2 Samuel 13:1–14:33

Original Meaning

Amnon’s Love for His Half-Sister, Tamar (13:1–2)

THE OPENING PHRASE (NIV “In the course of time”) is a Hebrew idiom used as a transition marker (see comments on 2:1; cf. also 8:1; 10:1; 15:1; 21:18).4 Its repeated use in 15:1 (with slight modification) serves to mark chs. 13–14 as a distinct literary unit within the extended narrative of Absalom’s rebellion (chs. 13–20).5

Verse 1 sets the stage for the new episode by introducing the principal actors, Amnon and Tamar.6 However, the Hebrew syntax (obscured by NIV; cf. NRSV, NJPS) highlights Absalom’s role: “And it happened thereafter—Absalom, David’s son, had a beautiful sister named Tamar, and Amnon, David’s son, loved her.”7 Thus the narrator lifts Absalom into the foreground and makes us aware that this is not simply a story about Amnon and Tamar, for it participates in the larger narrative of Absalom.

Since chapter 14 ends with the word “Absalom” (both in Heb. and the NIV), these two chapters begin and end with Absalom.8 Furthermore, the narrator identifies both Amnon and Absalom as sons “of David,” which reminds the reader that these actions are rooted in David’s sin. Amnon’s offense is sexual in nature, which ensures that the specter of David’s own crimes is never far beneath the surface of this episode. As we say in English, “the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree” or “like father like son.”9 David’s sin is returning to haunt him, and since the main players are his own sons and daughter, the drama to be played out will be intensely personal.

Another important feature about the way the characters are introduced is the way the sons of David frame (and trap!) the daughter of David. The names of Absalom and Amnon surround and silence that of Tamar, an effect created by the Hebrew syntax: Absalom had a sister … Tamar … Amnon loved her. Tamar is viewed from the outset as a secondary (i.e., passive) character—the sister of Absalom and the object of Amnon’s desire.10 Her dilemma is palpable. As a woman with no recognized power of her own, she becomes the victim of the power struggle in which one brother is hungry for political advancement, the other for passionate pleasure.

The reference to Tamar’s virginity (13:2) may be “a cynical commentary on the morals of the royal court: had she been married she would have been available.”11 David had taken the married Bathsheba, but Amnon feels prevented from taking Tamar.12 Amnon’s crude but honest explanation for his love-sickness (13:2) shows that his “love” for Tamar is not love in any meaningful sense, but only lust.

Amnon Rapes Tamar (13:3–22)

Bridging Contexts

VIOLENCE AND HATRED. In a word, this text is about violence. The Bible has much to say about violence in general. One of the reasons God sent a flood in Noah’s day was because “the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence (ḥamas)” (Gen. 6:11). The Old Testament prophets were vigilant in their condemnation of violence as a ruthless abuse of power, especially wherever it resulted in loss or injury to the unprotected.48 Seizure and abuse of power for personal gain (or gratification of selfish lusts) are uniformly condemned throughout the Bible.

As we have seen many times, these historical narratives illustrate truths taught explicitly elsewhere in Scripture. The violence David unleashed in the previous unit has now taken up residence in his family. Literarily, this unit mirrors the sins of David in chapters 10–12. The king was guilty of sexual transgression and murder, both of which come back to haunt him here among his own children. Amnon’s act of sexual violence leads to an act of deadly revenge.

But it would be a mistake to interpret the text as only and simply about violence, as though this were a one-dimensional portrait. The narrator has linked the two acts of violence—the rape of Tamar and the murder of Amnon—with the common thread of hatred, which gives the account depth and perspective. Amnon’s “intense hatred” of Tamar after he has ravaged her (13:15) leads to Absalom’s hatred of Amnon (13:22). One act of unbridled passion leads to vicious retribution, which unleashes monstrous hatred and fury. With Absalom’s sojourn in Geshur, the reader fully expects the violence to continue.

