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The first part of II Samuel 15 describes (part of) Absalom's preparations and maneuvers towards his rebellion against his father, King David, which is related from v. 10 on. According to the plain sense of the story, the first six verses describe his attempts at »stealing away the hearts of the men of Israel« (v. 6), first by appropriating the style of kings in providing himself with a (luxurious?) royal chariot and fifty men running before him; and later by denouncing the king's justice on the one hand, and suggesting his own kind of dealing justice to the wronged, had he been appointed a judge, on the other hand.
Absalom's apparent regal pomp in the form of a chariot and fifty runners is mentioned again in the story of Adoni j ah in I Reg 1,5, as well as in the »law of the king« in I Sam 8,11. The runners accompanying the king are mentioned elsewhere in the Bible, e.g. in I Sam 22,17, and in II Reg 11,4.6.11.19 they appear as a type of bodyguards of the king; and cf. also I Reg 14,27. Absalom then, as remarked by most commentators, slowly and shrewdly paves his way to the throne and the hearts of the people, first by apparently masquerading in public in regal pomp, the chariot and fifty runners serving thus as clear symbols of the status desired by him.1
A closer perusal of the whole pericope of II Sam 15,1-6, however, raises the question of whether we face here nothing but an extravagant and pompous display on the part of Absalom in his attempt to imprint his desired royal image in the public mind, thus legitimizing his concealed claim to the throne; or whether the colorful description hints at more than what meets the eyes at first glance, and Absalom here specifically underlines one of the main, and probably most important, roles of the ancient king -the supreme judge (cf. II Sam 12,1-6; 14,3 ff.; II Reg 6,26-30 and more).
Quite a few terms and idioms in this pericope, most of them part of a legal-technical jargon transpiring in biblical times, point, in my view, to the notion that the story under discussion aims at underlining not merely the regal...