Do you ever wonder why it’s ok for God’s people to murder entire armies and people groups? I do. I can’t pretend to understand all of it. I do understand the reasoning behind it, especially when I read about how other people groups worshiped different gods and participated in rituals that just aren’t ok in the eyes of many. The passage about David making the Moabites lie down so he could measure them off, group them up and dispose of them, though, got to me. It seems super harsh and is definitely a task I would not be up for. You know what else caught my eye? The fact that Jehoshaphat became Israel’s royal historian, yet he is not credited with writing any of 2 Samuel. I just have to wonder if he had a hand in this text, which is largely attributed to an unknown author. Some scholars think, though, that Nathan, Gad and Nathan’s son, Zabud, may have helped create this book. We may never know that answer until we get to ask the One Who Knows, but we can be thankful that someone did. We also can be thankful that people like David thought the task of recording history was so important that he assigned not just a historian but a ROYAL historian to do the job.
Writing prompt: all is fair in love and war
Write about how you feel about the slaying of the Moabites or any of the other people groups that were destroyed in this chapter. Alternately, write about the job of a royal historian. Imagine being chosen for the position and what an honor it would be (or not be if you don’t feel you’d enjoy it.)
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