Editorial July 9, 1949 Issue

THE WIFE OF NABAL

Robert Ellis Key

"A little more grace, a motive made pure, a few truths tenderly told, a heart softened, a character subdued, a life consecrated, would restore the right action of the mental mechanism, and make manifest the movement of body and soul in accord with God." Thus states Mary Baker Eddy in "Miscellaneous Writings" (p. 354). The mental mechanism to which Mrs. Eddy refers must move in the right direction in order to produce a right result. Selfishness and sin, if not corrected, are disastrous to harmonious action.

The Bible contains many object lessons indicating that right action brings harmonious results—lessons greatly illumined by Christian Science. One is the story of Nabal and David as found in the twenty-fifth chapter of I Samuel.

Nabal was a rich man who lived at Maon. He had three thousand sheep and a thousand goats grazing on the slopes of Carmel. But with all his wealth, Nabal was a churlish creature. His wife, Abigail, admitted as much to David. "Nabal is his name," she said, "and folly is with him." Nabal gave little thought to the courtesies of life. He was wealthy, and may have thought his riches would command respect without the exercise of the sentiments. Thus in his perverted view of life Nabal entertained a false material sense of substance. No doubt his material possessions impressed his neighbors; perhaps they induced a sense of servility on the part of the lesser landowners of the district, and this gratified his pride and tickled his ambition.

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