Ahithophel forced his way through the crowded streets to the court where Abner, his onetime friend and general, was viewing the wounded and dying men stretched out in rows. “Don’t touch these men,” Abner warned as he pulled Ahithophel away from the stretchers. “Some are dead. You could become defiled.”
“What is defilement to me if my son is here among these men?” Ahithophel countered.
When Abner did not answer, Ahithophel seized him by the shoulders: “Abner, in the name of God where is my son?”
Abner put his arm around Ahithophel and spoke gently. “I can assure you he is not here among these wounded.”
* * *
Ahithophel drew back. “If my son is not here, where is he?”
“Come with me to the king’s court where we can talk.”
Woodenly Ahithophel followed the general past the grimy, bloodstained men, some groaning with pain.
Inside the courtyard of the king, Ahithophel found himself surrounded by the men of Benjamin. They were waiting for Saul’s only surviving son, Ishbosheth, to come out into the courtyard to be crowned with his father’s crown. Seeing Abner, the king’s general, they crowded around and plied him with questions
“Why is Ishbosheth delaying?”
“It is important he be crowned at once.”
“Patience,” Abner admonished the men. “Please be patient with the young prince. He has just received word that the headless bodies of Saul and his sons have been hung for all to see from the walls of Bet Shean.”
A moan swept over the men. They began to cry out their frustrations to the God of Israel, who had deserted them in their hour of need. “This is not the worst,” Abner shouted, motioning for silence. “Word has also come to the young prince that the heads of his father and brothers are being sent around to all the Philistine cities so their people might mock the men of Israel.”
With that the men of Benjamin began to wail and weep, tearing their cloaks and beating their breasts. Some even dropped to the ground and wept with their foreheads touching the rough-packed dirt of the courtyard.
Ahithophel was caught up in the general grief, but he did not forget his purpose. He clutched the cloak of Abner and shouted over the din, “My son. What of my son?”
Abner turned to him with bloodshot eyes. “Ahithophel, your son died nobly on Gilboa with the king.”
Ahithophel staggered and fell back as though wounded himself. “No, no, not my son. You are mistaken. It could not have been my son.”
Abner put his arm around him, drawing him away from the rest of the men. “Ahithophel, I would not lie to you. As I live before God, your son died a hero.”
Ahithophel began to tremble. His teeth chattered as with great cold so that he could say nothing. Although his whole body shook with sobs, tears would not come.
Now Ishbosheth was led into the courtyard by priests bearing incense and holy water. Though the young prince appeared overcome with grief, the ceremony of crowning him king proceeded as though it were taking place back in the palace of Saul, and soon Ishbosheth stood awkwardly in the center of the court with great robes of state, that had been rescued from Gibeah, hanging large and loose on his slender frame.
At last Ahithophel found his voice. He looked wildly around at Ishbosheth and the others. “Why did they die? Where was the God of Israel when the roebucks of His people were being cut down by the chariots of the Philistines? Is our God not strong enough to deliver us from men who ride in chariots of iron?”
He moved around the courtyard, pain twisting his face as he demanded answers of the silent men. Suddenly a young priest named Gad stepped forward. “It is no mystery why Israel lost to the Philistines. It was not that our slings could not match the chariots of iron, nor that our arrows were not as sure as their iron lances, nor that their thousands outnumbered our hundreds; no, it was something deeper. We stood on Gilboa and watched them come as though we were already dead and doomed. The God of Israel was not with us, and we were as men without armor or a soldier without his shield.”
The young man’s voice took on the cadence of a prophet. “The terrible anger of Saul against his servant David divided our forces. We were all weak men who trembled like aspens at the sight of their chariots. If David had been there he would have raised up a standard in our midst and shouted us on, and we would have been fleet like mountain goats.”
Hearing the criticism of his dead father, Ishbosheth threw off his royal robe in a rage. “By my father’s good name, I shall not stand and hear you speak of him in these words and with the same mouth bless my enemy, David.”
Gad stood his ground. “It was Saul who led us out to certain defeat. It was his obsession that led him to pass through the Philistine lines to seek out the witch of Endor in the far side of Mount Moreh. He made her call up Samuel from the dead; that is a known sin for our people. Then, faint with fear because of what Samuel had told him, he walked all night to rejoin us at Bilboa. Tired and fearful he could not lead us out to victory against our enemies.”