Ahitophel

Seeing that his advice against David had not been followed due to Hushai's influence, Ahithophel surmised that the revolt would fail, returned to his hometown of Giloh, and hanged himself.

Levenson and Baruch Halpern, for example, note that "the narrator is sufficiently subtle (or guileless) to have Bathsheba's grandfather ... instigate the exaction of YHWH's pound of flesh," as Nathan's curse in 2 Samuel 12:11 comes to fruition.

[1] The Talmud speaks of this counsellor of David as "a man, like Balaam, whose great wisdom was not received in humility as a gift from heaven, and so became a stumbling block to him.

And being thus familiar with Divine wisdom and knowledge as imparted through the Holy Spirit, he was consulted as an oracle like the Urim and Thummim.

Therefore, David did not hesitate to submit himself to his instruction, even though Ahithophel was a very young man at his death, not more than thirty-three years old.

The one thing lacking in him was sincere piety, which proved his undoing in the end, for it induced him to participate in Absalom's rebellion against David.

To this dire course of action, he was misled by astrology and other signs, which he interpreted as prophecies of his kingship when in reality, they pointed to the royal destiny of his granddaughter Bath-sheba.

Thus, Absalom would profit nothing by his rebellion, for, though he accomplished his father's ruin, he would yet be held to account and condemned to death for his violation of family purity, and the way to the throne would be clear for Ahithophel, the great sage in Israel.

"[5] But he withheld his mystic knowledge from King David in the hour of peril and was therefore doomed to die from strangulation.

[6] "Ahitophel of the house of Israel and Balaam of the heathen nations were the two great sages of the world who, failing to show gratitude to God for their wisdom, perished in dishonour.

When David again warned him of the malediction, Ahithophel counselled the king to throw a tile, with the Tetragrammaton written upon it, into the cavity; the waters began to sink.

Ahithophel is said to have defended his use of the name of God in this emergency by referencing the practice enjoined by Scripture (Numbers 5:23) to restore marital harmony; surely a matter of small importance, he argued, compared with the threatened destruction of the world.

Posterity has been favored with the knowledge of but a small part of Ahithophel's wisdom, and that little through two widely different sources, through Socrates, who was his disciple, and through a fortune-book written by him.