Beauty and the Beast. The beastly brute is Nabal. A grumpy geezer. A gentleman farmer whose grasp for gold was only exceeded by his grasp for Mogen David. His eyes gazed over the greenly robed spring fields as he saw his herds of sheep gently grazing. His ears heard the bleat of sheep as nine pounds of wool was removed from their fat lamb shoulders. His nose caught the fragrant smell of rich foods placed on his teeming table by servants forced to work for a Simon Legree whip-cracking master.

A few miles south of Hebron in the tiny village of Maon, Nabal had carved out an empire of land, livestock, and lucre. All was "hunkey-dorey" until David proved to be the fly in the ointment.

It happened during the sheep shearing festival of an emerald green springtime. Ten of David’s men asked for f…