One of the dangers of interpretating this passage is to read it in isolation, missing its contribution to the message of 2 Samuel as a whole. Indeed, many scholars have devoted considerable time to 2 Samuel 1–10 in order to learn as much as possible about the history of David’s reign but neglect the prominence given in the narrative to the personal and societal consequences of the king’s sins detailed in chapters 11–20. While our historian is interested in the grandeur of David’s reign (he seems to rejoice in what God did through David), the focus in this last half of the book is to draw the reader into his prophetic evaluation of David and of all kings generally. As readers, we are invited to consider the full weight of sin, to see the social and public consequences of David’s personal adultery and murder.

Thus, what we learn here about violence and hatred should be read together with the lessons on sin, repentance, and forgiveness in the previous unit. Chapters 13–20 are also the gradual unfolding of that which Yahweh promised, the fulfillment of his judgment through Nathan the prophet (2 Sam. 12:10–12). Baldwin has said it well:

To concentrate on the historical aspect of David’s reign, therefore, and to stop there, is to miss the point of the book. What we are meant to find is guidance to live by, a clue to the deceptions that distort our understanding of what is beneficial and what ought to be done. In other words, these chapters, like many more, are meant to be “a lamp to my feet and a light to my path” (Ps. 119:105).49

Contemporary Significance

VIOLENCE AND HUMAN NATURE. The vicious cycle of apparently unending hatred and violence is characteristic of human nature and is what one recent author has called “ungrace.”50 Our world is filled with examples of ungrace, each with its own lengthy string of unforgiving acts of violence. The teenage bomb-thrower in Northern Ireland, the rock-throwing youth in Palestine, or the gun-toting Israeli soldier often has no knowledge, or at least no recollection, of the long history of violent hatred behind his actions. Ireland is still burdened with atrocities committed by Oliver Cromwell in the seventeenth century, Palestinians are avenging memories from five decades of injustices, and the Jews of modern Israel live with the haunting memories of centuries of anti-Semitism and pogroms in Europe.

This feature of human nature (why not call it human sin?) is spinning out of control. The twentieth century proved to be the most violent century of world history, dispelling the myth of humanism that things are improving and that the human spirit is gradually evolving into greater and better things. The statistics tell the story. Though scholars who study such things are not agreed about the specifics—admittedly, it is impossible to be confident of such computations—most estimates range between 160 million and 200 million deaths in the twentieth century related to war and genocide.51 About half of these are war related, while the remainder are credited to politically motivated carnage, typically communist oppression.

As the twentieth century ended, this trend has not been slowing. According to news reports, our world in the post—Cold War era is not getting less violent. There are now more and more “hotspots” around the world, often enflamed by racial and religious hatred and each threatening to erupt into ethnic cleansing at any moment. In the former USSR, Abkhazia and south Ossentia both seek secession from Georgia, while Kurds want to carve a state out of Turkey. Deaths in Kashmir’s Muslim insurgency against Hindu-dominated India passed the six thousand mark. Ethnic Kazakhs in Kazakhastan hate the Russian Cossacks, while Scots in Britain, Tutsis in Rwanda, Basques and Catalans in Spain, and Tauregas in Mali and Niger all seek varying degrees of self-rule or statehood. Even in North America, French Quebec edges toward separation from Canada.

Indeed, this period of post—Cold War world history seems destined to be characterized as the time of reemerging ancient tribal hatreds that have divided humankind for centuries by race, faith, and nationality. One leading authority has concluded: “The explosion of communal violence is the paramount issue facing the human rights movement today. And containing the abuses committed in the name of ethnic or religious groups will be our foremost challenge for the years to come.”52

“Like a spiritual defect encoded in the family DNA, ungrace gets passed on in an unbroken chain.”53 The sad fact is that our individual sins—our private hatreds and vitriolic passions—contribute to “ungrace” in our own tribes (families, churches, working environments, etc.). In one way or another, each of us repeats the failures of Adam and Eve in the primeval garden, eating the goodly fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil to learn for ourselves whether what has been “told” us is the real “right” and “wrong” of things.54 Thus, each of us contributes to the communal hatred that plagues humankind and constantly threatens to erupt at any moment in self-destructive violence. For this is the additional lesson of the story of David’s family: All hate-driven violence inflicts as much harm on the avenger as the victim. Amnon and Absalom both come to an ignoble and violent death, which contributes further to our full-orbed understanding of the nature of sin.

