The Life of David Series: A Tale of Two Cities, Part 1

The elderly prophet pauses on the dusty road that winds its way through the rock-strewn landscape. The men who accompany him – one leading a heifer, another carrying supplies that include, significantly, oil for anointing – stop and wait for him to catch his breath. Leaning on his staff, he raises his bearded, bushy-eyed face to the horizon, where an unassuming cluster of low buildings can barely be made out in the waning light of the day.

“Beit Lechem,” the prophet mutters. “The house of bread. Interesting choice.”

“Sh’muel,” one of his companions speaks up. “Are you well? Should we camp for the night?”

The prophet shakes his head and turns to his friends. “No, the work we have to do won’t wait.”

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The first city that figures in the life of David is Bethlehem, or Beit Lechem (בֵּ֣ית לָ֑חֶם). The above dramatization is from I Samuel 16, where we first meet David, shepherding his flock on the outskirts of the city. Some will remember that the story of Ruth centers on Bethlehem, but even that is not the first time Bethlehem show up on the map, so to speak.

A birth, and a death.

In Genesis 26, we read the following account:

Then they journeyed from Bethel. And when there was but a little distance to go to Ephrath, Rachel labored in childbirth, and she had hard labor. Now it came to pass, when she was in hard labor, that the midwife said to her, “Do not fear; you will have this son also.” And so it was, as her soul was departing (for she died), that she called his name Ben-Oni; but his father called him Benjamin. So Rachel died and was buried on the way to Ephrath (that is, Bethlehem). And Jacob set a pillar on her grave, which is the pillar of Rachel’s grave to this day.

And this little paragraph is full of significance as we begin our look at this seemingly insignificant town. Note carefully a few things.

First, the child that is born is Benjamin. We have talked about the relationship between Benjamin and Judah before. We’ll go back to it often.

Second, here we have a woman traveling to Bethlehem, where she gives birth. That won’t be the last time we see this happening.

Finally, there is a birth accompanied by a death. Hang on to that thought as well.

Leave the House of Bread at your peril.

If the biblical history of Bethlehem starts out on a bittersweet note in Genesis, it takes a horrific turn in Judges. The woeful tale begins in chapter 19 of that book:

And it came to pass in those days, when there was no king in Israel, that there was a certain Levite staying in the remote mountains of Ephraim. He took for himself a concubine from Bethlehem in Judah. But his concubine played the harlot against him, and went away from him to her father’s house at Bethlehem in Judah, and was there four whole months.

The story goes on to tell of how the jilted Levite went after his estranged concubine, and after some prodding, managed to get her father to agree to send her back with him.

However, the man was not willing to spend that night; so he rose and departed, and came opposite Jebus (that is, Jerusalem). With him were the two saddled donkeys; his concubine was also with him. They were near Jebus, and the day was far spent; and the servant said to his master, “Come, please, and let us turn aside into this city of the Jebusites and lodge in it.”

Now if you remember from our previous post, the area around Jerusalem was at that time inhabited by the tribe of Benjamin, who had become hopelessly intertwined with the pagan Jebusites who they had been unable to expel from the region. It is to Gibeah, a city in this region occupied by Benjamites, that the unfortunate woman from Bethlehem travels with her Levite “husband”.

Once inside the city they are unable to find lodging, so they prepare to spend the night in the square. One kind man, seeing this, urges them to take lodging in his house. This they do, and not a moment too soon. We pick up the tale in verse 22:

As they were enjoying themselves, suddenly certain men of the city, perverted men, surrounded the house and beat on the door. They spoke to the master of the house, the old man, saying, “Bring out the man who came to your house, that we may know him carnally!”

The tribe of Benjamin has fallen so far, due to their cohabitation with the pagan Jebusites, that they are indistinguishable in their perversion from the Sodomites, on whom the wrath of God fell in spectacular fashion. But if this story seems dark, buckle your seat belts, because it gets darker.

But the man, the master of the house, went out to them and said to them, “No, my brethren! I beg you, do not act so wickedly! Seeing this man has come into my house, do not commit this outrage. Look, here is my virgin daughter and the man’s concubine; let me bring them out now. Humble them, and do with them as you please; but to this man do not do such a vile thing!” But the men would not heed him. So the man took his concubine and brought her out to them. And they knew her and abused her all night until morning; and when the day began to break, they let her go. Then the woman came as the day was dawning, and fell down at the door of the man’s house where her master was, till it was light.

In the morning, the husband comes out and finds his concubine unresponsive. And what he does next is…well…bizarre.

So the man lifted her onto the donkey; and the man got up and went to his place. When he entered his house he took a knife, laid hold of his concubine, and divided her into twelve pieces, limb by limb, and sent her throughout all the territory of Israel. And so it was that all who saw it said, “No such deed has been done or seen from the day that the children of Israel came up from the land of Egypt until this day. Consider it, confer, and speak up!”

