What Does II Samuel 20:3 Mean?

David returns to Jerusalem and addresses an unresolved consequence of the rebellion: "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." The ten concubines whom Absalom violated on the palace roof are now placed in permanent isolation, provided for materially but denied any further conjugal relationship with the king.

The fate of the concubines is one of the most troubling elements of the narrative. The women did not choose to be violated by Absalom; they were the victims of a political act designed to humiliate David and demonstrate the usurper's possession of the royal household. Yet it is the women who bear the permanent consequences: lifelong confinement as "living widows," deprived of their freedom and their status while the man who violated them is already dead. The narrative records their fate without comment, but the silence is eloquent.

The Lord Jesus comes to bind up the brokenhearted and to set at liberty those who are bruised. The women who suffered the consequences of David's failures and Absalom's cruelty represent every innocent victim of the sins of the powerful, and the justice that David could not provide is the justice that Christ will render at His coming. "He shall judge the poor of the people, he shall save the children of the needy, and shall break in pieces the oppressor." The King whose kingdom is built on righteousness will vindicate every victim that human kingdoms have failed to protect.