Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 1 Chronicles 20:1
And it came to pass, that after the year was expired, at the time that kings go out [to battle], Joab led forth the power of the army, and wasted the country of the children of Ammon, and came and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried at Jerusalem. And Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it.
1. after the year was expired ] R.V. at the time of the return of the year, i.e. in the spring, 2Sa 11:1 ; 1Ki 20:22.
the power of the army ] The Heb. phrase is quite general in meaning: the host of war, the military forces.
Rabbah ] the capital of the Ammonites; Jer 49:2; Eze 21:20 (25, Heb). Its site, now called ‘ Ammn, is covered with important ruins of the Roman and Byzantine periods. The town lies in a fertile basin, its citadel on a hill on the north side. Bdeker, pp. 185 ff.
David tarried at Jerusalem ] In 2 Sam. these words introduce the story of David’s adultery with Bath-sheba, which is omitted from Chron.
Joab smote Rabbah ] In 2Sa 12:27 Joab reports to David the capture of the city of waters (i.e. the lower city), and invites him to come and complete the conquest (presumably by capturing the citadel) in person. Probably the citadel was dependent for water on the river which lows through the town.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Ch. 1Ch 20:1-3 (= 2Sa 11:1; 2Sa 12:26-31). The Subjugation of Ammon
The account of the siege of Rabbah is given more shortly in Chron. than in 2 Sam. From the latter we learn that the Ark was in the besiegers’ camp (1Ch 11:11), that the city was defended with spirit (1Ch 11:17), and finally taken piecemeal (1Ch 12:26-29).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
This chapter, containing such other warlike exploits belonging to Davids reign as the writer of Chronicles thinks it important to put on record, is to be compared with the passages of Samuel noted in the marginal references.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
1Ch 20:1-8
And it came to pass, that after the year was expired.
The capture of Rabbah
From its capture and punishment of its people we learn–
I. That in spiritual warfare there must be no cessation. Rest gives advantage to the enemy, and may delay or frustrate the end in view. Forwards, children, forwards! urged Blucher, in meeting Wellington at Waterloo.
1. Make needful preparation.
2. Be ready for every advantage. The time to go out must be discovered and seized.
II. That in conducting spiritual warfare opportunity is given for the display of virtuous qualities (2Sa 12:26-29). We must, transfer the glory of our conquests to our gracious Commander and Leader.
III. That all things in spiritual warfare will be subdued under Gods power. (J. Wolfendale.)
And David took the crown of their king from off his head.
The loss of a crown
The loss of a crown is much or nothing. The crown itself is a mere bauble, but it is full of significance as a token. Every office points in the direction of supremacy. The doorkeeper is on the road to the highest seat. Do not have a crown that any one can take from you. Men may steal your clothes, but they cannot steal your character. Start your son with fifty thousand golden, pounds, and he may lose it all, and want fifty thousand more; start him with a fine sense of honour, with a sound practical education, with a love of wisdom, with a knowledge of things real, simple, practical, and of daily occurrence, and he will, be rich all the time. Let no man take thy crown. When Carlyle was so poor as hardly to have a loaf, he was walking by the popular side of Hyde Park, and looking upon all that gay tumult he said to himself, with what in another man might have been conceit, but what in him was heroic audacity: I am doing what none of you could do; that is to say, he was writing one of his profoundest and most useful books. There he was rich. Have ideas, convictions, resolutions, ideals, and be faithful as a steward ought to be faithful, and it will never be written of thee that any man took thy crown. A man may throw away such a crown, a man may play the fool in old age; but the truth now to be inculcated is this, that no man, or combination of men, can take away the moral crown, the spiritual diadem, without the mans own consent. (J. Parker, D. D.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
CHAPTER XX
Joab smites the city of Rabbah; and David puts the crown of its
king upon his own head, and treats the people of the city with
great rigour, 1-3.
First battle with the Philistines, 4.
Second battle with the Philistines, 5.
Third battle with the Philistines, 6, 7.
In these battles three giants are slain, 8.
NOTES ON CHAP. XX
Verse 1. After the year was expired, at the time that kings go out to battle] About the spring of the year; 2Sa 11:1.
After this verse the parallel place in Samuel relates the whole story of David and Bath-sheba, and the murder of Uriah, which the compiler of these books passes over as he designedly does almost every thing prejudicial to the character of David. All he states is, but David tarried at Jerusalem; and, while he thus tarried, and Joab conducted the war against the Ammonites, the awful transactions above referred to took place.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Of this first verse, see my notes on 2Sa 11:1; and of 1Ch 20:2,3, on 2Sa 12:30,31; and of the rest of this chapter, on 2Sa 21:15, &c., where also an account is given of the seeming differences between this and that relation.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
1. at the time when kings go out tobattlein spring, the usual season in ancient times forentering on a campaign; that is, a year subsequent to theSyrian war.
