Ish-Bosheth, the son of Saul who reigned as king for a short time over all the tribes except Judah, is dead. Now the majority of the citizens of the nation turn to David to appoint him as their king, though he is not of the house of Saul. They need a strong and powerful man to lead the nation and apparently do not consider appointing a son of Ish-Bosheth to the position. We don't even know whether Ish-Bosheth fathered any sons; I am unable to find any information regarding whether or not he had offspring.
They also don't consider anointing Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan, as king for the same reason they didn't choose him instead of Ish-Bosheth in the first place: he is lame in both legs. In the ancient world, a male was not looked upon as a viable candidate for the kingship unless he was whole in body and in mind. Mephibosheth was only five years old when his father Jonathan died in battle but his age would not have been a hindrance to crowning him king and placing an advisor over him until he became of legal age. The accident that rendered him lame on the same day his father died, however, was an insurmountable hindrance to his ascension to the throne.
We will learn later in the Bible that Saul still has some surviving sons whose mothers are concubines but these sons are passed over for the kingship, likely due to their mothers being foreigners. (When the people come to David to appoint him king they will say to him that they are his "own flesh and blood". There is no doubt whatsoever that both of David's parents were natural born citizens of Israel.) Concubines were legally married to their husbands but, because they were not natural born citizens of Israel, they did not have the same marital rights as Israelite wives. It was not customary for a son of a concubine to be a man's chief heir unless he had no sons with his Israelite wife. We don't know for certain who Ish-Bosheth's mother was; some scholars believe his mother was Saul's chief wife Ahinoam even though Ish-Bosheth isn't mentioned on the list of children Saul had with her in 1 Samuel 14:49-50a. Other scholars think Ish-Bosheth was the son of a concubine and only became the heir-apparent to the throne because Saul's sons by his Israelite wife were all killed in battle at the same time and because Jonathan's son Mephibosheth received a lifelong disabling injury on that same day, causing him to be rejected as king.
Some of Saul's kinsmen still feel a relative of his belongs on the throne and not David, as we'll see later on in the Bible, but at this time the majority of the people want David to rule over them instead of a man of the house of Saul. "All the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron and said, 'We are your own flesh and blood. In the past, while Saul was king over us, you were the one who led Israel on their military campaigns. And the Lord said to you, 'You will shepherd My people Israel, and you will become their ruler.'" (2 Samuel 5:1-2)
Of course not every citizen of Israel travels to Hebron to declare David king but their representatives (thousands of army-aged men carrying weapons) go on their behalf. In 1 Chronicles 12 we are told that those who gathered together to proclaim him king were 6,800 additional men of Judah who were not already presently serving in David's army, 7,100 from Simeon, 4,600 from Levi and an additional 3,700 from the leader of the family of Aaron along with 22 men accompanying Zadok of the tribe of Levi, 3,000 from Benjamin, 20,800 from Ephraim, 18,000 from the half tribe of Manasseh living on the west side of the Jordan River, 200 chiefs and an unspecified number of other men from Issachar, 50,000 from Zebulun, officers numbering 1,000 along with their soldiers numbering 37,000 from Naphtali, 28,600 from Dan, 40,000 from Asher, and 120,000 from those living on the east side of the Jordan River: Reuben, Gad, and the other half of Manasseh. These thousands of men are ready to fight anyone who tries to put someone on the throne other than David.
We see from these men's words in verses 1-2 that all Israel was aware that David is the Lord's chosen king. Why did so many resist putting him on the throne for so long? It may have been because, at the time King Saul and his three oldest sons fell in battle, Israel was so deeply embroiled in war with the Philistines that the citizens could concentrate only on defending their nation under the leadership of Saul's cousin and army general, Abner. This would help to explain why Abner became so powerful in Israel that the people allowed him to appoint Ish-Bosheth as king over them: they greatly respected Abner and were grateful to him for his invaluable help in pushing back the enemy. Abner may have persuaded them that Israel looked weak without a king on the throne and, since he wanted to be the power behind the throne, he suggested the easily-controlled Ish-Bosheth. If the people suggested David to him as king, he may have stirred up prejudice against David because David lived among the Philistines for a while during his time in exile. He could have said, "David cannot be trusted! He might be working for our enemy. Yes, I know at one time he was anointed by the prophet Samuel but that was before he lived among the Philistines and worked for their king. If David becomes king over us, we could lose our nation. He might hand all of us and all of our land over to the enemy."
This is all mere speculation since we don't know exactly what was taking place in the people's minds or what Abner was saying to them during the years between Saul's death and David's coronation as king over all Israel. It could have come down to simple disobedience---people wanting their own will instead of wanting God's will---but I believe the people's acceptance of Ish-Bosheth was motivated by far more than a rebellious attitude. I believe this because as soon as Abner forsook Ish-Bosheth and put his support behind David we were told that the elders of Israel had longed for many years to see David on the throne instead of Ish-Bosheth and that thousands of men from Saul's own tribe would rather have David as their king than one of Saul's sons.
These elders come to David at Hebron now to oversee his coronation and to join in with the celebration that follows. "When all the elders of Israel had come to King David at Hebron, the king made a covenant with them at Hebron before the Lord, and they anointed David king over Israel." (2 Samuel 5:3) Again we look to 1 Chronicles 12 for additional details. "The men spent three days there with David, eating and drinking, for their families had supplied provisions for them. Also, their neighbors from as far away as Issachar, Zebulun and Naphtali came bringing food on donkeys, camels, mules and oxen. There were plentiful supplies of flour, fig cakes, raisin cakes, wine, olive oil, cattle and sheep, for there was joy in Israel." (1 Chronicles 12:39-40)
"David was thirty years old when he became king, and he reigned forty years. In Hebron he reigned over Judah seven years and six months, and in Jerusalem he reigned over all Israel and Judah thirty-three years." (2 Samuel 5:4-5) A large percentage of Bible scholars believe David was anointed by Samuel at the age of fifteen. This would mean fifteen years passed before he was made king over Judah and that he was around thirty-seven and a half when he was finally made king over the entire nation. Some scholars think he could have been as young as ten or twelve when he was anointed by Samuel, making his waiting period for the kingship even longer. The years since he was called away from tending the sheep to be anointed as the future king of Israel have not been easy. His path to the throne was so heavily strewn with obstacles that from man's viewpoint it looked impossible to get from the starting point to the finish line. But nothing is impossible for God! He always does what He says He is going to do. We may not always know how He's going to do it or when He's going to do it but if He's promised it to us it's as good as done, whether it happens tomorrow or decades from now.
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