The Secret Chord

Content Warning: The book depicts multiple instances of rape including graphic accounts of nonconsensual sex and humiliation. The following section includes analysis of one or more of those instances.

“Civilization is built upon the backs of men like him, whose blood and sweat make it possible. But comes the peace, and the civil world has scant place for such men.”

Natan raises the question of how to remember brutal men who made something good possible. The moral dilemma of Necessity as a Justification for Violence is a core theme of the book.

“Because of my work, he will live. And not just as a legend lives, a safe tale for the fireside, fit for the ears of the young. Nothing about him ever was safe. Because of me, he will live in death as he did in life: a man who dwelt in the searing glance of the divine, but who sweated and stank, rutted without restraint, butchered the innocent, betrayed those most loyal to him. Who loved hugely, and was kind; who listened to brutal truth and honored the truth teller; who flayed himself for his wrongdoing; who built a nation, made music that pleased heaven and left poems in our mouths that will be spoken by people yet unborn.”

Natan ponders the complexity of the human person and the difficulty of recording in history their true character. The use of two parallel sentences to list David’s good and bad characteristics works through antithesis to assert the impossibility of making a simple judgment of a person. It also works as foreshadowing, trying to build the reader’s curiosity about whom David will betray, whom he truly loved, and what brutal truths he embraced.

“The sweet singer of Israel. So the people called him, long before he was king. I had heard that singer’s voice fill a hall, and bring tears to the cheeks of seasoned warriors. But I had heard it also on the battlefield, fierce and wild, carrying over the clash of arms and the cries of the dying.”

Music is a central motif of The Secret Chord. It reveals truths about people. In this early passage about David’s great musical gift, it reveals why different kinds of people loved him, but more importantly sets up the tension between peace and war. David can use his gifts for either. His character arc is about which goal to embrace.