6 ¶And it
came to pass, while there was war between the house of Saul and the house of
David, that Abner made himself strong for the house of Saul.
7 And
Saul had a concubine, whose name was Rizpah, the daughter of Aiah: and
Ish-bosheth said to Abner, Wherefore hast thou gone in unto my father’s
concubine?
8 Then
was Abner very wroth for the words of Ish-bosheth, and said, Am I a dog’s head,
which against Judah do shew kindness this day unto the house of Saul thy
father, to his brethren, and to his friends, and have not delivered thee into
the hand of David, that thou chargest me to day with a fault concerning this
woman?
9 So do
God to Abner, and more also, except, as the Lord hath sworn to David, even so I
do to him;
10 To
translate the kingdom from the house of Saul, and to set up the throne of David
over Israel and over Judah, from Dan even to Beer-sheba.
11 And he
could not answer Abner a word again, because he feared him.
12 ¶And
Abner sent messengers to David on his behalf, saying, Whose is the land? saying
also, Make thy league with me, and, behold, my hand shall be with thee, to
bring about all Israel unto thee.
(2 Samuel 3: 6-12)
This block of verses
describes the cause of Abner’s defection from Ishbosheth (Saul’s son) to
David. (If you remember Abner was
another of Saul’s relatives and was in charge of the army during Saul’s reign.)
While there was war
between the house of Saul and David, Abner made himself strong for the house of
Saul. I think this is an
indication that there was some self-aggrandizement going on. The final straw for Ishbosheth was that
Abner took Saul’s concubine Rizpah and had sex with her, which was a
traditional way for a usurper to declare they had taken a king’s place—by
taking their wives. Ishbosheth
confronted Abner about it, and Abner hit the ceiling.
Abner then accused
Ishbosheth of ingratitude because Ishbosheth had charged him with fault about
Rizpah, after all Abner had done for him in maintaining his throne and fighting
his enemies. Abner was so angry,
he said he was going to switch sides and support David instead and use all his
influence to set David up as king.
Now, one interesting
thing about this block of verses is that you never really know if Abner
actually did take Rizpah, or
not. We just know that Ishbosheth
accused him of it. The jury is
still out and all we have is Abner’s side of the story because no doubt he told
it to David to explain why he switched sides, and no doubt he would tell it in
such a way as to make Abner look good and Ishbosheth look bad.
Another thing is that
Abner gets mad just because he’s been accused
of a fault, and he immediately makes a counter-accusation of ingratitude. Now,
I don’t know about you, but this seems to indicate that Abner has some kind of
entitlement problem. It is the
attitude of “I’ve done all this for you, so that precludes you from every
opposing me or denying me what I want, even if it is out of line or
criminal.” I have sometimes seen
this in a few military people online, who, when they (or the military) are
accused of fault, pull the
I-defended-your-freedom-how-dare-you-treat-me-this-way card. It is as if these individuals
believe one good work should excuse other sins. With a true idea of justice, we know that’s not the
case. Moreover, accusation, as
painful as it is, does not a conviction make. (I’m really glad this is a small minority of military, by
the way.)
Back to Abner.
What is more
worrisome is that Abner’s anger and entitlement over this accusation causes him
to change sides, and that gives us a clue that entitlement leads to disloyalty,
even while it wraps itself in patriotism and raves about ingratitude. (We get a number of examples of this in the Book of Mormon from the stories of Amalickiah and king men and Zoramites, and other dissenters.)
If Abner changes to
David’s side just because he is accused
of fault (and it is a pretty big fault), how long will it be before he commits
a fault with David and is accused of something? (Assuming he did what he was accused of..) Can he be counted on to stay true? It’s a legitimate question.
When I apply this
story to myself, I can remember a particular time a number of years ago when I
tried to aggrandize myself, and it brought me to overstep my bounds, which
naturally brought chastisement down on me. Then I got offended just because I was charged with fault,
and it made me want to take revenge in some way. Thankfully, humbling myself helped me recognize my sin and I
repented and stayed true to the church and to God.
May we serve
faithfully and not be too big to be corrected is my prayer for myself and all
of us.
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