Joab led forth the power ofthe army, and wasted the country . . . of AmmonThe formercampaign had been disastrous, owing chiefly to the hired auxiliariesof the Ammonites; and as it was necessary, as well as just, that theyshould be severely chastised for their wanton outrage on the Hebrewambassadors, Joab ravaged their country and invested their capital,Rabbah. After a protracted siege, Joab took one part of it, the lowertown or “city of waters,” insulated by the winding courseof the Jabbok. Knowing that the fort called “the royal city”would soon fall, he invited the king to come in person, and have thehonor of storming it. The knowledge of this fact (mentioned in 2Sa12:26) enables us to reconcile the two statements”Davidtarried at Jerusalem” (1Ch20:1), and “David and all the people returned to Jerusalem”(1Ch 20:3).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
The account of the siege of Rabbah, the capital, in the following year, 1Ch 20:1-3, is much abridged as compared with that in 2Sa 11:1; 2Sa 12:26-31. After the clause, “but David sat (remained) in Jerusalem,” in 2 Sam 11, from 2Sa 11:2 onwards, we have the story of David’s adultery with Bathsheba, and the events connected with it (2 Sam 11:3-12:25), which the author of the Chronicle has omitted, in accordance with the plan of his book. Thereafter, in 2Sa 12:26, the further progress of the siege of Rabbah is again taken up with the words, “And Joab warred against Rabbah of the sons of Ammon;” and in 2Sa 12:27-29 the capture of that city is circumstantially narrated, viz., how Joab, after he had taken the water-city, i.e., the city lying on both banks of the upper Jabbok (the Wady Ammn), with the exception of the Acropolis built on a hill on the north side of the city, sent messages to David, and called upon him to gather together the remainder of the people, i.e., all those capable of bearing arms who had remained in the land; and how David, having done this, took the citadel. Instead of this, we have in the Chronicle only the short statement, “And Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it” (1Ch 20:1, at the end). After this, both narratives (1Ch 20:2, 1Ch 20:3, and 2Sa 12:30, 2Sa 12:31) coincide in narrating how David set the heavy golden crown of the king of the Ammonites on his head, brought much booty out of the city, caused the prisoners of war taken in Rabbah and the other fenced cities of the Ammonites to be slain in the cruellest way, and then returned with all the people, i.e., with the whole of his army, to Jerusalem. Thus we see that, according to the record in the Chronicle also, David was present at the capture of the Acropolis of Rabbah, then put on the crown of the Ammonite king, and commanded the slaughter of the prisoners; but no mention is made of his having gone to take part in the war. By the omission of this circumstance the narrative of the Chronicle becomes defective; but no reason can be given for this abridgment of the record, for the contents of 2Sa 12:26-31 must have been contained in the original documents made use of by the chronicler. On the differences between 2Sa 12:31 (Sam.) and 1Ch 20:3 of the Chronicle, see on 2Sa 12:31. , “he sawed asunder,” is the correct reading, and in Samuel is an orthographical error; while, on the contrary, in the Chronicle is a mistake for in Samuel. The omission of is probably explained by the desire to abridge; for if the author of the Chronicle does not scruple to tell of the sawing asunder of the prisoners with saws, and the cutting of them to pieces under threshing instruments and scythes, it would never occur to him to endeavour to soften David’s harsh treatment of them by passing over in silence the burning of them in brick-kilns.
The passages parallel to the short appendix-like accounts of the valiant deeds of the Israelitish leaders in 1Ch 20:4-8 are to be found, as has already been remarked, in 2Sa 21:18-22. There, however, besides the three exploits of which we are informed by the chronicler in 2Sa 21:15-17, a fourth is recorded, and that in the first place too, viz., the narrative of David’s fight with the giant Jishbi-Benob, who was slain by Abishai the son of Zeruiah. The reason why our historian has not recounted this along with the others is clear from the position which he assigns to these short narratives in his book. In the second book of Samuel they are recounted in the last section of the history of David’s reign, as palpable proofs of the divine grace of which David had had experience during his whole life, and for which he there praises the Lord in a psalm of thanksgiving (2 Sam 22). In this connection, David’s deliverance by the heroic act of Abishai from the danger into which he had fallen by the fierce attack which the Philistine giant Jishbi-Benob made upon him when he was faint, is very suitably narrated, as being a visible proof of the divine grace which watched over the pious king. For the concluding remark in 2Sa 21:17, that in consequence of this event his captains adjured David not to go any more into battle along with them, that the light of Israel might not be extinguished, shows in how great danger he was of being slain by this giant. For this reason the author of the book of Samuel has placed this event at the head of the exploits of the Israelite captains which he was about to relate, although it happened somewhat later in time than the three exploits which succeed. The author of the Chronicle, on the contrary, has made the account of these exploits an appendix to the account of the victorious wars by which David obtained dominion over all the neighbouring peoples, and made his name to be feared among the heathen, as a further example of the greatness of the power given to the prince chosen by the Lord to be over His people. For this purpose the story of the slaughter of the Philistine giant, who had all but slain the weary David, was less suitable, and is therefore passed over by the chronicler, although it was contained in his authority,
(Note: Lightfoot says, in his Chronol. V. T. p. 68: Illud praelium, in quo David in periculum venit et unde decore et illaesus exire non potuit, omissum est .)
as is clear from the almost verbal coincidence of the stories which follow with 2Sa 21:18. The very first is introduced by the formula, “It happened after this,” which in 2nd Samuel naturally connects the preceding narrative with this; while the chronicler has retained as a general formula of transition, – omitting, however, (Sam.) in the following clause, and writing , “there arose,” instead of . in the later Hebrew is the same as . The hypothesis that has arisen out of (in Samuel) is not at all probable, although is not elsewhere used of the origin of a war. Even is only once (Gen 41:30) used of the coming, or coming in, of a time. On and instead of and , see on 2Sa 21:18. at the end of the fourth verse is worthy of remark, “And they (the Philistines) were humbled,” which is omitted from Samuel, and “yet can scarcely have been arbitrarily added by our historian” (Berth.). This remark, however, correct as it is, does not explain the omission of the word from 2nd Samuel. The reason for that can scarcely be other than that it did not seem necessary for the purpose which the author of the book of Samuel had in the first place in view. As to the two other exploits (1Ch 20:6-8), see the commentary on 2Sa 21:19-22. for in the closing remark (1Ch 20:8) is archaic, but the omission of the article ( instead of , as we find it in Gen 19:8, Gen 19:25, and in other passages in the Pentateuch) cannot be elsewhere paralleled. In the last clause, “And they fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants,” that David should be named is surprising, because none of those here mentioned as begotten of Rapha, i.e., descendants of the ancient Raphaite race, had fallen by the hand of David, but all by the hand of his servants. Bertheau therefore thinks that this clause has been copied verbatim into our passage, and also into 2Sa 21:22, from the original document, where this enumeration formed the conclusion of a long section, in which the acts of David and of his heroes, in their battles with the giants in the land of the Philistines, were described. But since the author of the second book of Samuel expressly says, “These four were born to Rapha, and they fell” (2Sa 21:22), he can have referred in the words, “And they fell by the hand of David,” only to the four above mentioned, whether he took the verse in question unaltered from his authority, or himself added . In the latter case he cannot have added the without some purpose; in the former, the reference of the in the “longer section,” from which the excerpt is taken, to others than the four giants mentioned, to Goliath perhaps in addition, whom David slew, is rendered impossible by . The statement, “they fell by the hand of David,” does not presuppose that David had slain all of them, or even one of them, with his own hand; for frequently signifies only through, i.e., by means of, and denotes here that those giants fell in wars which David had waged with the Philistines – that David had been the main cause of their fall, had brought about their death by his servants through the wars he waged.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| The Defeat of the Ammonites. | B. C. 1306. |
1 And it came to pass, that after the year was expired, at the time that kings go out to battle, Joab led forth the power of the army, and wasted the country of the children of Ammon, and came and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried at Jerusalem. And Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it. 2 And David took the crown of their king from off his head, and found it to weigh a talent of gold, and there were precious stones in it; and it was set upon David’s head: and he brought also exceeding much spoil out of the city. 3 And he brought out the people that were in it, and cut them with saws, and with harrows of iron, and with axes. Even so dealt David with all the cities of the children of Ammon. And David and all the people returned to Jerusalem.
