What is the story of David and Nabal?

A wealthy man in Maon, husband of Abigail. His shepherds and his flocks had been protected in the wilderness by David and his followers. David, therefore, during the sheep-shearing festivities, sent to greet Nabal and to ask for a share of his abundance — anything he liked to send him. Nabal, however, railed on David's men and refused to give them anything. He had no faith to discern in David the anointed of Jehovah. Abigail hastened to appease David's wrath. David accepted her person and her present, and left Nabal in God's hands. The next morning, when Abigail told him the danger he had escaped, his heart died within him. After about ten days God smote him and he died. Thus did God avenge the insult given to His servant when in rejection, and saved him from avenging himself. 1 Sam. 25:3-39.

David was angry. He was furious. He and his men had been insulted by a hard and selfish man called Nabal. David and his men had protected Nabal's flocks and servants over a period of time. When David requested some help from Nabal he had shown base ingratitude for all the help and protection his interests had been given by David and his men. Nabal dismissed David's men with utter contempt. David's reaction was understandable. He ordered his men to gird on their swords and follow him. He determined to teach Nabal a salutary lesson. It was well that Nabal had a wise wife. When one of Nabal's servants told Abigail, Nabal's wife, what had happened, and that David was on the warpath, Abigail took immediate steps to remedy the situation. To refer the matter to Nabal would have been a waste of time. Without referring to her husband she prepared a substantial supply of good food for David and his men and went to meet him before David could avenge himself on her husband. Abigail was wise. Her attitude to David was in stark contrast to her husband's behaviour. She was humble. She didn't take the credit for what she was doing. She attributed it to Jehovah. It was He who had restrained David and prevented him from shedding Nabal's blood in revenge. David had been in grave danger of violating a commandment of Jehovah, “Thou shalt not avenge thyself, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” (Lev. 19:18). David, she said, had been chosen to fight the enemies of Israel; to fight the battles of Jehovah. By this statement she had rightly inferred that he was wasting valuable time in seeking to avenge himself because of an insult from one of his own people. The Lord in His mercy had prevented David from staining his hands with the blood of an Israelite. David readily acknowledged that what he had intended doing was wrong and blessed God for His intervention through Abigail. The story ends with God's judgment against selfish and obdurate Nabal. Jehovah smote him. God's ways are always best.

Nabal is shearing his sheep in Carmel, and indulging himself after his manner, when David sends ten messengers to salute him, and to seek from him an acknowledgment of the care which had been taken of his shepherds in the wilderness. Nabal answers, reviling David as a runaway servant, and his company as people of whom he knows nothing; and flatly refuses. David's men return to convey the message and the insult to their master.

David goes to a man of estate called Nabal, seeking there in his distress some refreshment for his young men, and David sent ten young men with a respectful message to these Israelites. "And thus shall ye say to him that lives in prosperity, Peace be both to thee, and peace be to thine house, and peace be to all that thou hast. And now I have heard that thou hast shearers: now thy shepherds which were with us, we hurt them not, neither was there ought missing to them, all the while they were in Carmel. Ask thy young men, and they will show thee. Wherefore let the young men find favour in thine eyes: for we come in a good day: give, I pray thee, whatsoever comes to thine hand to thy servants, and to thy son David. And when David's young men came, they spake to Nabal according to all those words in the name of David, and ceased." This no doubt was a great trial to David. It requires, I need not say, much grace to ask a favour, especially of such a man as Nabal; but, even little known as he might be — and David well knew what some men were in Israel — it was no small humiliation for the anointed of Jehovah. But Nabal appreciated nothing of God, and hated every thought of grace, as the natural man does; and hence answers with the utmost rudeness, "Who is David? and who is the son of Jesse? there be many servants now a days that break away every man from his master. Shall I then take my bread, and my water, and my flesh that I have killed for my shearers, and give it to men, whom I know not whence they be? So David's young men turned their way, and went again, and came and told him all those sayings." David was deeply irritated, and "said to his men, Gird ye on every man his sword. And they girded on every man his sword; and David also girded on his sword: and there went up after David about four hundred men; and two hundred abode by the stuff."