Subsequently an outraged nation goes to war and comes within an inch of completely destroying the tribe of Benjamin. This is Benjamin at the “ravenous wolf” part of Jacob’s blessing. This event will become important in future posts.

But let’s focus back on the poor Bethlehemite woman. In this narrative, she leaves the House of Bread, and dies at the hands of pagans. Benjamite pagans, but pagans, nonetheless.

Return to the House of Bread to find redemption.

Perhaps one of the most important lines in the Book of Ruth is the first:

Now it came to pass, in the days when the judges ruled…

This sets the context squarely into the squalid time period we have just been reading about. Once we understand this, the book of Ruth becomes a tiny point of light in the darkness of the period of the Judges.

As the theme of Ruth is better known, I’ll summarize here, highlighting the important points for the purpose of our study. A family from Bethlehem moves to nearby Moab to escape famine. Once there, things go from bad to worse, and the whole family dies except for the matriarch, Naomi, and her two daughters-in-law, Ruth and Orpah. Once again, leaving the House of Bread is followed by death.

But here’s where things start to turn around. Naomi decides to go back to Bethlehem, and her Moabite daughter-in-law Ruth insists on going with her. And in Bethlehem Naomi and Ruth find salvation at the hands of a kinsman redeemer, Boaz. Upon marrying Boaz, Ruth gives birth to a son, Obed, who is the father of Jessie, who is the father of the hero of our story, David.

And the last paragraph of this beautiful tale ties together a thread we’ve been following since our very first study:

Now this is the genealogy of Perez: Perez begot Hezron; Hezron begot Ram, and Ram begot Amminadab; Amminadab begot Nahshon, and Nahshon begot Salmon; Salmon begot Boaz, and Boaz begot Obed; Obed begot Jesse, and Jesse begot David.

Why start with Perez? Well for starters, like Obed, Perez’s mother, Tamar, was a gentile. As was Boaz’s mother (or, more likely, great great grandmother), Rahab. But there’s more: starting with Perez links the book of Ruth to that oh-so-curious chapter 38 of Genesis, which we have discussed at length. Surprisingly, they have a lot in common. Both involve gentile women and men of the tribe of Judah. Both have to do with the concept of the kinsman redeemer. Both contain an arc of redemption (Judah, Naomi). And both are important way-stops in the story that leads to David, and more importantly, to the Messiah.

Bringing it all together.

So other than the fascinating connections and parallelisms in the narrative of the city of Bethlehem, what can we take away from this study?

A lot, actually.

First, in Genesis a woman travels to Bethlehem to give birth. In Ruth, another woman travels to Bethlehem to give birth. And the alert reader is probably already ahead of me…in Luke 2 a woman travels to Bethlehem…to give birth. So the biblical history of Bethlehem points straight to Christ.

But it gets even better. In Genesis, Rachel gives birth to Benjamin, then dies. In Matthew 2:18, after Harod has learned of the birth of Jesus and has ordered the murder of the innocents, we read.

A voice was heard in Ramah,
Lamentation, weeping, and great mourning,
Rachel weeping for her children,
Refusing to be comforted,
Because they are no more.

The parallelism in Scripture is truly amazing. In Genesis, Rachel gives birth to Benjamin, and her children weep for her. In Matthew Mary gives birth to the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, and Rachel weeps for her children. And it all happens in Bethlehem.

When I was a teenager I heard a preacher say one time “The God who created the Universe wrote the Bible.” When we are confronted with the intricacy of the connections between Old Testament and New we get a glimpse of the significance of that phrase.

The second application has to do with the name of Bethlehem itself: House of Bread. Of course, when we think of the concept of bread, our minds go to Jesus’s own words in John 6:

I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me shall never hunger, and he who believes in Me shall never thirst. But I said to you that you have seen Me and yet do not believe. All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out.

Of course the obvious observation is that the House of Bread became the literal House of the Bread when Jesus was born there. But let’s go back to the narrative, shall we?

The poor unfortunate woman of Judges leaves the House of Bread to dwell among the pagans, and finds death and destruction. But Ruth, a pagan herself, goes to the House of Bread, and finds redemption and life. In John 3, Christ Himself expresses the contrast:

He who believes in Him [the Son] is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

It’s likely that most who read this site are those who have already put their trust in Christ. But if perchance you are reading this and find yourself outside the House of Bread, come to Bethlehem. Put your trust in the Lion of the Tribe of Judah. Find redemption, and escape the judgement to come. The gates of the city are open, the arms of the Kinsman Redeemer are spread wide in welcome, and you will in no wise be cast out.

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