How the army of the Ammonites and their allies was routed in the field we read in the foregoing chapters. Here we have the destruction of Rabbah, the metropolis of their kingdom (v. 1), the putting of their king’s crown upon David’s head (v. 2), and the great severity that was used towards the people, v. 3. Of this we had a more full account in 2 Sam. xi., xii., and cannot but remember it by this sad token, that while Joab was besieging Rabbah David fell into that great sin in the matter of Uriah. But it is observable that, though the rest of the story is repeated, that is not: a hint only is given of it, in those words which lie here in a parenthesis–But David tarried at Jerusalem. If he had been abroad with his army, he would have been out of the way of that temptation; but, indulging his ease, he fell into uncleanness. Now, as the relating of the sin David fell into is an instance of the impartiality and fidelity of the sacred writers, so the avoiding of the repetition of it here, when there was a fair occasion given to speak of it again, is designed to teach us that, though there may be a just occasion to speak of the faults and miscarriages of others, yet we should not take delight in the repetition of them. That should always be looked upon as an unpleasing subject which, though sometimes one cannot help falling upon, yet one would not choose to dwell upon, any more than we should love to rake in a dunghill. The persons, or actions, we can say no good of, we had best say nothing of.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
see note on: 2Sa 12:26
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
CRITICAL NOTES.] This extract from the ancient records tells of Rabbah taken (1Ch. 20:1-3); and three sons of the giant of Gath slain (1Ch. 20:4-8). It covers 2 Samuel 11-21. [Murphy].
1Ch. 20:1-3.Rabbah taken. Year, at the return or beginning of the year, setting in of spring. Time, when kings of Israel were accustomed, after winter season, to go out to war. Rabbah besieged to complete chastisement of Ammon for insult to Davids messengers. Tarried, his presence not required in the war, more needful in seat of government (cf. 2Sa. 12:26-31). Crown. When citadel was taken, the king captured or killed; David took the crown from his head and set it upon his own, to represent himself lord of the Ammonite territory. Cut (1Ch. 20:3, cf. margin, made them sawers of stone, diggers of iron, and cutters of wood, i.e., condemned them to forced labour; cf. 2Sa. 12:30-31).
1Ch. 20:4-8.Giants slain. Gezer, Gob (2Sa. 21:19). Sibb. (chap. 1Ch. 11:29). Sippai, Saph. They, the Philistines. Elh. (2Sa. 21:19; 1Ch. 11:26). Gath (1Ch. 20:6; Jos. 11:22). Man (2Sa. 20:6-7). Fell (1Ch. 20:8, cf. 2Sa. 20:22, where an account of a conflict between David and a son of Rapha is given).
HOMILETICS
THE CAPTURE OF RABBAH.1Ch. 20:1-3
Punishment of Ammon for treatment of embassy of condolence, hindered by inclement season, now to be completed. The chief city taken, and its fall the crowning act of Davids conquests. From the manner of its capture and the punishment of its people we learn
I. That in spiritual warfare there must be no cessation. Rest gives advantage to the enemy, and may delay or frustrate the end in view. Forwards, children, forwards! urged Blucher, in meeting Wellington at Waterloo.
1. Make needful preparation. Count cost, and fail not through lack of forethought and preparation. Enterprises break down, plans wrecked in every department of labour, through neglect of this principle. What king going to make war against another king, sitteth not down first, and consulteth whether he be able with ten thousand to meet him that cometh against him with twenty thousand?
2. Be ready for every advantage. The time to go out must be discovered and seized. Many such seasons given to a watchful Christian. Take the instant by the forward step. To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven.
II. That in conducting spiritual warfare opportunity is given for the display of virtuous qualities. Joab had besieged the capital, taken lower part of town, or city of waters, and knowing that it would soon fall, sent for the king to come in person and have the honour of taking it himself (cf. 2Sa. 12:26). Taking this act as that of an adroit courtier, unwilling to run the risk of exciting the kings envy by his success, it was wise. But the act of a devoted servant, denying himself, honouring his master, and shielding him from popular disfavour (through his conduct with Bathsheba). Room for us to help the weak, admire the successful, and, above all, to transfer the glory of our conquests to our gracious Commander and Leader.
III. That all things in spiritual warfare will be subdued under Gods power. The city was taken, and the people subdued. In Christian warfare, every evil thought in heart, every besetting sin, and every vicious principle in life, overcome by grace; every stronghold of Satan, and every enemy to Christ eventually subdued. He must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet. Great the punishment of those who resist. Ammonites suffered severely, but woe to the wicked; it shall be ill with him.
THE HEROES AND THE GIANTS.1Ch. 20:4-8
Individual exploits here given marvellous. Sibbechai, Elhan, and Jonathan slew their men, sons of Rapha, descendants of the race of Raphaim at Gath, remains of pre-Canaanitish inhabitants, distinguished by their gigantic size (cf. 2Sa. 21:15-22). Learn
I. The enemies of Gods people are most powerful. Giants in appearance and reality.
1. Splendid in equipment. Armed with shields and spears, mighty in stature, and conspicuous among their fellows. Our enemies often powerful in material advantages, learning, and all appliances of modern science.
2. Defiant in attitude. He defied Israel (1Ch. 20:7). Thinking much of themselves, highly esteemed, perhaps, by contemporaries; men of a high look and a proud heart. The lofty looks of man shall be humbled, &c.
