samuel tells a story about David’s national military census.
For some unexplained reason he shouldn’t have done it.
But I don’t waste time wondering why it was wrong because today I’m looking at what prompted it: the anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and it incited David against them to say, “Go, number Israel and Judah”.
But then there’s a cross-reference to the same story in Chronicles: then Satan stood up against Israel and moved David to number Israel. So Israel had done some unnamed evil that angered the Lord. Then David personally initiated the census – he admitted later: it is I who have sinned, and it is I who have done wrong – but the text says that the Lord incited it and that Satan motivated it too.
I don’t have a big problem with the idea that an event can have a bunch of inputs. The problem is that in this story the inputs that you’d think would work against each other seem to be collaborating.
For me this story is part of the bible-reader’s minefield. I don’t like having to manage multiple contrary inputs. My preference is for simplicity clarity & common-sensicality.
That said…even though I don’t get it doesn’t mean I don’t believe it.
But it’s a complex story and so I finish the book of Samuel filing the Census Story in my Inconclusive Events drawer.
Note: quotes from 1 Samuel 24:1, 17, 1 Chronicles 21:1 (NASB)