Abigail: Beautiful, Intelligent, Wise, Prudent … and Honored by God … Lesson 3

Abigail:  Beautiful, Intelligent, Wise, Prudent … and Honored by God … Lesson 3

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; I Chronicles 3:1

In our last lesson, we left David, and his mighty men armed and galloping toward Nabal’s estate with the intention and purpose of destroying him … in fact they planned to kill him and all the males of his household!  David has revenge on his mind!   Revenge is never a good thing, is it?  It not only hurts the intended person, but it also hurts the intended person’s family, and might I add, it also emotionally hurts the person who is meting out the revenge even though they may not realize it at the time! 

Let’s see what happens next by picking up with verse 14 …

Verse 14: Now one of the young men told Abigail, Nabal’s wife, saying, “Look, David sent messengers from the wilderness to greet our master; and he reviled them. 

Look at what one of the young men did, one of the young men that had witnessed the exchange between Nabal and David’s men, he went to Abigail and told her what had happened.  Why did the young man go to Abigail and not Nabal?   Let’s just pause here and look at what this implies about Nabal …

He was unapproachable …

He was ill-natured …

Others walked on eggshells around him …

His employees were afraid to talk with him …

He made others feel uncomfortable …

He was ungoverned …

Hmmmm, this verse also says that Nabal ‘reviled’ David’s men, what does ‘reviled’ in this context mean?  According to the Lexicon, it means …

Spoke to in anger …  Nabal spoke to David’s men in anger

Scorn … Nabal scorned them

Railed on them/flew upon them … Nabal verbally attacked them

In other words, Nabal didn’t hold back when verbally attacking David’s men.

This young man, realizing the seriousness of what Nabal had done (David was God’s appointed king in addition to the protector of Nabal’s flocks.) made haste to tell Abigail.  With an attitude such as Nabal’s, it seems reasonable to assume this was not the first time Abigail had been brought into a situation of Nabal’s doing.  Neighbors far and wide likely knew of Nabal’s disposition.

It seems that Abigail could have been/most likely was a wife who lived in and amongst constant controversy!

verses 15 & 16: But the men were very good to us, and we were not hurt, nor did we miss anything as long as we accompanied them, when we were in the fields.  16 They were a wall to us both by night and day, all the time we were with them keeping the sheep. 

The young man reporting to Abigail goes on to tell her, in essence that Nabal’s sheep were safe, David’s men were good to them and as a result, they and their flocks had been and were protected.

It seems that the young man is trying to give Abigail a full picture of the situation and to make her see what Nabal refused to acknowledge.

Verse 17:  Now therefore, know and consider what you will do, for harm is determined against our master and against all his household. For he is such a scoundrel that one cannot speak to him.”

It’s clear here that the young man expected Abigail to do something.  He tells her that Nabal and his household are about to be harmed.  And then he finishes up with derogatory comments about his master.

He is a scoundrel … meaning worthless, wicked, rascally, lawless

No one can ‘speak’ to him … meaning he refuses to see reason

Abigail’s next actions show us that both she and the young man understood the significance of what Nabal had done by his actions.  The young man, in reporting to Abigail, had done what he could.  The situation was now before Abigail, what would she do?

Verse 18:  Then Abigail made haste and took two hundred loaves of bread, two skins of wine, five sheep already dressed, five seahs of roasted grain, one hundred clusters of raisins, and two hundred cakes of figs, and loaded them on donkeys. 

Abigail springs into action!  Her family’s and the families of many others’ future were at stake.  She must focus on what she could do, not what she couldn’t!  Look at all the food she gathers …

200 loaves of bread

2 skins of wine

5 sheep already dressed

5 seahs of roasted grain (seah:  a measure of flour or grain approximately 1 ½ pecks)

100 clusters of raisins

200 cakes of figs

Remember there is a feast going on, so all this food was likely already prepared.

Verse 19:  And she said to her servants, “Go on before me; see, I am coming after you.” But she did not tell her husband Nabal.

Abigail did not tell her husband …

Was he too drunk to understand what he had done … maybe

Would he have cared even if he had been sober … it doesn’t seem as if he would

At any rate, we can safely assume that if Abigail had told Nabal her plan, whether he was drunk or sober, he would assuredly have forbidden her from carrying it out.  He likely would have ridiculed her and thought her actions were silly and needless.  So, Abigail kept her mouth shut and tried to save her family without the help of her husband.

She sent her servants with all the food she had gathered before her, and she followed after.  Do you think she carefully planned her strategy … food for the hungry tummies then the reasoning?

Can Abigail undo what her husband has done?  We’ll find out next week in our next lesson.  I’ll meet you back here next week.

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