II. Gods people are ever victorious in Gods strength. Inferior in number and unequal in outward equipment, yet a match for giants of ignorance, vice, and sin. Shepherd boys have overthrown kingdoms, and striplings slain giants of evil. Men of faith, with lamps and pitchers. with the jawbone of an ass, with the meanest instruments, have overcome men of might and stature. Never let the churchs friends be disheartened by the power and pride of the churchs enemies. We need not fear great men against us while we have the great God for us. What will a finger more on each hand do, or a toe more on each foot, in contest with Omnipotence?
HOMILETIC HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS
1Ch. 20:1. David tarried at Jerusalem. Out of the way of temptation if he had gone with the army in active duty. Temporary rest from work and fight leads often to (a) moral indolence or spiritual sloth; (b) carelessness in office, or unfaithfulness in calling; (c) temptation and disgrace. Idle hours bring forth idle thoughts, and idle thoughts are nothing but dry, kindling wood, that waits only for a spark to be suddenly a blaze. All have had painful experience that our sins often have their roots in indolence and unfaithfulness in our calling. As long as we walk and work in our office, we are encompassed with a wall; as soon as we fall out of our office, we fall away from our fortunes, and become a prey to the enemy [Disselhoff].
1Ch. 20:2. Crown from off his head.
1. Earthly crowns and kingdoms may be lost and transferred to others. By war, wickedness, and death. When Richard II. was deposed, he was brought forth, says the historian, in a royal robe, and a crown upon his head. Never was a prince so gorgeous with less glory and more grief.
2. Heavenly crowns may be gained. David set store on this crown from the King of Ammon. Better far the crown of Gods favour, the crown of righteousness, the crown of glory. These untarnished by blood and severities, real ornaments to character, and unfading with time, &c.
1Ch. 20:4-8. The conflict of the world-power against Gods kingdom is
(1) a continual conflict ever again renewed (There was war again, 1Ch. 20:5);
(2) a conflict carried on with malicious cunning, frightful power, and mighty weapons (1Ch. 20:5);
(3) a conflict perilous to the people of God, demanding all the power given them by the Lord, and their utmost bravery;
(4) a conflict that by Gods help at last ends in the victory of his kingdom [Lange].
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 20
1Ch. 20:2. An incorruptible crown. A French officer, a prisoner on parol at Reading, met with a Bible; he read it, was so impressed with its contents that he was convinced of the folly of sceptical principles and of the truth of Christianity, and resolved to become a Protestant. When rallied by gay associates for taking so serious a turn, he said in vindication, I have done no more than my old schoolfellow Bernadotte, who has become a Lutheran. Yes, but he became so, said his associates, to obtain a crown. My motive, said the Christian officer, is the same; we only differ as to the place. The object of Bernadotte is to obtain a crown in Sweden; mine is to obtain a crown in heaven [Bib. Museum].
1Ch. 20:3. A lesson to conquerors. When Edward the Confessor had entered England from Normandy to recover the kingdom, and was ready to give the Danes battle, one of his captains assured him of victory, adding, We will not leave one Dane alive. To which Edward replied, God forbid that the kingdom should be recovered for me, who am but one man, by the death of thousands. No; I will rather lead a private life, unstained by the blood of my fellow-men, than be a king by such a sacrifice. Upon which he broke up his camp, and again retired to Normandy, until he was restored to his throne without bloodshed [Percy Anecdotes].
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
12. WARS WITH RABBAH AND THE PHILISTINES (1Ch. 20:1-8)
1Ch. 20:1. And it came to pass, at the time of the return of the year, at the time when kings go out to battle, that Joab led forth the army, and wasted the country of the children of Ammon, and came and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried at Jerusalem. And Joab smote Rabbah, and overthrew it. 2. And David took the crown of their king from off his head, and found it to weigh a talent of gold, and there were precious stones in it; and it was set upon Davids head: and he brought forth the spoil of the city, exceeding much. 3. And he brought forth the people that were therein, and cut them with saws, and with harrows of iron, and with axes. And thus did David unto all the cities of the children of Ammon. And David and all the people returned to Jerusalem.
4. And it came to pass after this, that there arose war at Gezer with the Philistines: then Sibbecai the Hushathite slew Sippai, of the sons of the giant; and they were subdued. 5. And there was again war with the Philistines; and Elhanan the son of Jair slew Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite, the staff of whose spear was like a weavers beam. 6. And there was again war at Gath, where was a man of great stature, whose fingers and toes were four and twenty, six on each hand, and six on each foot; and he also was born unto the giant. 7. And when he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimea Davids brother slew him. 8. These were born unto the giant in Gath; and they fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants.
PARAPHRASE
1Ch. 19:1. When King Nahash of Ammon died, his son Hanun became the new king. 2, 3. Then David declared, I am going to show friendship to Hanun because of all the kind things his father did for me. So David sent a message of sympathy to Hanun for the death of his father. But when Davids ambassadors arrived, King Hanuns counselors warned him, Dont fool yourself that David has sent these men to honor your father! They are here to spy out the land so that they can come in and conquer it! 4. So King Hanun insulted King Davids ambassadors by shaving their beards and cutting their robes off at the middle to expose their buttocks; then he sent them back to David in shame. 5, When David heard what had happened, he sent a message to his embarrassed emissaries, telling them to stay at Jericho until their beards had grown out again.
6. When King Hanun realized his mistake he sent $2,000,000 to enlist mercenary troops, chariots, and cavalry from Mesopotamia, Aram-maacah, and Zobah. 7. He hired thirty-two thousand chariots, as well as the support of the king of Maacah and his entire army. These forces camped at Medeba where they were joined by the troops King Hanun had recruited from his cities. 8. When David learned of this, he sent Joab and the mightiest warriors of Israel. 9. The army of Ammon went out to meet them and began the battle at the gates of the city of Medeba. Meanwhile, the mercenary forces were out in the field.