This consuming, self-destructive nature of sin is graphically illustrated by the following story of how an Eskimo kills a wolf, related by radio personality Paul Harvey.

First, the Eskimo coats his knife blade with animal blood and allows it to freeze. Then he adds another layer of blood, and another, until the blade is completely concealed by frozen blood. Next, the hunter fixes his knife in the ground with the blade up. When a wolf follows his sensitive nose to the source of the scent and discovers the bait, he licks it, tasting the fresh frozen blood. He begins to lick faster, more and more vigorously, lapping the blade until the keen edge is bare. Feverishly now, harder and harder the wolf licks the blade in the arctic night. So great becomes his craving for blood that the wolf does not notice the razor-sharp sting of the naked blade on his own tongue, nor does he recognize the instant at which his insatiable thirst is being satisfied by his “own” warm blood. His carnivorous appetite just craves more—until the dawn finds him dead in the snow!55

Original Meaning

Amnon Rapes Tamar (13:3–22)

THE PREVIOUS TWO verses presented Amnon’s problem: that he cannot have the woman he desires. Here we meet his solution: the nefarious advice of a friend. By way of introducing Amnon’s friend, Jonadab, the Hebrew syntax uses a grammatical parallel missed in most all translations: “There was to Absalom a beautiful sister, whose name was Tamar…. But there was to Amnon a friend, whose name was Jonadab” (13:1 and 3). Tamar may be beautiful, but Jonadab is shrewd.13 More than a “friend,” Jonadab is the “son of Shimeah, David’s brother.” Now we get a picture of the strife pervading David’s extended family, which seems divided into opposing camps. Tamar and Absalom are allies on the one hand, while Amnon and his cousin Jonadab are on the other.14 The battle lines for future combat seem established.15

Amnon’s speech explaining his illness to Jonadab (13:4) uses an impressive literary device to stress the aroused nature of his passion. The result is that the explanation (“I’m in love with Tamar, my brother Absalom’s sister”) gives the impression of a succession of faltering, gasping sighs, in which alliteration intensifies the grip that his passion has over him.16 Amnon’s speech proclaims love for Tamar, but his actions are about to unveil a more sinister passion.

Amnon follows Jonadab’s advice by feigning illness in order to draw Tamar into the trap (13:6–14). The Hebrew of this text uses a wide array of literary devices to emphasize the irony and injustice of the shameful act.17 The interchanging use of “sister” and “brother” in the dialogue focuses on the familial relationship between Amnon and Tamar and heightens the tragedy about to occur. After driving everyone out of the room so they can be alone, Amnon reveals his true intent to Tamar (13:11): “Come to bed with me, my sister.” The NIV here has obscured two separate imperative verbs, the second of which is “lie down” (škb) further modified by “with me.” This locution (“lie down with”) normally denotes sexual relations that are illicit.18

Tamar’s impressive speech desperately raises numerous objections and shows her to be a woman of integrity (12:12–13).19 She begins with a firm and resolute refusal, with another subtle use of “my brother.” Amnon may have hoped for consensual relations with Tamar in the privacy of his bed chamber. But her prohibition, “Don’t force me!” uses a specific verb decrying the act for what it would be: rape.20 Her objections involve several elements. (1) Israel is not Canaan, and such abusive force is not acceptable here. His proposal is a “wicked thing” (n^ebalah, folly, an outrageously disgraceful act) and will only make a fool of him. (2) In a more practical vein, Tamar uses great foresight in warning that if he rapes her, he will ruin both their lives. She will be forced to live in shame, and he will become “one of the wicked fools in Israel.” (3) Finally, Tamar asserts that marriage is not out of the question and that following the proper procedures may work in Amnon’s favor.21 Taken together, these objections are an unmistakable indictment of Amnon’s proposal.

Secondarily, Tamar’s stirring appeal in the current arrangement of the narrative (i.e., coming in this unit immediately after chs. 10–12) serves also as another indictment of David. This narrator is fond of thematic analogies between episodes. So here it seems likely that Amnon’s lying on his feigned sickbed is similar to David’s rising from his siesta bed. One summons his forbidden sister in order to abuse her; the other summons another man’s wife to abuse her.22 Thus, Amnon’s actions are subtly drawn together with David’s in a cause-and-effect relationship: David’s sin has come to rest now in his immediate family.

