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2 Samuel 9 of 24

2 Samuel 9

A king asks whether any of his predecessor's line survives, expecting to eliminate them; he finds a crippled young man and gives him a seat at his table.

Summary

David asks if there is yet any left of the house of Saul to whom he can show kindness for Jonathan's sake. Ziba, a servant of Saul's household, is brought to him and answers that Jonathan has a son who is lame on his feet. His name is Mephibosheth. He lives at Lo-debar in the house of Machir son of Ammiel. David sends for him. Mephibosheth comes and falls on his face before the king. David calls his name, and he answers 'Behold thy servant.' David says: do not fear, for he will surely show him kindness for Jonathan his father's sake, and will restore him all the land of Saul his grandfather, and he shall eat bread at David's table continually. Mephibosheth bows himself and says: what is thy servant, that thou shouldest look upon such a dead dog as I am.

David calls Ziba, the servant of Saul's household, and tells him that all that pertained to Saul and all his house has been given to Mephibosheth. Ziba and his fifteen sons and twenty servants shall till the land for Mephibosheth and bring in the increase so that the son of Jonathan shall have food to eat. Mephibosheth himself shall eat at David's table always. Ziba, who has fifteen sons and twenty servants, answers: according to all that my lord the king hath commanded his servant, so shall thy servant do. The chapter ends with the notice that Mephibosheth ate at David's table as one of the king's sons, and that he was lame on both his feet. The repetition of the lameness at the chapter's end is the narrator's way of insisting that the kindness shown is real and is without any strategic advantage for David: the man is helpless, and the king is good to him.

Appears
David
Themes
Covenant Loyalty Royal Mercy The House of Saul
All 24 chapters — click to jump
  1. 2 Samuel 1Chapter 1 is the hinge between 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel.
  2. 2 Samuel 2Chapter 2 opens the period of civil war that will occupy much of the first half of the book.
  3. 2 Samuel 3Chapter 3 is one of the most politically complex chapters in the book.
  4. 2 Samuel 4Chapter 4 closes the civil war with a brief, ugly episode.
  5. 2 Samuel 5Chapter 5 is the pivotal chapter of the book's first half.
  6. 2 Samuel 6Chapter 6 is one of the most dramatically charged chapters in 2 Samuel, covering two episodes that frame the ark's arrival in Jerusalem.
  7. 2 Samuel 7Chapter 7 is the theological centre of the entire David narrative and one of the most consequential passages in the Hebrew Bible for later Jewish and Christian thought.
  8. 2 Samuel 8Chapter 8 reads differently from everything around it.
  9. 2 Samuel 9Chapter 9 is the chapter the Court History uses to establish one key dimension of David's character before the crisis arrives.
  10. 2 Samuel 10Chapter 10 establishes the military context of the Bathsheba episode.
  11. 2 Samuel 11Chapter 11 is the turning point of 2 Samuel and one of the most consequential chapters in biblical narrative.
  12. 2 Samuel 12Chapter 12 contains the most famous confrontation in the book.
  13. 2 Samuel 13Chapter 13 is the first fulfilment of Nathan's sentence in chapter 12.
  14. 2 Samuel 14Chapter 14 covers the three years in which David longs for Absalom but will not recall him, and Joab's intervention to change that.
  15. 2 Samuel 15Chapter 15 is the emotional nadir of the first movement of the Absalom crisis.
  16. 2 Samuel 16Chapter 16 covers three encounters as David makes his way out of Jerusalem.
  17. 2 Samuel 17Chapter 17 is the intelligence chapter of the Absalom revolt and turns on a moment of competitive counsel.
  18. 2 Samuel 18Chapter 18 is the emotional climax of 2 Samuel.
  19. 2 Samuel 19Chapter 19 covers David's return to Jerusalem and the political settlements it requires.
  20. 2 Samuel 20Chapter 20 is the coda to the Absalom crisis.
  21. 2 Samuel 21Chapter 21 opens the appendix section of 2 Samuel — chapters 21-24 are not chronological narrative but supplementary materials: two episodes of famine and plague bracketing two poems and two hero lists.
  22. 2 Samuel 22Chapter 22 is an extended psalm, found also as Psalm 18 in the Psalter, which the editors of 2 Samuel have placed near the end of the book as David's retrospective meditation on his life.
  23. 2 Samuel 23Chapter 23 contains two distinct sections.
  24. 2 Samuel 24Chapter 24 is the second appendix episode bracketing the poems of chapters 22-23, and it closes the book on an unexpected note.
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2 Samuel 8
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2 Samuel 10
The book itself
Summary & story
What 2 Samuel is, why it matters.
Analysis
Themes
Power, consequence, grief, the dynastic promise, and the realism of the prose.
Who's who
David's court
The household of a king who has everything and gives most of it away.

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