By
Patsy Norwood © 2025 All Rights Reserved! Any and all commercial use of this study is
prohibited!
I Samuel 25: 1 – 42; 27:3; 30: 1-18; II Samuel 2: 2-3; 3:3; 17:25; I Chronicles 2:16-17; 3:1
We could also add
hospitable, risk-taker, wife, mother, brave, courageous, faithful, generous,
humble, discerning and submissive to Abigail’s virtues. That’s quite a description isn’t it and I
can’t wait to share with you all the things I’ve learned about this woman of
God.
But … I hate it
when there’s a ‘but’ don’t you … but she was married to a man who was foolish,
evil, wealthy, stubborn, selfish, full of himself, prideful and greedy. In short, her husband was a scoundrel!
Have I piqued your
interest, I hope so because the more I studied this woman, the more I wanted to
learn. God’s word is that way, isn’t
it? The more we study it the more we want
to study it and oh, the strengthening of our faith and relationship with God
that comes with spending time in His word, it is such a blessing!
Are you
ready? Let’s drop in on Abigail and the
circumstances surrounding this glimpse of her life starting in I Samuel 25: 1
with a bit of background information …
Verse 1: Then Samuel
died; and the Israelites gathered together and lamented for him and buried
him at his home in Ramah. And David arose and went down to the Wilderness
of Paran.
Samuel: faithful, performer
of priestly duties, God-honoring, prophet, and the last of the judges,
dies. Israel was heart-broken and
gathered publicly to mourn him. They
‘lamented’ for him. I went to a Greek
Lexicon to get a better meaning and explanation of the word ‘lament’ and this
is what I found. Lament: to tear the
hair and beat the breasts; to wail; mourn.
It seems that the Israelites as a whole, loved Samuel and mourned his
death deeply.
Josephus, a Jewish
historian, said, “They wept for him a very great number of days, not looking on
it as a sorrow for the death of another man, but as that in which they were all
concerned He was a righteous man, and gentle in his nature, and on that
account, his was very dear to God.
After Samuel’s death David
thought it wise to move further southwest in fear that the death of Samuel
might give King Saul renewed vigor to get rid of him. A little background research on Saul and
David gives us the reason David was on the run from Saul. God had removed the kingship of His people
from Saul because of his sin and appointed David as the next king. However, Saul was still on the throne and so
full of envy and jealously toward David that he tried to kill him. In fact, Saul spent the rest of his life
seeking a way to kill David. You can
read about the ongoing conflict between King Saul and David in I Samuel,
chapters 18-31.
It’s here in his new
location that David encounters a scoundrel and his lovely wife … the woman of
whom our study is centered.
Verses 2 and 3: Now there was a man in Maon
whose business was in Carmel, and the man was very
rich. He had three thousand sheep and a thousand goats. And he was shearing his
sheep in Carmel. The name of the
man was Nabal, and the name of his wife Abigail. And she
was a woman of good understanding and beautiful appearance; but the
man was harsh and evil in his doings. He was of the
house of Caleb.
Let’s see what these
verses tell us about Nabal (the scoundrel) and Abigail (his lovely wife):
We’ll start with Nabal …
His name means “obstinate
fool”…
He was rich and had 3000
sheep and 1000 goats …
He was shearing sheep in
Carmel …
His home was in Carmel, his
sheep and goats were located in the Wilderness of Maon where David had come
after Samuel’s burial (the Wilderness of Maon was located next to the
Wilderness of Paran) …
He was married to Abigail
…
He was harsh and evil in
his doings (overbearing, surly, mean, selfish, a drunkard, unmanageable,
stubborn, ill-tempered, inhospitable) …
He was of the house of
Caleb (This Caleb is the same Caleb associated with Joshua and the conquering
of the Promised Land. When the Promised
Land was divided among the tribes of Israel, Caleb was given the city of Hebron
as his land inheritance. Caleb was an
honorable and godly man, but this ancestor of his, Nabal, was not.)
Now, let’s look at
Abigail:
Her name means
‘father of joy’ or ‘cause of joy.’
She was married to
Nabal …
She had good
understanding (clever and intelligent) …
She was beautiful.
One has to wonder
how Abigail wound up married to such a man as Nabal. Perhaps it was an arranged marriage. On the outside looking in, a wealthy and
settled man might be considered a good match for someone’s daughter during this
time in history. We don’t know, but it
sure makes one wonder!
The stage is now
set, and the characters are in place.
Nabal is in Carmel
and its sheep shearing season, presumably spring. It was a time of celebration and feasting; a
major social event and it seems that Nabal was hosting a feast …
Abigail is
presumably at their home likely busy with all the feast preparations and
activities …
David with his
band of mighty men/followers is in the area on the run from Saul.
We’re going to
stop here and give us time to get all this fixed in our minds. In our next lesson an issue arrives that’s
going to change everyone’s lives. Meet
me back here next week as we’ll see Nabal display a sample of all his
unpleasant ‘attributes!’
patsy @ From
This Heart of Mine
~ a place for women to
gather and study God's Word ~
Sources used for this
study:
Various translations of the Holy Bible
Various commentaries
Several trusted and biblically sound online sources
Dictionary of New Testament Background, Editors: Craig A
Evans & Stanley E. Porter
Archaeological Study Bible
All the Women of the Bible by Edith Deen
Daughters of Eve by Lottie Beth Hobbs
Halley’s Bible Handbook by H. H. Halley
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