10. When Joab realized that the enemy forces were both in front and behind him, he divided his army and sent one group to engage the Syrians. 11. The other group, under the command of his brother Abishai, moved against the Ammonites. 12. If the Syrians are too strong for me, come and help me, Joab told his brother; and if the Ammonites are too strong for you, Ill come and help you. 13. Be courageous and let us act like men to save our people and the cities of our God. And may the Lord do what is best. 14. So Joab and his troops attacked the Syrians, and the Syrians turned and fled. 15. When the Ammonites, under attack by Abishais troops, saw that the Syrians were retreating, they fled into the city. Then Joab returned to Jerusalem.
16. After their defeat, the Syrians summoned additional troops from east of the Euphrates River, led personally by Shophach, King Hadadezers commander-in-chief. 17, 18. When this news reached David, he mobilized all Israel, crossed the Jordan River, and engaged the enemy troops in battle. But the Syrians again fled from David, and he killed seven thousand of their troops. He also killed Shophach, the commander-in-chief of the Syrian army. 19. Then King Hadadezers troops surrendered to King David and became his subjects. And never again did the Syrians aid the Ammonites in their battles.
1Ch. 20:1. The following spring (spring was the season when wars usually began) Joab led the Israeli army in successful attacks against the cities and villages of the people of Ammon. After destroying them, he laid siege to Rabbah and conquered it. Meanwhile, David had stayed in Jerusalem. 2. When David arrived on the scene, he removed the crown from the head of King Milcom of Rabbah and placed it upon his own head. It was made of gold inlaid with gems and weighed seventy-five pounds! David also took great amounts of plunder from the city. 3. He drove the people from the city and set them to work with saws, iron picks, and axes, as was his custom with all the conquered Ammonite peoples. Then David and all his army returned to Jerusalem.
4. The next war was against the Philistines again, at Gezer. But Sibbecai, a man from Hushath, killed one of the sons of the giant, Sippai, and so the Philistines surrendered. 5. During another war with the Philistines, Elhanan (the son of Jair) killed Lahmi, the brother of Goliath the giant; the handle of his spear was like a weavers beam! 6, 7. During another battle, at Gath, a giant with six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot (his father was also a giant) defied and taunted Israel; but he was killed by Davids nephew Jonathan, the son of Davids brother Shimea. 8. These giants were descendants of the giants of Gath, and they were killed by David and his soldiers.
COMMENTARY
Among the military campaigns of David none was more important and none involved more tragic personal consequences than the war with Ammon and Syria. The parallel account of this conflict is in 2Sa. 10:1-19. The first five verses in the present chapter describe the Ammonite insult to Davids ambassadors and to Israel. When Saul was king of Israel the Ammonite king was named Nahash. Nahash means serpent. The serpent was regarded as symbolic of wisdom and craftiness. Nahash and the Ammonites held the Gileadite people in subjection in the days preceding the reign of Saul. When the Jabesh-gileadites were told to present themselves so the Ammonites could gouge out their right eyes (1Sa. 11:1-11), an urgent message was sent to Saul. The newly appointed Hebrew king organized his army and delivered the Jabesh-gileadites. For this service the people of Jabesh-gilead were always grateful to Saul. Some fifty or sixty years elapsed between this incident and the one presently being considered. This Nahash may be the same person to whom reference is made in I Samuel, chapter 11, or he may be the son of the king of Ammon in Sauls day. Some nations used class names for their kings. Agag was such a name among the Amalekites. Pharaoh was used in this manner in Egypt. Nahash could have been used the same way among the Ammonites.
Upon the death of Nahash, as a friendly gesture, David sent representatives to express Israels sympathy. In time past Nahash had been kindly disposed toward David. We do not have a record of any special kindnesses, but David felt obligated to the neighboring nation. Hanun, son of Nahash, ruled in his fathers place. We have no reason to question Davids motives, but Hanuns counselors suspected that Davids men came as spies. Because of Davids conquests, the Ammonites knew that they would have to challenge Israel if they maintained their territory. Hanun accepted his counselors advice and used this occasion to show Ammons disdain for Israel. A servant was not permitted to grow a beard. Davids representatives were shaved. The ambassadors were further humiliated in that their robes were cut off so as to expose the mens secret parts. Then they were sent on their way and were made a public spectacle. When David learned what had happened, he advised his representatives to stay at Jericho until their beards were grown. Then they would most likely return to Jerusalem.
The Ammonites did not have to wait for David to declare war against them. In their shameful treatment of Davids men war had already been declared. Hanuns people did not suppose that by their own power they could contest Israels claim to their territory. They hurriedly made arrangements to call for help of mercenaries. Mesopotamia was the territory in the vicinity of Haran between the Euphrates and the Tigris rivers. Aram-maacah was a region in the vicinity of Mt. Hermon. Zobah lay in the district beyond Damascus. Out of these places soldiers were brought in. The Ammonites paid a very high price for their services (1000 talents of silver, or perhaps as much as $1,500,000). In addition to these great armies there were thirty two thousand chariots. This powerful expeditionary force set itself in battle order at Medeba. Medeba lay about twenty miles south-west of Rabbah, the capitol city of the Ammonites. With the mercenaries on the scene, the Ammonites organized their own forces and the combined armies presented a very serious threat to David and Israel. At this juncture David ordered Joab, the captain of his host, to call the army of Israel for the conflict.
Joab was a seasoned veteran. He knew the dangers involved if Israels army should be encompassed and cut off by the enemy. He was also aware of fact that the hired soldiers were more dangerous than the Ammonites. He, personally, took the choice men of Israel and engaged the mercenaries in battle. Joab assigned the rest of Israels army to Abishai, whose responsibility was to engage the Ammonites in battle. If Abishai could hold the Ammonites, and if Joab could rout the hired soldeirs, Israel would win the battle. If either Hebrew captain experienced trouble, the other would come to his aid. It was a very wise battle plan. Before the battle was joined, Joab charged all of Israels soldiers to play the man for our people and for the cities of our God. A similar battle-cry is recorded in 1Sa. 4:9 when the Philistine officers charged their warriors to quit themselves like men and fight. Paul, in 1Co. 16:13, used this battle-charge again when he said, Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong. The word quit in this context meant to equip oneself, to concentrate ones energies for the task at hand. Joabs thought was that the Hebrew soldiers should do their very best and leave the outcome to Jehovah. Joab, with Jehovahs help, was able to scatter and put to flight all of the soldiers hired by Hanun. When their help was dispersed, the Ammonites retreated into the walled city of Rabbah. Joab then reported to David in Jerusalem.
