Where’s Lumpy?

I have not watched NBC’s new “Kings” series, nor do I plan to.  In the current political climate (“current” meaning from the days of Woodrow Wilson through the present), any series that glorifies absolute power concentrated in the hands of a monarch gives me the willies.  This, aired to a nation that by and large couldn’t pick the Constitution out of a deck of playing cards, spells trouble.

I have read that the series is based on the story of King David in I and II Samuel.  As more and more economic and military power is concentrated in the hands of a U.S. presidency seemingly bent on enslaving a populace that begs for it, I share Samuel’s warning to Israel, occasioned by their demand for a king (who turned out to be the abysmal King Saul):

So Samuel told all the words of the LORD to the people who were asking for a king from him. He said, “These will be the ways of the king who will reign over you: he will take your sons and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horsemen and to run before his chariots.  And he will appoint for himself commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and some to plow his ground and to reap his harvest, and to make his implements of war and the equipment of his chariots.  He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers.  He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his servants.  He will take the tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and to his servants. He will take your male servants and female servants and the best of your young men and your donkeys, and put them to his work.  He will take the tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves. And in that day you will cry out because of your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves, but the LORD will not answer you in that day. (I Samuel 8:10-18, ESV; emphases mine)