CONSIDERING ACHISH as his best hope in his desperate situation, David sought asylum from him. But David’s best hope crashed! What he thought would be a safe place turned out to be a dangerous one. He was now “in their hands” (v.13) – “under arrest, confined and taken into custody”.⁷ David must now think of how to escape. David’s attempts at self-preservation by lying to a priest (1 Sam 21:1-9) and seeking security from an enemy (vv.10-12) had both backfired. And now he had to act out of character in a bizarre manner to ensure his own safety: “he pretended to be insane in their presence” and “acted like a madman” (v.13, NIV). For David, this was his only way out. In his pretended insanity he “scribbled on the doors of the gate” (v.13). Perhaps, he was “writing nonsensical graffiti or symbols associated with cultic curses”.⁸ And he demeaned himself by “letting saliva run down his beard” (v.13). “The beard was an obvious and important symbol of manhood in that culture, and desecration of one’s beard – especially with spit (cf. Num 12:14; Job 30:10) – would be an obvious indication of derangement within the context of their culture.”⁹ David’s act convinced the Philistines that he was no longer a threat to them. In 1 Samuel 21, David was hardly in touch with God. But God was with him, speaking to him through “the sword of Goliath” (1 Sam 21:9) and the Philistines’ recognition of him as “David the king of the land” (v.11).

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⁷ Dale Ralph Davis, 219 ⁸ Robert D. Bergen, 1, 2 Samuel, The New American Commentary (B & H, 1996), 224 ⁹ Robert D. Bergen, 224