“At anchor laid, remote from home,
  Toiling, I cry, ‘sweet Spirit, come,’
  Celestial breeze no longer stay,
  But swell my sails, and speed my way.”

BARZILLAI

BY REV.  GEORGE MILLIGAN, M.A., D.D.

“There is nothing,” says Socrates to Cephalus in the Republic, “I like better than conversing with aged men.  For I regard them as travellers who have gone a journey which I too may have to go, and of whom it is right to learn the character of the way, whether it is rugged or difficult, or smooth and easy” (p. 328 E.).

It is to such an aged traveller that we are introduced in the person of Barzillai the Gileadite.  And though he is one of the lesser-known characters of Scripture—­and we might perhaps never have heard of him at all had it not been for his connection with King David—­on the few occasions on which he does appear he acts with an independence and disinterestedness which are very striking.

The first of these occasions is at Mahanaim, in his own country of Gilead.  In the strong fortress there David and his companions had taken refuge after the disastrous revolt of Absalom.  Owing to their hurried flight, the fugitives were wanting in almost all the necessaries of life, and they could hardly fail also to have been a little apprehensive of the kind of welcome the Gileadites would extend to them.  But if so, their fears were soon set at rest.  Three of the richest and most influential men in the district at once came to their aid.  Shobi the son of Nahash, and Machir the son of Ammiel, and Barzillai the Gileadite of Rogelim, brought beds, and cups, and wheat, and barley, and honey, and butter, and sheep—­all, in fact, that was needed—­for David, and for the people that were with him:  for they said, “The people is hungry, and weary, and thirsty, in the wilderness” (2 Sam. xvii. 29).

In so acting, the first of these, Shobi, may have been trying to atone for his brother’s insulting conduct when David had sent messengers to comfort him on his father’s death (2 Sam. x. 1-5);[1] and Machir as the friend of Mephibosheth (2 Sam, ix. 4), was naturally grateful for the king’s kindness to the lame prince.  But, as regards Barzillai, we know of no such reasons for his conduct, and his generosity may, therefore, be traced to the natural impulses of a kind and generous heart.  In any case, this unlooked-for sympathy and friendship had an arousing and encouraging effect upon the king.  He no longer despaired of his fortunes, black though at the moment they looked, but, marshalling his forces under three captains, prepared for war with his rebellious son; with the result that in the forest of Ephraim Absalom’s army was wholly defeated, and the young prince himself treacherously slain.