He drew me closer. “I want you, Abishag.” His kiss tasted minty, and I felt the steady thrumming of his heart against mine.
I returned his kiss, feeling as though I needed to grasp this moment lest it never come again. His kiss deepened, and I felt myself falling into a place of no returning. But eventually it was Solomon who resisted and gently broke his hold and held me at arm’s length. “I want you, but not this way. I could legally take you as a concubine, my love, but I want you as my wife.”
My heart lifted with his pronouncement. But I placed a gentle hand on his chest. “And what of Naamah?”
His brow furrowed as though he did not understand me.
“Do not think me foolish, my lord. I only worry because I know that Naamah does not want me in your life. I have known it from the beginning.”
He stroked my cheek, his smile warm. “Do not fear Naamah. She knows I will take other wives. She has always known it, though she does not like it.” His dark eyes glanced off mine as if remembering. “She thought in marrying me she could remain my first and only wife. But that is not possible when you marry a king. Surely you know this?” He seemed suddenly concerned with my opinion, and I recognized how easily women could sway him. He did not want to hurt us. But he wanted us to accept his choices without a fuss.
“I do not mind being second of many, my lord.” I touched his beard and smiled. “It is enough to know you want me.”
Joy lit his eyes then, and all thoughts of my request to return to Shunem vanished. “At week’s end we will have a wedding such as you have never seen.” He cupped my quivering chin. I could not keep my eyes from filling with joyous tears.
He kissed me again, but it did not linger. “We must not awaken love until it is ready,” he said, and I knew he tasted the joy of poetry in his meaning.
“No, we mustn’t.” I smiled. “A week? Not a few days?”
He chuckled at my anxious longing. “A week will cause the waiting to be worth the joy. Before you know it you will be tired of me and wishing we had waited even longer.” His arms around me told me that his words were not possible. I could never grow tired of him. My heart had found its song again in the beat of his heart.
“I will never grow tired of you, my lord. I am yours all the days of my life.”
10
A whirlwind of activity followed Solomon’s pronouncement to me. Bathsheba called me daily to her chambers, while maids frantically worked to sew an elaborate wedding robe, complete with embroidered sleeves and hem. The headscarf rivaled any I had seen the queen wear, and the jewels Solomon bestowed on me glistened like those in his crown.
Naamah was strangely absent from most of these preparations, but one afternoon as I took a break to walk in the central courtyard where female servants worked at the spindle and distaff or sat at large looms placed beneath overhanging awnings, she found me there.
I stiffened at her approach, though I remembered to bow. “My lady.” I rose and offered her a conciliatory smile. She did not return it.
“Abishag.” She nodded once, though she could not hide the rigidity of her jaw, and when she crossed her arms, I braced myself for an onslaught of bitter words, as Batya had been so fond of using.
I waited, taking a step back from her. “How can I help you?” I had often diffused Batya’s anger by offering help. Perhaps Naamah would soften as well.
But her gaze seemed to harden as she scrutinized me in silence. At last she spoke. “My son is Solomon’s heir. Do not forget that.”
I drew in a breath. Was that the cause of her fear? “I am happy for you, mistress. How blessed you are to have borne his first son.” I smiled, hoping to dispel the tension.
“I am also the first wife. Do not forget that as well.” She lifted her chin with not even the hint of a smile on her lips.
I studied her for a lengthy moment, searching my heart for understanding. Her anger was simply a mask for her fear of losing Solomon to me. But she had not thought far enough to realize I would not be Solomon’s last.
“You have nothing to fear from me, Naamah.” I spoke softly, kindly. “I know Solomon loves you and the children you have given him. You are the first, as you will remain. I am second and insignificant in comparison.” I extended a hand in quiet supplication, hoping she would relax and unwind her crossed arms. “Solomon will take more wives after me. How many, I do not know, but I do understand that I will not be his last.”
