1 Samuel 30:17

_AND DAVID SMOTE THEM FROM THE TWILIGHT EVEN UNTO THE EVENING OF THE NEXT DAY: AND THERE ESCAPED NOT A MAN OF THEM, SAVE FOUR HUNDRED YOUNG MEN, WHICH RODE UPON CAMELS, AND FLED._ There escaped not a man of them, save four hundred young men, which rode upon camels, and fled - rather dromedaries (see a story exactly parallel, Robinson's 'Biblical Researches,' 2:, p. 584). The people as well as the booty taken from Ziklag was recovered, and, besides, a great amount of spoil which they had collected in wide freebooting excursion....

16-20 Sinners are nearest to ruin, when they cry, Peace and safety, and put the evil day far from them. Nor does any thing give our spiritual enemies more advantage than sensuality and indulgence. Eating and drinking, and dancing, have been the soft and pleasant way in which many have gone down to the congregation of the dead. The spoil was recovered, and brought off; nothing was lost, but a great deal gained....

Verse 1 Samuel 30:17. _THERE ESCAPED NOT A MAN OF THEM_] It is well known to every careful reader of the Bible, that the _Amalekites_ were a proscribed people, even by God himself, and that in extirpating them it has been supposed David fulfilled the express will of God. But all this depends on whether _he_ had an express commission to do so, received from God himself, as Saul had....

DAVID RESCUES HIS WIVES FROM THE AMALEKITES (1 Samuel 30:1). EXPOSITION DAVID UPON HIS RETURN FINDS ZIKLAG BURNT BY THE AMALEKITES (1 Samuel 30:1). 1 SAMUEL 30:1 ON THE THIRD DAY. David evidently could not have gone with the Philistines As far as to Shunem; for, as noticed in the previous chapter, it would have been impossible to march back to Ziklag in so short a time

AND DAVID SMOTE THEM FROM THE TWILIGHT EVEN UNTO THE EVENING OF THE NEXT DAY,.... As there are two twilights, the twilight of the morning, and the twilight of the evening; this is differently understood some take it for the twilight of the morning, and that it was night when David came to them, and let them alone till they were drunk and asleep, and then early in the morning fell upon them, and smote them until the evening; so Josephus s relates it; but others take it to be the twilight of the evening, and that he fell upon them that night, and continued the slaughter of them to the evening of the next day, with which agrees the Targum; nay, some take the next day, or the morrow, to be that which followed after the two evenings; so that this slaughter was carried on to the third day: AND THERE ESCAPED NOT A MAN OF THEM, SAVE FOUR HUNDRED YOUNG MEN THAT RODE UPON CAMELS, AND FLED; that s...

CHAPTER 30 _ 1. The Amalekites destroy Ziklag (1 Samuel 30:1)_ 2. David's distress and return unto the Lord (1 Samuel 30:6) 3. David pursues the Amalekites (1 Samuel 30:9) 4. The young Egyptian and the defeat of the enemy (1 Samuel 30:11) 5. The threatening dissension and David's decision (1 Samuel 30:21) 6. The spoil sent to Judah (1 Samuel 30:26) The chastening hand of the Lord now rests heav

1 SAMUEL 30. AMALEKITE RAID ON ZIKLAG._ Cf._ above. 1 SAMUEL 30:1. On reaching Ziklag, David found that the Amalekites had sacked the town and carried off the families and property of himself and his followers. Apparently he had taken his whole force to Achish, leaving Ziklag without any adequate garrison. 1 SAMUEL 30:7. Encouraged by an oracle from Yahweh, David went in pursuit, probably southwards, overtook the raiders, annihilated them all but 400, and recovered the captives and the spoil. 1 SAMUEL 30:14. CHERETHITES: a tribe in the South or Negeb (_cf._ 1 Samuel 27:10), pr

THE TWILIGHT. the morning. Hebrew. _nesheph, a_ Homonym: meaning (1) _darkness,_ 2 Kings 7:5; 2 Kings 7:7; Job 24:15.Proverbs 7:9; Isaiah 5:11; Isaiah 21:4; Isaiah 59:10; Jeremiah 13:16. _(2) daylight,_ 1 Samuel 30:17

The pursuit 7. _bring me hither the ephod_ He desired to consult God by means of the Urim and Thummim, as before at Keilah (1 Samuel 23:9)....

AND DAVID SMOTE THEM, &C.— The number of Amalekites that fled, was equal to that of all David's forces; and out of self-preservation, he was obliged to put as many of them to the sword as he could, to prevent being surrounded and destroyed by so superior a number. A partial victory, instead of being of any service to him, would have rather turned out to his disadvantage; because the straggling parties might have united, and watched an opportunity of retrieving their defeat by a second attack; and it was not unknown to David, nor can it be unknown to any impartial reader, that the Amalekites were such inveterate enemies to the Israelites, and so restless at the same time, that they would have lost no opportunity of wiping off their disgrace, or endangering the very being of the Israelitish nation. I affirm, lastly, that David not only acted prudently, but well, in pursuing his victory, an...