Disavowal and Projection: an example from the life of King David

“You are the man”. These are the words spoken to King David from the prophet, Nathan in 2 Samuel, chapter 12. Two words in the Hebrew (atah ha’ish), translated as four words in English. As the author describes this story, the reader gets the sense that David immediate understood what was being communicated to him; and it put a chill down his spine.

Prior to hearing these words from the prophet, David had committed adultery with a married woman named Bathsheeba and then had her husband killed to cover up a possible scandal. As far as we know he thinks he’s gotten away with it all. That is until God sends the prophet Nathan to confront him.

Nathan comes to the king and tells him a story about a man who had one sheep. This man loved his sheep so much he named the sheep and thought of it as a child. One day his rich neighbor who had much land and hundreds of sheep was hosting a visitor and needed to slaughter a sheep for his meal. Instead of choosing a sheep from one of his flock, this neighbor sneaks over into the man’s yard and steals his one and only sheep to slaughter and serve as a meal that night.

Upon hearing this, David is outraged at the injustice and shouts out, “That man must die!”

The prophet Nathan responds back to David with the two Hebrew words that began this paper: אתה הא'ש. Translation: You are the man!

You, David. It’s you I was just describing. You are the man who has any resource available at his disposal; and it’s you, David, that stole from your neighbor something that he dearly loved and cherished. You are the man that I was just describing, David.

With this, David falls on his face and weeps. He knows what Nathan has just said is true; and he experiences the conviction that naturally went along with his wrongdoing.

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Sometimes it’s too scary to admit our own faults, to take an honest look at our behavior and admit wrong. In those circumstances one way that the mind avoids feelings of guilt and shame is by finding other people in the world with similar attributes that we can express our outrage at. The psychological term for this phenomenon is called projection.

During projection, we disavow the unwanted feelings we have inside of us and project them into another person in order to avoid our own disappointment and outrage at ourselves. All the while projection frees us up to express our full outrage at someone other than ourselves, and gives us permission to say things like, “That man must die!”

As therapists, one of our jobs is to recognize projection when we see it in our clients and find a way to give those projections back to their owners, much like Nathan does with David. Only then is one capable of processing their pain in a healthy way. Very carefully, we find ways to say to our clients, “Actually, I think this belongs to you.” If the projection is taken back two things become possible in that moment: 1) one can begin the work of self-forgiveness, 2) we can love our neighbor more fully.