We run our website the way we wished the whole internet worked: we provide high quality original content with no ads. We are funded solely by your direct support. Please consider supporting this project.
How do you respond to 2 Samuel 16:10?
David says of Shimei’s cursing him, “If he is cursing because the Lord said to him, ‘Curse David,’ who then shall say, ‘Why have you done so?’”
Some compatibilists cite this text to suggest that David regarded evil deeds, including cursing, as taking place in accordance with the sovereign will of God. If we accept this usage of this text, we should also accept David’s conclusion that nothing should be done about it (see How do you respond to Genesis 45:5, 50:20?). If this conclusion is unacceptable, so is the deterministic interpretation of this passage which gives rise to it.
In point of fact, this text does not support compatibilism. Abishai, who tended to have a hot temper (1 Sam. 26:8–9; 2 Sam. 3:30, 39), wanted to respond to Shimei’s cursing by killing him (v. 9). David rather “takes this moment of cursing to reflect on his position before God and his trust that it is God’s grace and not Abishai’s sword that can counter Shimei’s cursing.”* If God is in fact against David—if Shimei is speaking truth—killing Shimei will accomplish nothing. On the other hand, if God is on David’s side, killing Shimei is not necessary. David’s hope is that God is on his side and that his fortune would be reversed in the near future (v. 12). The text does not warrant the conclusion that God controls all cursing, and thus (thankfully) the implication that we should be passive in the face of evil.
Note
* L. Keck, ed. The New Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. II (Nashville, TN: Abindon, 1998), 1326.
Category: Q&A
Tags: Q&A, Responding to Calvinism
Topics: Providence, Predestination and Free Will, Responding to Objections
Verse: 2 Samuel 16
Related Reading
What about the thief on the cross?
Question: You hold that most people who are saved will nevertheless have to go through a “purging fire” to have their character refined and fit for heaven. Whatever is unfinished in our “sanctification” in this epoch must be completed in the next. But how does this square with Jesus telling the thief on the cross,…
What is the significance of Numbers 16:41–48?
The day following the Korah incident (see vs. 20–35), the Israelites rebelled against Moses again, this time because they blamed him for the death of those who were judged the day before (vs. 41). The Lord was very angry because of this and said to Moses and Aaron, “Get away from this congregation, so that…
What is the significance of Exodus 32:33 ?
The Lord says “I will blot out of my book” all those who persist in rebellion against him. If everything is eternally foreknown by God, one wonders why he would have recorded in his “book” the names of people who were to be blotted out eventually (cf. Rev. 3:5). Indeed, if God foreknew that certain…
Answering an Objection to a Cross-Centered Approach to Scripture
Through Greg’s Facebook and Twitter, we’ve been getting some great feedback and questions regarding his cross-centered approach to Scripture. Several have voiced questions similar to the reader’s (below), so we thought it would be helpful to post Greg’s answer here on his blog.
What do you think of Thomas Aquinas’ view of God?
Question: You have written (in Trinity and Process) that the relational God of the Bible is the antithesis of the immutable God of Thomas Aquinas. Could you explain this? Answer: Aquinas and much of the classical theological tradition borrowed heavily from Aristotle’s notion of God as an “unmoved mover.” God moves the world but remains…
Paradigm Shift Questions
A couple that was recently introduced to ReKnew and several of my books recently wrote to tell me that they are in the process of embracing the warfare worldview along with the open view of the future. They said that they “realize that these things aren’t minor adjustments but are rather all-encompassing paradigm shifts in…