2 Samuel 13:16

_AND SHE SAID UNTO HIM, THERE IS NO CAUSE: THIS EVIL IN SENDING ME AWAY IS GREATER THAN THE OTHER THAT THOU DIDST UNTO ME. BUT HE WOULD NOT HEARKEN UNTO HER._ No JFB commentary on this verse....

1-20 From henceforward David was followed with one trouble after another. Adultery and murder were David's sins, the like sins among his children were the beginnings of his punishment: he was too indulgent to his children. Thus David might trace the sins of his children to his own misconduct, which must have made the anguish of the chastisement worse. Let no one ever expect good treatment from those who are capable of attempting their seduction; but it is better to suffer the greatest wrong than to commit the least sin....

The sense of the passage probably is, “And she spake with him on account of this great wrong in sending me away, greater than the other wrong which thou hast done me (said she), but he hearkened not unto her.” The Hebrew text is probably corrupt, and the writer blends Tamar’s words with his own narrative....

EXPOSITION 2 SAMUEL 13:1 AFTER THIS. This phrase, as we have seen on 2 Samuel 10:1, has little chronological force, but the date of the sad event which formed the second stage in David's punishment can be settled with considerable certainty. Tamar was the daughter of Maacah, a princess of Geshur, and David's marriage with her, while still at Hebron, is mentioned as a proof of his growing power, and consequently some time must have elapsed after his appointment as king before this alliance took place. As Absalom was apparently older than Tamar, if she were now fifteen or sixteen years of age. David would have been king of all Israel at least thirteen or fourteen years, and would have reached the summit of his glory. His wars would be over, Rabbah capt

AND SHE SAID UNTO HIM, [THERE IS] NO CAUSE,.... For such treatment as this: THIS EVIL IN SENDING ME AWAY [IS] GREATER THAN THE OTHER THAT THOU DIDST UNTO ME; not that this was a greater sin, but it was a greater evil or injury to her, that being done secretly, this openly; being turned out in that open manner, it might look as if she was the aggressor, and had drawn her brother into this sin, or however had consented to it; had it been kept a secret, she would not have been exposed to public shame and disgrace, and she might have been disposed of in marriage to another; it would not have been known to the grief of her father, to the revenge of Absalom, and to the dishonour of religion; besides, the sin of Amnon might have been more easily excused, if any excuse could be made for it, as that it arose from the force of lust, and a strong impure affection, but this from barbarity and inhum...

3. FURTHER CHASTISEMENT: AMNON, TAMAR, AND ABSALOM CHAPTER 13 _ 1. Amnon's wicked desire (2 Samuel 13:1)_ 2. The incest (2 Samuel 13:6) 3. His hatred (2 Samuel 13:15) 4. Amnon murdered (2 Samuel 13:19) 5. Absalom's flight (2 Samuel 13:37) “Behold I will raise up evil against thee out of thine own house.” This was Jehovah's sentence and it is now carried out. The evil which he had nourished in his heart, the passion which he had fed now breaks out in his own family. His oldest

2 SAMUEL 13. AMNON, TAMAR, AND ABSALOM (J). 2 SAMUEL 13:1. Amnon, David's eldest son, forces his half-sister, Tamar, the full sister of Absalom. He might have married her (2 Samuel 3:5 *) but did not choose to do so. She rent her royal tunic, probably a garment reaching to the hands and feet (_cf._ Genesis 37:3 *); Joseph's coat of many colours represents the same Heb. word. David was angry, but he did not vex him by punishing him, for he loved him because he was his first-born (so LXX). 2 SAMUEL 13:23. Two years later, Absalom induced Amnon to be his guest at the sheepshearing (p. 101) at Baalhazor

NO CAUSE. Hebrew "[Give] no ground for talk". EVIL. Hebrew. _ra`a `._ App-44....

There is _no cause_ The Heb. text cannot be so translated, and is certainly corrupt. The Sept. is also confused, but its original reading as indicated by the Old Latin Version gives an excellent sense, thus; "_And she said unto him, Nay, my brother, for greater will be this latter wrong, in sending me away, than the former that thou didst unto me_....

THEN AMNON HATED HER EXCEEDINGLY— The flux and reflux of passion in a brutal breast are here finely painted. Commentators are at a loss to account for this sudden and excessive hatred; and, indeed, there seems to be something extraordinary in it. Tamar's rape had an effect upon her ravisher directly contrary to that of Dinah upon her's. But their circumstances were different. Hope seconded and supported _Shechem's_ passion, but despair drove _Amnon's_ into its opposite extreme. This is often observed to be the case with passions too tumultuous and unruly. Amnon's mind was first agitated by lust, and then by remorse, which drove to different extremes like the vibrations of a pendulum. God abandoned him thus to the tumult of his own intemperate mind, to make this other punishment of David's adultery more flagrant, and the prophet's prediction of _raising up evil to him out of his own house...