2 Samuel Chapter 6 Summary

The Divine Bug Zapper Treatment

  • David decides to bring the Ark of the Covenant from Baale-judah to Jerusalem. They load it up on a new cart, driven by two guys named Uzzah and Ahio.
  • David and the whole house of Israel dance "with all their might" in front of the Ark and God, singing and playing tambourines, lyres, and other instruments.
  • However, when they reach a certain point, Uzzah touches the Ark to steady it, as the oxen are shaking it, and gets struck dead.
  • David, momentarily, gets scared and angry because of this—he's worried worse things will happen if he brings the Ark into Jerusalem. So, he leaves it with a guy named Obed-edom for three months.
  • God blesses Obed-edom and his household, consequently, which encourages David to follow through with his plan, and move it into Jerusalem.

Footloose

  • So, to much fanfare, David brings the Ark into Jerusalem, sacrificing an ox to God after the Ark is six paces inside the city. He then—famously—dances "with all his might" in front of God and the Ark, clad only in a simple linen ephod (a kind of apron, loin cloth thing).
  • However, when David's wife, Michal, sees his spiritual merriment ("getting happy" as American Baptists put it), she thinks he looks like a fool and despises him.
  • After lodging the Ark in a tent, and offering more sacrifices to God, David distributes cakes and meat to all the people, blesses them, and says good night.
  • When he gets back home, Michal dishonors him, saying he had "uncovered" himself shamefully before the people and before his servants' maids in dancing as he did.
  • David somewhat mysteriously replies that God chose him to be king after Saul, and that he (David) will make himself even more contemptible in her eyes and his own, but will still have the honor of the maids she mentioned. So there, wifey.
  • As punishment for her snobbishness and effrontery, Michal remains childless to the day of her death.