XXVII. (1 Samuel 27:1) David and his Band take Refuge with Achish, King of Gath, who Receives him Kindly, and gives him Ziklag as a Residence — Their Expeditions against the Nomad Tribes lying south of Canaan.... [ Continue Reading ]
AND DAVID SAID IN HIS HEART. — David’s position seems to have grown more and more untenable during the latter days of Saul’s reign. Probably the paroxysms of the king’s fatal malady grew sharper and more frequent, and his chieftains and favourites, whom, as we have already seen (1 Samuel 26), he had... [ Continue Reading ]
THE SIX HUNDRED MEN. — This was the original number. They still formed the nucleus of the force, but the total number was now far larger. These “six hundred” had each their households, besides which, many a group of warriors, large and small, had already joined the now renowned standard of the futur... [ Continue Reading ]
AND DAVID DWELT WITH ACHISH AT GATH. — His reception by the Philistines seems to have been most kindly. There was a wide difference between the circumstances of this and his former visit to Gath. _Then_ he was a fugitive, almost unattended; _now_ he was at the head of an army of trained and devoted... [ Continue Reading ]
AND IT WAS TOLD SAUL. — This short statement tells us plainly that up to the moment when Saul heard that David had crossed the frontier, he had not ceased to pursue after him and to seek his life. Ewald considers that it was during the residence at Gath that David exercised himself as a musician in... [ Continue Reading ]
WHY SHOULD THY SERVANT DWELL IN THE ROYAL CITY WITH THEE? — The real reason why David wished a separate residence was that he might conduct his forays and other affairs apart from the supervision of his Philistine friends. _They_ had one purpose in welcoming him and his band, _he_ had quite another.... [ Continue Reading ]
ZIKLAG. — In the days of Joshua this place fell to the lot of Simeon (Joshua 19:5). It was afterwards captured by the Philistines, not long before the time of David, and Keil thinks was left without inhabitants in consequence of this conquest. Its exact situation has never been clearly ascertained;... [ Continue Reading ]
A FULL YEAR AND FOUR MONTHS. — Keil calls attention to the exact statement of time here as a proof of the historical character of the whole narrative. The Hebrew expression, translated “a year,” is a singular one: _yamim_ — literally, _days_ — a collective term, used in Leviticus 25:29; 1 Samuel 1:3... [ Continue Reading ]
WENT UP. — The expression is strictly accurate. The nomad tribes against whom his expeditions were directed dwelt on higher ground than David’s home at Ziklag, apparently on the wide extent of the mountain plateau, that high table-land at the north-east of the desert of Paran. THE GESHURITES, AND TH... [ Continue Reading ]
AND LEFT NEITHER MAN NOR WOMAN ALIVE. — These acts of ferocious barbarity are simply without excuse; the reason for them is told us in 1 Samuel 27:11. No captive was to be left alive to tell the tale to King Achish, who was under the delusion that David’s feats of arms were carried out at the expens... [ Continue Reading ]
AND DAVID SAID, AGAINST THE SOUTH OF JUDAH. — The answer of David to his sovereign lord, the King of Gath — for he was now, to all intents and purposes, a vassal prince of Achish — was simply a falsehood. He had been engaged in distant forays against the old Bedaween enemies of Israel, far away in t... [ Continue Reading ]
AND DAVID SAVED NEITHER MAN NOR WOMAN. — This and the following (12th) verse gives the reason for these atrocious acts of murder. The wild and irresponsible Arab chief alone seemed represented in David in this dark portion of his career. This saddest of all the Chapter s in David’s life follows clos... [ Continue Reading ]