2 Samuel 13:30

_AND IT CAME TO PASS, WHILE THEY WERE IN THE WAY, THAT TIDINGS CAME TO DAVID, SAYING, ABSALOM HATH SLAIN ALL THE KING'S SONS, AND THERE IS NOT ONE OF THEM LEFT._ Tidings came to David, saying, Absalom hath slain all the king's sons. It was natural that, in the consternation and tumult caused by so atrocious a deed, an exaggerated report should reach the court, which was plunged into the depths of grief and despair. But the information of Jonadab, who seems to have been privy to the design, and the arrival of the other princes, made known the real extent of the catastrophe....

30-39 Jonadab was as guilty of Ammon's death, as of his sin; such false friends do they prove, who counsel us to do wickedly. Instead of loathing Absalom as a murderer, David, after a time, longed to go forth to him. This was David's infirmity: God saw something in his heart that made a difference, else we should have thought that he, as much as Eli, honoured his sons more than God....

Verse 2 Samuel 13:30. _ABSALOM HATH SLAIN ALL THE KING'S SONS_] _Fame_ never _lessens_ but always _magnifies_ a fact. _Report_, contrary to the nature of all other things, _gains strength by going_. _Virgil_ has given, in his best manner, a fine personification of _Fame_ or _Evil Report_. - AEN. iv., 173. Extemplo Libyae magnas it _Fama_ per urbes; _Fama_, malum qua non aliud velocius ullum, Mobilitate viget, viresque adquirit eundo, c. "Now _Fame_, tremendous fiend! without delay, Through Libyan cities took her rapid way...

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 IT CAME TO PASS WHILE THEY WERE IN THE WAY,.... On their road homewards, before they got to Jerusalem: THAT TIDINGS CAME TO DAVID; perhaps brought by one who was at the entertainment, who upon seeing Amnon smitten, immediately rose up and fled with the news of it to David: SAYING, ABSALOM HATH SLAIN ALL THE KING'S SONS, AND THERE IS NOT ONE OF THEM LEFT; which he might suppose was the design of Absalom, and was done before that time; however, so it was ordered in Providence, that David, that rejoiced at the news of the death of Uriah, might be terrified with the tidings of the death of all his sons; and for a while it was as if it was really so, which occasioned the following behaviour in him....

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

The news brought to David. Absalom's flight 31. _tare his garments_ RENT HIS CLOTHES. The E. V. has introduced a distinction which does not exist in the Hebrew. Cp. ch. 2 Samuel 1:11. _lay on the earth_ Cp. ch. 2 Samuel 12:16. _and all his servants_, &c. The Sept. and Vulg. represent a slightly different reading; "And all his servants, who stood by him, rent their clothes....

_Absalom Flees to Talmai._ 2 Samuel 13:30-39 30 And it came to pass, while they were in the way, that tidings came to David, saying, Absalom hath slain all the king's sons, and there is not one of them left. 31 Then the king arose, and tare his garments, and lay on the earth; and all his servants stood by with their clothes rent. 32 And Jonadab, the son of Shimeah David's brother, answered and said, Let not my lord suppose _that_ they have slain all the young men the king's sons; for Amnon only is dead: for by the appointment of Absalom this hath been determined from the day that he forced his sister Tamar. 33 Now therefore let not my lord the king take the thing to his heart, to think that all the king's sons are dead: for Amnon only is dead. 34 But Absalom fled. And the young man that kept the watch lifted up his eyes, and looked, and, behold, there cam

THE CRIME OF AMNON, AND ABSALOM'S VENGEANCE This narrative and the history of Absalom's rebellion is omitted in Chronicles....