At this juncture, David, in the wilderness of Paran, heard that Nabal, a rich flock-master of Maon, was shearing his sheep in Carmel. So he sent, and asked for a present as an acknowledgment of the kindness shown by him, and the protection afforded by his band, to the flocks and servants of Nabal in the past. "Thy shepherds," said David, "which were with us, we hurt them not, neither was there ought missing to them, all the while they were at Carmel" (ver. 7). Had David exaggerated the service that he and his band had rendered? What could the shepherds say? "The men were very good to us, and we were not hurt, neither missed we any thing, as long as we were conversant with them, when we were in the fields; they were a wall to us both by night and day, all the while we were with them keeping the sheep" (15-16). Such services under ordinary circumstances called for a recompense, most would think; but above and beyond this, David, by his messengers, afforded the flock-master an opportunity of ministering to the Lord's anointed during his time of trial. That message sent to Nabal tested him in a double way. Would he requite kindness, and would he care for the king after God's own heart? What thought Nabal of David's message, and of the opportunity afforded him? His words are an index to his mind: "Who is David? and who is the son of Jesse? There be many servants now-a-days that break away every man from his master. Shall I then take my bread, and my water, and my flesh that I have killed for my shearers, and give it to men, whom I know not whence they be?" (10, 11). Self pervades the answer; my bread, my water, my flesh, my shearers. He only thought of that which he possessed. Like the fool in Luke 12, his desires went not out beyond himself and his immediate circle, forgetful how precarious was the tenure of that which he called his own. He was churlish; he was also foolish. A runaway servant he professed to think that David was; men whom I know not whence they be, was his description of David and his company. God's interests on earth at that time were nothing to Nabal. He thus lost his opportunity of taking God's side in his day, and lost it for ever.

Has Nabal had no successors? Has he no representatives on earth at this day? Was it so difficult to discover who David was? The right solution of that question would shed a flood of light on the importance of the opportunity to which he was so indifferent. In his own house there was one who knew who and what David was; Abigail, his wife, could have answered her husband's questions. Yet we know not that she had any special means of acquiring that knowledge beyond those possessed by Nabal. Probably she had never met David, as very likely Nabal and he were personally unacquainted with each other. Now, however, came Abigail's opportunity; would she use it? or would she, sheltering herself behind her lord, allow the precious moments to pass, and so be involved in the destruction which Nabal in his folly courted. She had but a short time to decide; procrastination for a day would have been fatal. Advised by one of the young men of Nabal's reply to the messengers, and warned of the impending vengeance: "Now therefore know and consider what thou wilt do; for evil is determined against our master, and against all his household: for he is such a son of Belial, that a man cannot speak to him" (17); Abigail had to act for herself, if David's anger was to be appeased. This she did, for we read, "Abigail made haste, and took two hundred loaves, and two bottles of wine, and five sheep ready dressed, and five measures of parched corn, and an hundred clusters of raisins, and two hundred cakes of figs, and laid them on asses, and she said to her servants, Go on before me; behold I come after you. But she told not her husband Nabal" (18-19).

How imminent was the danger, and Nabal quite unconscious of it! As Abigail rode on the ass, and came down by the covert of the hill, behold, David and his men came down against her on their errand of destruction. He and she now met in the valley, or defile. She had descended into it on the one side, and he and his men came down into it from the other. The two companies confronted each other. Then Abigail bowed herself as a suppliant at David's feet, beseeching his forgiveness, and deprecating his wrath. Personally innocent of Nabal's offence, she took her place as liable for the consequences of it (28), and cast herself on David's mercy. Nabal was a man of Belial (i.e., a worthless fellow). As his name was, so was he; Nabal (i.e., a fool), was he, and folly was with him. Who, on the other hand, was David? She well knew, she could and did tell.

