Adonijah's Attempted Theft of Shekinah

Shekinah is the girl in David's bed. He was cold at the end, no longer dreamed of what he was. Not full of himself, the athlete supple beyond bend, who led a troop fifteen fugitive years, slept on the ground, fasted for days could not get warm. He shivers in the kingdom of memories and when he opens his eyes he is not home. He is in a tent with a flag on the top like a Bedouin, surrounded by sweets he can't eat, lords and courtiers he can't stand. So they bring a girl to warm him. It is a parable of age. When you are forsaken, God will take you up.

She lays beside his memories of Absalom and Gath, wars, Saul at night,  air and men, intrigues and women. He is freezing. She feels the bone. Compassion flows around them. She feels the wasted muscle of the sinew arms, feet and hands. She loves the man, else how stand? Now he sleeps. She has fulfilled rest to the king. But he stirs. His dreams are light. She is a nurse, a blanket, a pillow. The lights are out. A guard stands. What kind of love has the girl in his bed? For a friend, to sing and hold when they go where none has gone. Go not alone is the wisdom of the home. The everlasting in the bed, his fingers ache, digestion unsettled, gaps in the teeth, eyes dry on good days. No cough, dementia or out of breath moaning. Her comfort does not prolong.

Then he sees beyond the bone, the miracle of the words so great: he has set apart the godly for himself. You have filled my heart with greater joy. I will lie down and sleep in peace. [for he grants sleep to those he loves. 127.2] These are good. Four sons lost! How do we know he lives a life of faith? Hang around at night. He says with amazement what spring and winter behold  in each other in the sea they can't cross. She holds tight in these fits. Heart reaches. Wishes herself two. A king and bone shop. Think, having done, of ancestral memory, as there is of birth and life, that folk wisdom of death initiates itself. While old ladies in the home, all men having gone, whisper to one another, boast that they know. We never quite find out till flesh melts quick as it can. She doesn't leave.

What nurse gets in bed with a patient? One could cross the heart being of a soul? Voyagers who ride in Charon's boat, cross and recross with Dante, are they 40, 50, 60, 70, in full flesh after meal and wine, love made possible to satiate long sleep and talk of Beckett dying? David has this boatman, Shekinah, this flower.  How his hair is growing thin. Cheeks hang. You think the mind diminished but he sees his life and work are not enough. He sees the cold, no alibi. Everybody knows. Faulkner frowns. None good.  Gone down in ships. Vanity, said the man's son. Redemption.

There is more however. As if you cannot know her as you think. She was much sought after, vetted for beauty and purity, "they sought for a fair damsel through all the coasts of Israel, and found Abishag a Shunammite" (I Ki 1.3). That's in the flesh. In the spirit she was Shekinah, which shows why it was such an affront to Solomon when his mother Bathsheba, David's queen, at the request of another rebel brother Adonijah, asked her to solicit from Solomon Abishag as his wife. It is an affront because she was in bed with David, but "he did not know her," but more because she was the wife of spirit of Israel. Solomon, just anointed king, a youth, tells his mother, "I will not say thee nay" (2.20), but when she reveals the request Solomon says, "Adonijah shall be put to death this day" 2.24). The magnitude of this offense cannot be exaggerated. Adonijah was a rebel in every way.You cannot steal Shekinah.