2 Samuel 16 Bible study: Let him curse

Chapter 15 ended with two men coming into Jerusalem: "So Hushai, David’s friend, came into the city; and Absalom came into Jerusalem" (15:37). Chapter 16 follows both roads. The first half stays with David, who had gone up the ascent of the Mount of Olives to the top (15:30, 15:32): "When David was a little past the top" (16:1), Ziba meets him with food and donkeys (16:1-4), and at Bahurim Shimei comes out cursing (16:5-13), until "The king and all the people who were with him arrived weary; and he refreshed himself there" (16:14). The second half is in the city: "Absalom and all the people, the men of Israel, came to Jerusalem, and Ahithophel with him" (16:15). There Hushai greets Absalom (16:16-19), and Ahithophel gives his counsel (16:20-22). The chapter ends with a line about that counsel: "All the counsel of Ahithophel was like this both with David and with Absalom" (16:23).

2 Samuel 16:11→leads toLuke 6:28

Shimei cursed David and threw stones at him (16:5-7). Abishai asked to kill him (16:9), and David said, "Leave him alone, and let him curse; for the LORD has invited him" (16:11), and "It may be that the LORD will look on the wrong done to me, and that the LORD will repay me good for the cursing of me today" (16:12). Jesus taught, "bless those who curse you, and pray for those who mistreat you" (Luke 6:28). No New Testament passage cites 2 Samuel 16, so setting the two side by side is a reading. Some see part of Jesus' teaching in what David does: cursed on the road, he doesn't curse back, and he won't let Shimei be struck (16:11). Others read each on its own terms: David doesn't bless Shimei or pray for him; his reason is that "the LORD has invited him" (16:11), and his hope is for good to himself (16:12); at the end of his life he told Solomon, "don’t hold him guiltless" (1 Kings 2:9). In the same teaching Jesus gives a different reason: "you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind toward the unthankful and evil" (Luke 6:35).

שׁוּבshuvsay SHOOV

Brown-Driver-Briggs: "turn back, return", and in the causative form used here, "cause to return, bring back", "give back, restore", and "give in payment, requital". The chapter has it three times, all in that form. Ziba says Mephibosheth is waiting for Israel to "restore me the kingdom of my father" (16:3), yashivu. Shimei says, "The LORD has returned on you all the blood of Saul’s house" (16:8), heshiv. And David hopes, "the LORD will repay me good for the cursing of me today" (16:12), veheshiv. It is the verb of David's promise to Mephibosheth, "will restore to you all the land of Saul your father" (9:7). Judges uses it of God paying back Abimelech: "Thus God repaid the wickedness of Abimelech" (Judges 9:56). And Solomon uses it to Shimei himself: "the LORD will return your wickedness on your own head" (1 Kings 2:44).