So the beginning of 1 Kings reveals how Solomon inherits the throne of Israel amid much family strife. It all unfolds from these first 6 verses in 1 Kings 1.
1 When King David was old and well advanced in years, he could not keep warm even when they put covers over him. 2 So his servants said to him, “Let us look for a young virgin to attend the king and take care of him. She can lie beside him so that our lord the king may keep warm.”
3 Then they searched throughout Israel for a beautiful girl and found Abishag, a Shunammite, and brought her to the king. 4 The girl was very beautiful; she took care of the king and waited on him, but the king had no intimate relations with her.
David is old, and his buddies come up with an interesting way to keep him warm at night – find him a beautiful young virgin to sleep with. Why didn’t he just sleep with one of his wives? Why didn’t he sleep with Bathsheba? He was willing to murder to sleep with her before.
David didn’t actually have sex with Abishag, and maybe this is just some weird ancient custom, but this passage is a reminder to me that David definitely had some serious issues with women.
5 Now Adonijah, whose mother was Haggith, put himself forward and said, “I will be king.” So he got chariots and horses ready, with fifty men to run ahead of him. 6 (His father had never interfered with him by asking, “Why do you behave as you do?” He was also very handsome and was born next after Absalom.)
Issues with women lead to issues with offspring. Sexual sins destroy families. We go from reading about David’s issues with women to reading about his issues with his sons. Adonijah declares himself King, and in verse 6 it is pointed out that David was not in the habit of rebuking his sons. King David was not a responsible father.
I think these two things are linked, being sexually pure and being a good parent, just as much as the act of having sex is linked to the act of becoming a parent. These opening verses remind us that King David had issues with both sexual impurity and irresponsible parenting. The rest of 1 and 2 Kings reveal the family strife this caused and how it lingered on for generations.
Richard Venable
These are hard but true thoughts. It is good to know that despite David’s bad parenting, he still had some good descendants: Josiah, Hezekiah, Jehoshaphat and most importantly, Jesus.