She bristled at my comment, and I feared I had said too much. But slowly, cautiously, she lowered her arms and let her shoulders fall in a sense of defeat. “I have always known it.” Her admission surprised me. “I have never wanted nor liked it, but I have known it deep in my heart.”
Compassion filled me, and I wondered how it must have been to be given your heart’s desire only to know you would lose it someday. I had never been given mine to lose. Until now.
“Our lives often do not turn out the way we expect,” I said, taking a small step closer to her. “I would not be here if I had been given what I longed for, what life was meant to be.”
She met my gaze at that, as though she suddenly realized I too had a story of becoming, of being in this place. Hers, as I had heard Bathsheba tell it, was one of desire and choice.
Mine was not.
“Was there a man you had hoped to marry in your village?” she asked as we turned to walk back toward the palace halls. The late afternoon shadows had fallen, and I knew her children would have need of her soon, and the servants would call us to the banquet halls to dine.
“There was a boy I once thought I could love,” I admitted. “But he married my niece soon after my brother signed the ketubah that wed me to the king.”
She seemed to ponder that a moment. “Do you miss your life in your village?”
I shook my head. “No more than you miss your life in Ammon.” We were near the turns in the hall that led in different directions—hers to her rooms on the second floor, mine to the court of women—and turned to face each other. “I choose to find the music of Adonai wherever He has placed me,” I said, holding her gaze. “I would like us to be friends.”
She blinked at that final word but did not bristle as I had expected she might. “I will think on it,” she said. But as we parted, she cast a small smile my way.
I awoke early the day of my wedding to Solomon, though in truth I wonder if I had slept at all. My nerves heightened, and I sensed rather than heard music in every word, every footfall, even in the chatter and quarrels of servants.
My maids, especially Rani, hovered over me, subjecting me to one more goat’s-milk-and-honey treatment, smoothing my skin and plaiting my hair, pulling it into an elaborate style with the traditional seven combs for Solomon to remove.
Breads and pastries carried sweet scents from the cooking rooms, and a multitude of servants spread palm fronds, lit scented sconces, and filled basket upon basket with spiced nuts and fruits. Meats of every kind overpowered my senses. Even in my secluded rooms, I could hear the hurried footfalls and nearly taste the food by the enticing aromas. Solomon had clearly spared no expense on my behalf.
“It is time, my lady,” Rani said once the last bit of kohl adorned my eyes and the veil rested securely, covering all but those beguiling lashes. My pulse quickened at the thought of seeing Solomon dressed in his bridal finery. What would he say when he saw me thus?
“I am ready.” I allowed Rani to take my elbow and guide me through the halls. Guards flanked us before and behind, and my heart beat to the pounding of their girded feet.
“Are you nervous?” Rani asked when we finally stopped in the anteroom outside the king’s columned audience chamber.
I stepped closer to the side door and pulled it slightly ajar. “Now I am.” My breath hitched at the brilliant beauty of this transformed place.
Rani stood on tiptoe behind me and peered into the room. She drew in a breath. “I have never seen such a thing.”
“He spared nothing,” I said, finding it su
ddenly hard to breathe. How was it he could pour so much gold into transforming his chambers just for me? I was not even an official bride. Just an inheritance from his father. Unworthiness crept over me, and I felt heat fill my face. I looked about for a place to sit.
Rani seemed to notice, for she gripped my arm and guided me to a bench. “Are you all right, mistress?” She placed a cool hand on my forehead, careful not to mar the makeup she had so recently applied. “Let me fetch you some water.” I nodded, and she hurried over to a guard to demand her request. I smiled at her boldness.
The water did revive me, and as I rested, my breathing grew normal, and I allowed my mind to listen to the sounds going on around me. Somewhere in the distance a harpist tuned his instrument, and an ensemble of musicians played a few notes, waiting to announce my presence.
I closed my eyes, taking it all in. Thank You, Adonai. I could not imagine beginning my marriage without gratitude for all God had allowed in my life. I may not have chosen the path, but surely the Lord had directed my steps.
