Why was David called 'a man after God's own heart' even though he committed adultery and murder?

God's description of David (1 Samuel 13:14) refers to his orientation, not his moral perfection. David's Psalms — especially Psalm 51, written after his worst sin — show a person whose love for God meant failure drove him toward God, not away from Him. He always returned. Love of God is measured by the direction failure sends you.

How did Solomon start by loving God and end by turning away — and what caused it?

Solomon 'loved the LORD, walking in the statutes of David his father' (1 Kings 3:3) at the start of his reign. But 1 Kings 11 opens: 'Solomon loved' 700 foreign wives who turned his heart to their gods. The same capacity for love he once directed toward God was redirected. Love of God must be protected — it does not sustain itself automatically.

What does Deuteronomy 30:20 mean when Moses says God 'is thy life' — not gives life, but is it?

Moses declares: 'cleave unto him: for he is thy life.' This is an ontological statement, not a transactional promise. God is the source of existence itself — not a provider who rewards love with life as compensation. When Israel stopped loving God and pursued other gods, they were not breaking a rule. They were severing themselves from the source of their vitality as a people.

What does Hosea mean when he says Israel 'forgot' God — and why is forgetting worse than rebelling?

Hosea 2:13 says Israel 'forgat me, saith the LORD.' Israel did not hate God or consciously choose to abandon Him. She drifted in comfort, burned incense to the Baals, wore her jewelry, chased other lovers, and forgot. Forgetting implies intimacy that cooled — not ignorance, but betrayal through gradual inattention. The prophets consistently found this pattern more dangerous than open apostasy.

What is the promise of Deuteronomy 30:6 about the 'circumcision of the heart' — and what does it say about this commandment's difficulty?

Deuteronomy 30:6 promises God will 'circumcise thine heart to love the LORD thy God with all thine heart.' This acknowledges that full obedience to this commandment requires divine transformation, not just human effort. Jeremiah called it a new covenant written on the heart (Jer 31:33). Ezekiel called it a heart of flesh replacing stone (Ezek 36:26). Moses saw it coming.

Commandment #3 · Positive · Belief & God

Love God

וְאָהַבְתָּ אֵת יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ

Source: Deuteronomy 6:5 · Maimonides, Sefer HaMitzvot, Positive #3

Of all the commandments in the Torah, this one is hardest to enforce and easiest to fake. You can observe Shabbat without loving God. You can bring offerings without loving God. You can recite the Shema without loving God. This commandment demands something internal — a genuine orientation of the heart. The history of Israel is largely the history of what happened when this love was present and what happened when it was not.

וְאָהַבְתָּ אֵת יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ בְּכָל לְבָבְךָ וּבְכָל נַפְשְׁךָ וּבְכָל מְאֹדֶךָ

"And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might."

Deuteronomy 6:5 — Open in Torah Reader

David: A Man After God's Own Heart אִישׁ כִּלְבָבוֹ

When God rejected Saul and sought a new king for Israel, the phrase He used through Samuel became the defining description of what this commandment looks like in a human life:

בִּקֵּשׁ יְהוָה לוֹ אִישׁ כִּלְבָבוֹ

"The LORD hath sought him a man after his own heart."

1 Samuel 13:14

David was not perfect. He committed adultery, arranged a murder, numbered the people in pride, and made catastrophic choices with his children. But in every case, he returned. The Psalms are the record of a man who loved God so genuinely that failure drove him back toward God rather than away from Him. Psalm 51 — written after his worst sin — is not the prayer of a man performing repentance. It is the cry of someone who genuinely missed closeness with God.

This is what makes David the template for the third commandment: love of God is not measured by the absence of failure but by what failure does to you. If it drives you toward God, the love is real.

Solomon: The Tragedy of Love That Cooled לֵב שֶׁהִתְקָרֵר

Solomon began his reign explicitly described as loving God. 1 Kings 3:3: "Solomon loved the LORD, walking in the statutes of David his father." God appeared to him and offered anything he asked. Solomon asked for wisdom. It was granted, along with riches and honor. His Temple dedication prayer in 1 Kings 8 is among the most beautiful expressions of love toward God in the Hebrew scriptures.

But 1 Kings 11 opens with the word וְהַמֶּלֶךְ שְׁלֹמֹה אָהַב — "King Solomon loved" — and what follows are the seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines. The same verb used for his love of God now introduces his descent. Love of God and love of that which distracts from God cannot coexist indefinitely. One will win.