David understood that in order to take advantage of this initial success he would need to maintain pressure on the enemy. Shopach (Shobach) came on the scene as the captain of the Syrians who were beyond the River (the Euphrates). The mercenaries who had been turned back by Joab sent runners to their allies in Mesopotamia requesting help. The enemy regrouped. In the meantime, David personally led the Hebrew army to war with the Syrians. Somewhere beyond the Jordan River, probably in northeastern Palestine, the battle was joined. Forty thousand enemy soldiers fell. The captain, Shopach, was killed, Seven thousand warriors who drove chariots were put to death. Those who remained surrendered. Never again were the Ammonites able to secure aid from the Syrians. Through these events David annexed the territory of Ammon, consolidated his holdings in Syria, and laid undisputed claim on lands reaching all the way to the Euphrates River.
While the Syrians and their allies had been vanquished, the Ammonites had taken refuge behind the walls of Rabbah, their main city. Chapter twenty, 1Ch. 20:1-3, describes the completion of the conquest of Ammon. At this time the Ammonites finally paid the price for humiliating Davids ambassadors and for challenging Israel to war. By the time Davids army had won the conflict with the Syrians, the winter season was rapidly approaching. A token siege likely was set around Rabbah. David returned to Jerusalem and the rest of his army would take up winter quarters in appointed places. The winter passed. When spring came, Joab was sent to tighten the siege at Rabbah and maintain it until the city fell. The terrors troubling people in a besieged city almost defy description. The Book of Lamentations describe this hopeless situation in the siege of Jerusalem. There was no traffic in or out of the city. When food and water were exhausted, the only alternative was to fall to the enemy. Usually, this meant death for the helpless victims. Joab set such a siege at Rabbah. In the meantime David tarried at Jerusalem (1Ch. 20:1). At this point in the Book of II Samuel two chapters (eleven and twelve) are given to the account of Davids sin with Bathsheba.[38] It is a matter of curious interest that the chronicler omits this incident in Davids life. Davids sin could not be hidden. Perhaps the historian was permitted by the Holy Spirit to omit this painful account because it was fully treated in the record in II Samuel. Here in the Book of Chronicles David moves from one victory to another. This Bathsheba affair would certainly break the continuity of this account. If David had gone with the army on this occasion as he had when the Syrians were ruined, history might have been written differently. The fact is, he tarried at Jerusalem. He sinned with Bathsheba. He dealt deceitfully with Uriah. Uriah carried his own death warrant to Joab, his commander. Many other Hebrew soldiers died so Joab could guarantee Uriahs death. David was caught in the web of his sin and in many ways, his life was never the same again. The flood-gates of lust, revenge, grief, and heart-break were opened. David lived in turmoil from that time until the day he died. He tarried at Jerusalem. Perhaps duties of state kept him there. Had he been somewhere else, he might have fallen in the same sin or in some greater sin. The fact remains, he was tempted and he sinned against God.(See Psalms 51).
[38] Spence, H. D. M., The Pulpit Commentary, I Chronicles, p. 316.
While these things were taking place in Jerusalem, Joab was doing his work well at Rabbah. One day the Ammonites reached their extremity. An urgent message came to David. He must hurry to Rabbah if the city is to fall to him. Otherwise, it will fall to Joab. Hanun, king of Ammon, had a great crown which was symbolic of his office. It was composed of a talent of gold. The value of the gold talent may be estimated at thirty to fifty thousand dollars. The crown probably weighed about one hundred pounds. It may well have adorned the head of the Ammonites chief god, Molech. The crown was decorated with precious stones. Strong men would hold this crown over Davids head. The spoil of the city was laid at his feet. The Ammonites in Rabbah became prisoners of war, many of whom were mercilessly mutilated by David and his warriors. This was regarded as divine retribution for the antagonistic actions and military rebellion of these descendants of Lot.
The paragraph in verses four through eight reminds the Bible student of the parallel section in 2Sa. 21:18-22. The historian simply recalls some matters both courageous and curious in connection with Israels military engagements. The name Gob in 2Sa. 21:18 is not identified. The Septuagint versions uses Gath in this place. Gath was in Philistia some twenty miles due east of Ashkelon which was situated very near the coast of the Great Sea. Gezer was about twenty miles north of Gath on the border of the tribe of Ephraim. Sibbecai is listed among Davids warriors in 1Ch. 11:29. Sippai, the giant, is elsewhere called Saph. This was certainly an important encounter which resulted in the defeat of the Philistines. Bible students have given considerable attention to 1Ch. 20:5 in the passage under consideration. The parallel to this in 2Sa. 21:19 says that Elhanan the son of Jaareoregim the Bethlehemite slew Goliath the Gittite. The record here says that Elhanan slew Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite. Another warrior named Elhanan is mentioned in 1Ch. 11:26, He cannot be identified with the man now under consideration. It is possible that the Lahmi here may well be accounted for by the Bethlehem in the reference in II Samuel. Since Goliath was such a champion of the Philistine cause, it would be no strange circumstance if others among the giants bore that name. The reference to these men of giant stature proves information concerning this remnant of the Anakim (long necked men) among the Philistines. An ordinary man would not have been able to handle the giants spear. The weavers beam refers to a wooden bar about ten inches in circumference used to anchor the threads on a loom. The head of the spear carried by the Goliath who fell before David weighed about twenty pounds. Among the oddities Israel encountered was the giant who had six digits on each hand and foot. Even so, he was not equal to the warrior in Davids ranks who cut him down in Gath. The defiance of Israel sealed Goliaths doom when he challenged David in the vale of Elah. In like manner, Jonathan, Davids nephew, took up the challenge on this later occasion. It is possible that the giant with the abnormal number of fingers and toes was the father of other giant sons. Just as Caleb in his day was at his best when warring with the Anakim at Hebron, so this kind of opposition proved the real courage of David and his men.
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
(1) After the year was expired.Heb., at the time of the return of the year: i.e., in spring. (See 1Ki. 20:22; 1Ki. 20:26.)