Trumpets blared moments later, announcing the king’s arrival into the audience hall. Rani jumped up and down at my side like a giddy child, and I chuckled at her obvious delight. “Calm down, Rani, or you will have me dancing before it is time.”
“But you are about to marry the king!” She seemed completely taken with Solomon, and I couldn’t help but smile. Solomon was the most handsome of men in all Israel, and I think every woman who saw him loved him on sight.
“You forget that I already married one king,” I said, steering the conversation away from her obvious obsession with my soon-to-be husband.
She sobered. “Yes, of course. But not like this.” She brightened again and laughed.
“Hush now. They will hear you.” I did not mean to sound so stern, but I knew my tone was aimed more at my own racing heart than her exuberance.
We waited an eternity for Solomon to make his way to his dais, and even longer for the singers to proclaim my beauty to the king in song.
Female singers sang as I at last followed Rani to the entrance of the audience chamber and began the long descent toward the king’s dais.
“Where has your beloved gone, most beautiful of women?” The singers’ words carried the song as through golden glass. “Which way did your beloved turn, that we may look for him with you?”
I lifted my chin, my gaze first on the women, then on Solomon, who held my look so securely I lost all sense of fear. “My beloved has gone down to his garden, to the beds of spices, to browse in the gardens and to gather lilies,” I said. “I am my beloved’s and my beloved is mine. He browses among the lilies.”
The words had been crafted between us during the week preceding this joyous day. I had feared that I would not remember my part, but Solomon’s smile brought the words back with a rush of intense feeling. My cheeks fairly burned as I spoke, knowing their hidden meaning, intimated between us as we had penned the words. But my emotions heightened even further as he uttered his lines while my feet drew me ever closer to him.
“You are as beautiful as Tirzah, my darling, as lovely as Jerusalem, as majestic as troops with banners.”
I looked at him through the hooded veil, holding that intense gaze of his.
“Turn your eyes from me—they overwhelm me,” he said, his voice like that of an earnest lover. “Your hair is like a flock of goats descending from Gilead. Your teeth are like a flock of sheep coming up from the washing. Each has its twin—not one of them is missing. Your temples behind your veil are like the halves of a pomegranate. Sixty queens there may be, and eighty concubines, and virgins beyond number, but my dove, my perfect one, is unique, the only daughter of her mother, the favorite of the one who bore her. The young women saw her and called her blessed. The queens and concubines praised her.”
He paused as my feet came to rest at the steps to his throne. Our gazes held, and for a heady moment I put aside the references to the queens and concubines he had mentioned, thankful that at least for now they were not true of him. One day they would be, I told myself in some rational corner of my mind. But not today. I would not allow the fear of the future to mar the beauty of this moment.
“Who is this that appears like the dawn?” the women continued as I gazed on my beloved, loving him despite every flaw others might have seen in him, even things I saw in him. “Fair as the moon, bright as the sun, majestic as the stars in procession.”
“You who dwell in the gardens with friends in attendance,” Solomon concluded, “let me hear your voice!”
The crowd looked to me, the silence broken only by the music of a lone harp. I longed to glimpse the musician, but instead I closed my eyes to catch the timing of my final words. I opened my mouth to sing.
“Come away, my beloved.” I extended a hand toward Solomon, and he met me on the steps. “And be like a gazelle or like a young stag on the spice-laden mountains.”
The harp ceased, and Solomon pulled me to the top step to stand beneath a golden-edged canopy, where Zadok the priest stood in all his priestly finery to bless our union. I felt the pressure of Solomon’s gentle touch on my elbow and blushed when he lifted the corner of his garment to rest it upon my shoulder.
“I am my beloved’s,” Solomon said as the last words of blessing were spoken.
“And he is mine,” I said.