This was just Nabal's mode of acting; he reaped all the advantage he could from David; but the moment David put in his claim for sympathy and aid, his worldly spirit developed itself. "One of the young men told Abigail, Nabal's wife, saying, Behold, David sent messengers out of the wilderness, to salute our master; and he railed on them. But the men were very good to us, and we were not hurt, neither missed we anything, as long as we were conversant with them when we were in the fields. They were a wall to us both by night and by day, all the while we were with them keeping the sheep." This was all very well. Nabal could well understand the value of David's protection, though he cared not for David's person. So long as David's men were a wall to his possessions, he would tolerate them; but when they would become a burden, they were rejected and railed upon.

While hiding in the neighborhood where Nabal kept his flocks, David and his men had not trespassed upon his rights. On the contrary, the men had acted as a wall to protect his flocks from attacks of savage beasts, and still more savage men. David thus makes a frank appeal for recognition by Nabal. Would he not give him a small portion of that which he had in such abundance?

When David heard of Nabal's sheep shearing project, he felt it opportune to send ten young men to him to request some provisions of food (v.5). Of course Nabal was not under any legal obligation to David, though there was no doubt he ought to have felt himself under moral obligation. The young men were instructed to show fullest respect to Nabal, greeting him with peace toward himself, his house and all that he had. Nabal is to be reminded that while David and his men were in the same area as Nabal's shepherds, they had been a protection for them rather than stealing from them, as many armies would do. None were hurt, nor were any sheep missing. They suggest that Nabal ask his shepherds about this, to confirm it. In view of this they ask that Nabal should give them whatever provisions he may have readily available (v.8). The message was simple and respectful, and any right-minded man would have been considerate of them.

However, Nabal is only aroused with anger against them (v.10). He answers in the most insulting way, "Who is David? and who is the son of Jesse?" Then he speaks of him as a servant who has broken away from his master. This was not true, of course, but he was not interested in enquiring as to the truth.

Nabal refuses even the meagre pittance which David, with all courtesy, requests. Utterly unlike his illustrious forefather, so far from following with his whole heart the Lord, he refuses to give one particle in recognition of His rightful claims. Thus he establishes his moral kinship with Saul, rather than with David. His churlish reply shows how utterly he failed to recognize that everything he had was a gift from God. It was his own, to do with as he would, is all his thought; and should he take his sheep and his provision, which he had made for his servants, to give to one whom he utterly refused to acknowledge? He goes beyond the refusal to give, and adds a gratuitous insult to the one who had made the claim. "Who is David?" he says, "and who is the son of Jesse? there be many servants nowadays that break away every man from his master." To him, David was nothing but a runaway slave who had absconded from Saul, his master. Nabal probably knew something of the merits of the case. He need have been no stranger to why David was away from the court of Saul, and he himself had likely been a witness to the relentless pursuit of David. For him, therefore, to speak as he did showed more than a misapprehension. It was a wilful refusal to recognize the righteous claims of one who was suffering for no wrong of his own.

A few touches suffice to set Nabal, her husband, before us. He was a man of great possessions, but without understanding. Spiritual destitution did not trouble him. His flocks had increased and were in safety, and these were his only care; therefore he would feast and make merry. Unwelcome as the truth was, it was none the less certain, that he owed his prosperity to one on whom he bestowed not a thought. It was characteristic of David to seek the welfare of all of Israel, and it was he who had protected Nabal's flocks from the incursions of enemies (vers. 7, 15-16). Would he acknowledge this? Would he own his indebtedness and seek to make some return? Nothing could exceed the grace with which the claims of David were set before him. How were they met? with unmingled contempt. "Who is David? and who is the son of Jesse? There be many servants now-a-days that break away every man from his master. Shall I then take my bread, and my water, and my flesh that I have killed for my shearers, and give it unto men, whom I know not whence they be?"