Amnon is not to be deterred. With staccato-like precision and brevity, details of the deplorable act are recorded (13:14–15). Verse 14 begins with his refusal to hear any more pleas from Tamar. This is followed quickly by three action verbs used only with their objects: “he overpowered her and abused her and bedded her.”23 Having earlier seized Tamar (13:11), Amnon has not released her to this point. He now “overpowers” her, which emphasizes the raw physical violence with which he forces himself on her, removing any trace of doubt about Tamar’s innocence.24

Next the narrator uses the same word chosen by Tamar in 13:12 in her attempt to dissuade him (“Don’t force me”), denoting rape or forced intercourse (“raped her”). The final verb in 13:14 (škb, omitted in the NIV) contains subtle connotations that are difficult to convey in translation. When used in an intransitive construction with a preposition phrase, it often means “lie with,” in the sense of seduction and consensual sexual relations (cf. v. 11, where Amnon hopes for Tamar’s cooperation).25 But here in verse 14, the verb is in fact a transitive, using the direct object marker to identify Tamar, reducing her as the victim to a mere object: “bedded her.”26 The repetition integrates three verbs in an escalating sequence of violence.27 Amnon dehumanizes Tamar and then ravages her, leaving her “a desolate woman” (13:20).

Recent literary studies of 13:1–22 have focused on its chiastic structure with a center at verses 14–15.28 Here Amnon’s violence against Tamar turns love into hatred. The movement from passion to self-gratification to revulsion is difficult to explain and has evoked interesting psychological speculation.29 But the point of the narrator is that Amnon’s repugnance for Tamar becomes central and must be addressed in the rest of the passage. Just as his unrelenting love (lust) for Tamar drove the first portion of the narrative forward, now his hatred drives the next.

The next sequence of events is clarified when we keep the Pentateuchal law in view, regardless of how much or little it was enforced in the royal court of David. In his hatred, Amnon wants to drive Tamar away (13:15). But Israelite law (and presumably earlier Hebrew mores) required that a man who had sexual intercourse with a virgin must marry her (Ex. 22:16–17; Deut. 22:28–29).30 Tamar objects that “sending” her away now will be worse than Amnon’s first offense (2 Sam. 13:16)—a reference to the Old Testament provision for divorcing a wife (notice “sends” in Deut. 24:1).31 Amnon and Tamar are not married, of course, but Tamar’s use of the technical term for divorce is a plea, a reminder that two wrongs do not make a right. By treating her now as a divorced and shamed woman, Amnon will only compound a difficult situation. She is again acting morally and wisely in order to divert tragedy for both of them.

The mention of Tamar’s “richly ornamented robe” is interesting because this is the only other example of the expression used to describe Joseph’s famous “coat of many colors” (NIV “richly ornamented robe,” Gen. 37:3). As in the Joseph narrative, we have no clear indication of the precise nature of the robe that makes it so distinctive.32 Whatever the term’s etymological significance, the narrator has thankfully left us a note explaining the symbolism of Tamar’s robe: It signified her status as an unmarried princess (2 Sam. 13:18). Once she tears it, the robe symbolizes the ruin of her life.33

The laconic verse 21 states that when David learns what has happened, he is furious. The abrupt ending of the verse is an indictment of his inactivity. Commentators often speculate about his failure to defend Tamar and punish Amnon, perhaps insisting on marriage as prescribed by law. It seems likely that David’s consciousness of his own guilt paralyzes him.34 How can he chastise Amnon in light of his own sin? Perhaps David could have prevented what will soon take place. Instead, he appears the overindulgent father, who becomes a passive, silent sufferer throughout the rest of the extended narrative (i.e., through ch. 20). Absalom refuses to speak to Amnon, but he treasures the hatred in his heart (13:21). The narrative that began with love (13:1–2) now ends with hatred (13:21–22). At its center stands the act of violence that has turned love into hatred (13:14–15).35

Absalom Kills Amnon (13:23–39)