At the time that kings go out.See 1Ki. 20:16. Military operations were commonly suspended during winter. The Assyrian kings have chronicled their habit of making yearly expeditions of conquest and plunder. It was exceptional for the king to remain in the country.
Joab led forth the power of the army.Samuel gives details: David sent Joab and his servants (? the contingents of tributaries, 1Ch. 19:19), and all Israel (i.e., the entire national array).
Wasted the country.An explanation of Samuel: wasted the sons of Ammon.
Rabbah, or Rabbath Ammon, the capital. (See 2Sa. 11:1; Amo. 1:14; Jer. 49:2-3.)
But David tarried (Heb., was tarrying) at Jerusalem.While Joabs campaign was in progress-In 2Sa. 11:1 this remark prepares the way for the account which there follows of Davids temptation and fall.
And Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it.A brief statement, summarizing the events related in 2Sa. 11:27-27. From that passage we learn that, after an assault which doubtless reduced the defenders to the last stage of weakness, Joab sent a message to David at Jerusalem to come and appropriate the honours of the capture. Our 1Ch. 20:2, which abruptly introduces David himself as present at Rabbah, obviously implies a knowledge of the narrative as it is told in Samuel, and would hardly be intelligible without it. Whether the chronicler here and elsewhere borrows directly from Samuel, or from another document depending ultimately on the same original as Samuel, cannot certainly be decided.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
The City of Rabbah Taken
v. 1. And it came to pass that after the year was expired, v. 2. And David took the crown of their king from off his head, and found it to weigh a talent of gold v. 3. And he brought out the people that were in it, and cut them with saws and with harrows of iron,
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
EXPOSITION
The contents of this chapter are all to be found in the work of Samuel, but woven in, in very different places. The cause of the first considerable difference of this kind is in connection with the occurrence of what would have seemed a mere casual detail of expression in our first verse, “But David tarried at Jerusalem,” at which same statement, however, the writer of Samuel halts, to append all that then happened with David in the disastrous matter of Bathsheba and Uriah, occupying nearly two whole chaptersa history not recorded at all by the Chronicle compiler. Why David tarried at Jerusalem, and how far he did so legitimately and in harmony with the necessities of government, we know not, but certain it is, he was tempted to make the unhappiest use of his “tarrying at Jerusalem.”
1Ch 20:1
The fifteenth verse of the previous chapter stated that the discomfited Ammonites “fled and entered into the city,” i.e. into Rabbah. Hither we now learn that, by the command of David (2Sa 11:1), Joab, at the “return of the year,” i.e. probably at the return of spring (Exo 23:16; Exo 34:22), brings the power of the army, and, after ravaging the country surrounding it, sits down to besiege Rabbah itself. The series of feasts, beginning in spring and ending in autumn, regulated the year. The sacred year began with the new moon that became full next after the spring equinox; but the civil year at the seventh new moon. This one verse illustrates in four several instances at fewest the advantage of having two versions of the same events, even though in this case in comparatively immaterial respects.
1. We here read that Joab wasted the country of the children of Ammon and besieged Rabbah, in place of the less consistent reading of 2Sa 11:1, “destroyed the children of Ammon, and besieged Rabbah.”
2. We have here in the Hebrew the right word for “kings” (), instead of the word for “angels” (), as in the parallel place.
3. While we read here that Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it, the parallel place, now shifted to 2Sa 12:27-29, tells of Joab’s generosity (if it were this, and not fear or possibly somewhat tardy obedience to strict commands given on his commission), in his message to David, to repair to the spot immediately and share the glory of the reduction of the city, or be its nominal captor.
4. And, once more, while we read here that Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it, and yet read in the parallel place of the delay and the visit of David (with which the very first clause of our 2Sa 12:2, “And David took,” etc; is in perfect accord) and of David’s nominal taking of the city, we find probably the just and inartificial explanation of all this in 2Sa 12:26-29. There we read more particularly that Joab sent word he had taken the “city of waters,” i.e. tie lower part of the city (where a stream had its source, and no doubt supplied the city with water), which was very likely the key of the whole position,and called upon David to come up and “encamp against the city and take it,” i.e. the city, or citadel, which stood upon the heights north of the stream. Glimpses of this kind may suffice to convince us how rapidly a text, really correct, would melt away for us a very large proportion of the whole number of the lesser obstacles which often impede our path in the historical books of the Old Testament. At the time that kings go out. It was no doubt the case that, even in Palestine, the winter was often a period of enforced inactivity. Rabbah. Tim punishment of Ammou for the treatment of David’s well-intended embassy of condolence is now about to be completed. The familiar root of Rabbah signifies multitudinous number, and, resulting thence, the greatness of importance. It was the chief city of the Ammonites, if not their only city of importance enough for mention. In five passages its connection with Ammon is coupled with its name (Deu 3:11; 2Sa 12:26; 2Sa 17:27; Jer 49:2; Eze 21:20), “Rabbah of the children of Ammon.” It has been conjectured to be the Ham of the Zuzim, or the Ashteroth Karnaim of the Rephaim (Gen 14:5), of which latter theory there is some interesting evidence of a corroborating tendency at all events (see Smith’s ‘Bible Dictionary,’ 2:985). Rabbah is the proper spelling of the word, except when in a constructive state, as in the above phrase. The relations of Moab and Ammon with Israel are full of interest. After the overthrow of Og, King of Bashan (Num 21:33), “Moab and Ammon still remained independent allies south and cast of the Israelite settlements. Both fell before DavidMoab, evidently the weaker, first; Ammon not without a long resistance, which made the siege and fall of its capital, Rabbah-ammon, the crowning act of David’s conquests. The ruins which now adorn the ‘royal city’ are of a later Roman date; but the commanding position of the citadel remains; and the unusual sight of a living stream abounding in fish (2Sa 12:27; Isa 16:2) marks the significance of Joab’s song of victory, ‘I have fought against Rabbah, and have taken the city of waters'”.