Moses' Warning: Love Is Life כִּי הוּא חַיֶּיךָ

In his final address before Israel entered Canaan, Moses frames the entire covenant as a choice between life and death — and the hinge is love:

לְאַהֲבָה אֶת יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ לִשְׁמֹעַ בְּקֹלוֹ וּלְדָבְקָה בוֹ כִּי הוּא חַיֶּיךָ

"That thou mayest love the LORD thy God, and that thou mayest obey his voice, and that thou mayest cleave unto him: for he is thy life."

Deuteronomy 30:20 — Open in Torah Reader

Moses does not say God will give life as a reward for love. He says God is life. This is not a transactional statement. To love God is to be connected to the source of existence itself. The covenantal blessings of land, long life, and prosperity are downstream effects. The love itself is the connection to life. When Israel stopped loving God and pursued other gods, they were not merely breaking a rule — they were cutting themselves off from the source of their vitality as a people.

Hosea: When Israel Forgot God הוֹשֵׁעַ

The prophet Hosea received the most intimate and painful command in all of Scripture: marry a woman who would be unfaithful to you, as a living parable of Israel's relationship with God. His entire message is a grief-stricken love letter from God to a nation that has forgotten Him:

וּפָקַדְתִּי עָלֶיהָ אֶת יְמֵי הַבְּעָלִים אֲשֶׁר תַּקְטִיר לָהֶם וְתִשְׁכַּח אֹתִי נְאֻם יְהוָה

"And I will visit upon her the days of Baalim, wherein she burned incense to them; and she forgat me, saith the LORD."

Hosea 2:13

The word וַתִּשְׁכַּח — "she forgot" — is the most devastating description of a violation of this commandment. Israel did not hate God. She forgot Him. In the comfort of Canaan, with harvests to celebrate and neighbors' festivals to attend, God simply slipped out of first place. The violation of this commandment rarely comes as open rebellion. It comes as distraction, accommodation, gradual forgetting.

The Promise: God Will Circumcise the Heart מוּל לֵבָבֶךָ

The most astonishing element of this commandment is what God says will happen in the future — a promise that acknowledges the commandment is beyond human capacity to fully keep:

וּמָל יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ אֶת לְבָבְךָ וְאֶת לְבַב זַרְעֶךָ לְאַהֲבָה אֶת יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ בְּכָל לְבָבְךָ

"And the LORD thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the LORD thy God with all thine heart."

Deuteronomy 30:6 — Open in Torah Reader

This verse, in the context of restoration from exile, declares that there is a future state in which God Himself performs surgery on Israel's heart to enable complete love. The commandment was always there. But the capacity for full obedience to it awaits a divine act. The prophets saw this coming. Jeremiah called it a new covenant written on the heart. Ezekiel called it a heart of flesh replacing a heart of stone. Moses called it the circumcision of the heart.

Key Figures in This Commandment

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David — Love Through Failure

His Psalms are raw proof that love of God was not a performance for David but a pursuit. After his lowest moments he returned. After victories he attributed everything to God. No figure in Scripture embodies the third commandment more completely — imperfection and all.

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Hosea — God's Love for an Unfaithful Israel

Hosea did not only preach about Israel's failure to love God. He lived it. His marriage to Gomer — a wife who left him — was a parable God authored. The fact that God spoke to Israel through marital metaphor reveals how deeply He identifies the third commandment with covenant love, not mere obligation.

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Joshua's Final Charge

Before the tribes dispersed to their allotments, Joshua gave one final command in Joshua 23:11: "Take good heed therefore unto yourselves, that ye love the LORD your God." It was the last thing he said that mattered. Every other instruction depended on this one.

Study Questions

For reflection and group study

God called David "a man after my own heart" despite David's serious sins. What does this suggest about what God counts as love for Him — and what does it mean for how we evaluate ourselves?

See 1 Sam 13:14; Ps 51; Acts 13:22

The Shema (Deut 6:4) says God is one; the next verse (6:5) says love Him with all your heart, soul, might. Why does the declaration of God's unity come immediately before the command to love? What is the logical connection?

See Deut 6:4–5

Moses says God "is thy life" — not that He gives life, but that He is it. What does it mean for a community to lose love for God if love of God is life itself? What does Israel's exile look like through this lens?

See Deut 30:15–20; Hos 4:6

Hosea describes Israel's unfaithfulness as forgetting — not hating — God. What conditions in Israelite society enabled the forgetting? How does prosperity relate to the cooling of love?

See Hos 2:13; Deut 8:11–14; 32:15

Deuteronomy 30:6 says God will circumcise Israel's heart to love Him. If God has to perform an operation to enable this love, what does that say about the nature of the commandment — and why was it given at all if it requires divine enablement?

See Deut 30:6; Jer 31:33; Ezek 36:26

Read this commandment in the original Hebrew alongside the English translation.

Open Deuteronomy 6:5 in Torah Reader

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