David’s ten concubines

Q. In 2 Samuel 20:3, why did David keep his former concubines in prison for the rest of their lives.

2 Samuel 20:3 And David came to his house at Jerusalem; and the king took the ten women his concubines, whom he had left to keep the house, and put them in ward, and fed them, but went not in unto them. So they were shut up unto the day of their death, living in widowhood.

A. These are the ten concubines that David left to keep the house when he escaped from Absalom (2 Samuel 15:16). This can sound bad to us that David would leave them behind at Jerusalem – but we are looking it in hindsight, and it turned out badly. However, I think he had no obvious reason to suppose these women would be in imminent danger from his son Absalom. Because of the vile counsel of Ahithophel (2 Samuel 16:21-22) that turned out to be the false assumption. You must do something so heinous as to convince the people there could be no reconciliation of Absalom and David. It was good counsel as a strategy of military takeover but morally it was evil, and probably beyond what David could have guessed would happen. After Absalom’s rebellion was put down, David came back to his house at Jerusalem. These, who all need had been raped by Absalom, David “put them in ward, and fed them, but went not in unto them.” They lived as widows. When we compare all the uses of “ward” and “shut up” in the Scriptures, it is not necessary that we think that David put these concubines in prison. Sometimes ward does mean prison or something related to it. Sometimes it means more of a division or separation (Nehemiah 12:44-46; 13:29-31). “Shut up” sometimes refers to the quarantine of those the priests were investigating for skin diseases, or to those who were separated for some reason. Here these words mean that because Absalom had defiled these concubines, David made a separation of them from the rest of his wives and concubines. They functionally lived the lives of widows. They were not put away, neither set at liberty to be given to another, but were perpetual widows. Though David took care of them as far as housing and feeding them, he no longer went in to them as his concubines.

Many things in Old Testament times are often very distinct from our own modern experiences. We may have difficulty relating to those times. However, we know that they are written for our learning and our admonition, and “It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter” (Proverbs 25:2).