Solomon had chosen a different course to end our wedding festivities. Rather than taking me to the normal wedding tent in the palace courtyard, Solomon excused us both from the feast, which would last seven days, and guided me to his personal chambers. I did not realize then what a privilege he had bestowed on me. I don’t think Naamah appreciated the treatment I received, but to her credit she appeared to do her best to put it behind us. We remained at a truce of distant friendship, one that I suspected could grow closer once Solomon sought more wives.
But for now, I looked about his spacious and opulent chambers, stunned by the beauty and yet simplicity of the furnishings. Where gold and tapestries had adorned the audience hall, very little lined the walls in his chambers. Piles of plush cushions created a comfortable seating area, and a raised bed with heavy curtains took up the sleeping room.
He guided me there without pausing, and I noticed that servants had lit golden lamps set in niches in the walls. A single table sat to the side, where a small, carved cedar chest rested. I glanced at it with a curious look, but he simply tipped my chin to gaze into his eyes, away from the trappings of his room.
“How beautiful you are, my dove,” he whispered, his voice more earnest than it had been during the public ceremony. He lifted the clasp that held my veil in place and carefully laid it aside. One by one the combs Rani had wound through my hair came undone until my waist-length tresses fell like a covering around me. The unbinding of hair was a sacred symbol to my people, one that bound me to him in a way nothing else quite could.
He touched the strands as though they were silken gold, then slowly tucked a few behind one ear. His lips sought the place at my ear that he had exposed, then trailed along my chin, stopping slowly at my lips. My breath came faster with each touch of his lips against my skin.
“I belong to my beloved and his desire is for me,” I said, boldly returning his kiss.
He laughed, a delightful sound, and I discovered how quickly all the finery of preparation could be undone in one passionate moment. Solomon wasted no time drawing me into his arms and leading me to the place where we could complete our love.
I did not hear the song of my youth or the desire of my past in his kiss, for a new song now filled me. A song of completeness and belonging, of knowing I was loved.
A song I would long remember.
Postlude
They say time has a way of changing our desires, but life has taught me that desires are only changed when we allow them to be. Circumstances beyond our control will intrude into our lives every single day, but they cannot change our heart’s longings. Circumstances cannot even change us unless we le
t them.
When I was a child, I thought my life would follow the pattern of every other girl in my village. I would grow up and marry and bear children and die. It is the pattern and circle of all life. But I did not see that I would be taken from my village, marry and remain a virgin, then marry again and become a companion of one of Israel’s greatest kings. In all of this, I only saw the moment, and I made choices to accept the moments as good—most of the time.
There were times when the good escaped me and took my heart’s song with it. But when the days grew darkest and the times most uncertain, I recalled words my ima had whispered to me before she died. Words she had heard passed down throughout Israel that were first penned by King David: “The Lord is my strength and my shield. My heart trusts in him, and he helps me. My heart leaps for joy, and with my song I praise him.”
My ima was right. Life is indeed full of joy . . . and with my song I will praise my King.
Note to the Reader
Abishag’s story in Scripture is short and yet intriguing. In a certain sense she is like Esther, whose entrance into the king’s court came about through a beauty contest. In his later years, King David could not stay warm, which prompted his servants to suggest a beautiful virgin be sought to entice his ardor. Of all the maids in Israel, Abishag was chosen.
But King David had apparently passed the point of male passion, for Abishag remained a virgin during the remainder of David’s reign. Upon King David’s death, however, the story takes a turn, and Abishag becomes a piece in the royal puzzle, one that completes and solidifies Solomon’s right to rule.
As with all of the women in Scripture, we cannot know the minute details of Abishag’s life. What type of home did she come from? What dreams did she dream? What became of her?
Some suggest that Abishag the Shunammite is the same person named in the Song of Solomon as “the Shulammite.” Others don’t see it that way. Shunem, where Abishag apparently came from, was a city in northern Israel. We do not know the location of the Shulammite’s heritage. A one-letter difference in the spelling of these names leaves enough of a gap to allow for speculation.
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