1Ch 20:2
Found it to weigh a talent of gold. Two difficulties present themselves in this verse, viz. the reported weight of this crown, and the uncertainty as to what head it was from which David took it. Whatever was its weight, if David’s head was able to sustain it for a minute or two, the head of the King of the Ammonites might also occasionally have borne it. Yet it would scarcely be likely that the King of the Ammonites would have so ponderous a crown (calculated at a weight of a hundred and fourteen pounds Troy, or a little more or less than one hundredweight) as one of ordinary wear, or that he would have one of extraordinary wear on his head precisely at such a juncture. Both of these difficulties will remove if we suppose that the Hebrew , instead of meaning their king, is the name of the Ammonitish and Moabitish idol (i.q. Moloch), and which we find (Authorized Version) in Zep 1:5, and probably (though not Authorized Version) in Jer 49:1, Jer 49:3, and Amo 1:15. The Septuagint treats the word thus. The point, however, cannot be considered settled.
1Ch 20:3
Cut them with saws (so Heb 11:37). We have here the very doubtful (so far as regards its real signification) Hebrew word (and he cut) instead of (he put). Probably it is nowhere else used in the sense of “cutting,” if it is here. Its ordinary sense is to rule or put into subjection. The parallel place (2Sa 12:31) corrects, in the word (Authorized Version) axes, our Hebrew text, which repeats the word for saw, though putting it in the plural, and which thereby shows , instead of . This last word means “Axes” or “scythes,” and is from the root , to cut (2Ki 6:4). It is found only in 2Sa 12:31, though it should appear here also. There is a fourth severity of punishment mentioned in the parallel place, that the people were “made to pass through the brick-kilns,” a form of torture possibly suggested by the own familiar cruelty of the Ammonites in “making their children to pass through the fire to Moloch.” However, in harmony with what is above said respecting the doubtfulness of the just signification of the verb , much uncertainty hangs over the interpretation of this verse. Instead of severity and needless cruelty on the part of David, it may rather set forth that he subjected them to hard tasks in connection with the cultivation of the soil and with the making of bricks. The saws and harrows and axes (or scythes) were awkward and unlikely weapons to be employed for the purpose of inflicting torture, when the ordinary weapons of battle and warfare were close at hand. This view, however, is contrary to the verdict, so far as the above Hebrew verb is concerned, of Gesenius’s ‘Thesaurus,’ p. 1326, and of Thenins, on this and the parallel passage. When such punishments were of the nature of torture, the cruelty was in some cases extreme. “The criminal was sometimes sawn asunder lengthwise; this was more especially the practice in Persia. Isaiah, according to the Talmud-isis, was put to death in this wise by King Manasseh, ‘Sanhedrin,’ p. 103, c. 2; comp. Justin’s dialogue with Trypho”. With saws. The word in the original is not in the plural. It occurs again only in the parallel place (2Sa 12:31) and in 1Ki 7:9, both times in the singular. The teeth of Eastern saws then and now usually incline to the handle instead of from it. With harrows of iron. The only harrow known to have been used at this time consisted of a thick block of wood borne down by a weight, or on which a man sat, drawn over the ploughed land by oxen (Isa 28:24, Isa 28:25; Job 39:10; Hos 10:11), and the root of the Hebrew word expresses the idea of crushing or levelling the land. But our present word is very different, and is found only here and in the parallel place, with the word “iron” accompanying it, so as to be equivalent to a compound word, and appears to mean “sharp instruments of iron,” or sharp threshing instruments. The use of the former part of this phrase (1Sa 17:18) for cheeses is the only other instance of its occurrence. Saws should be “axes,” or “scythes,” as stated above, though it is not any of the three more ordinary words for “axe” (see Smith’s ‘Bible Dictionary,’ 1:142).
1Ch 20:4
For the Gezer () of this verse, the parallel place (2Sa 21:18) shows Gob (), a name not known, but which careless transcription may have easily made out of the former. The Syriac Version, however, as well as the Septuagint, has Gath in that verse as well as in the two verses following (2Sa 21:18-20), another name also easily interchangeable in Hebrew characters with Gezer. The “yet again” of our 1Ch 20:6 would well accord with the supposition that the conflict with the Philistines was at Gath, or at the same place, each of the three times. Gezer belonged to Ephraim, and was situated to the north of Philistia (1Ch 7:28; 1Ch 14:16). Sibbechai (see also 1Ch 11:29; 1Ch 27:11). Sippai. In the parallel place spelt Saph. It is remarkable that, in the Peshito Syriac, over Psa 143:1-12, is found the inscription,” Of David, when he slew Asaph, the brother of Gulyad, and thanksgiving that he had conquered.” Of the children of the giant. The Hebrew word for “giant,” rapha (always in these verses spelt with a final aleph, but in the parallel verses always with he final), is here (Authorized Version) translated. “The Rapha, a native of Gath, was the forefather of the Canaanitish Rephaim, mentioned as early as Gen 14:5; Gen 15:20; Deu 2:11; Deu 3:11; Jos 12:4; Jos 15:8; Jos 17:15. The slaying of Ishbi-benob (2Sa 21:16) is not here given. It is also to be observed that the lengthy account of Samuel, respecting Absalom and his rebellion (2 Samuel 13-21.) is not found here.
1Ch 20:5
Elhanan the son of Jair. In Samuel Jair appears as Jaare. This Elhanan is probably different from him of 1Ch 11:26. There is a strange confusion in the reading of this and its parallel verse. If our present verse is to stand corrected by accepting from its parallel “the Bethlehemite” in place of our Lamhi, then either we have no name given for the brother of Goliath, the Gittite; or, if we drop the word “brother” (changing the of Chronicles into the of Samuel), and make Goliath the Gittite the man slain by Elhanan, then of such a Goliath we know nothing, and it is a most unlikely coincidence of name with the conquered of David’s sling.. Kennicott’s seventy-eighth dissertation is occupied, and ably, with the pros and cons of this question; and the curiosities of Jerome on the passage may be found in his ‘Quaestiones Hebraicae.’ There seems no sufficient reason to depart from our reading here, to which it were preferable to adjust the reading in the parallel place, which exhibits almost certainly a glaring corruption of text in another respect.
1Ch 20:6
A man of stature. The Hebrew text is , as also in 1Ch 11:28; and (in the plural) in Num 13:32. An eccentric and probably corrupt form appears in the parallel place. Pliny (‘Nat. Hist.,’ 2:43) speaks of the Sedigiti, and places them in the family of Forli, among the Himyarites.
1Ch 20:7
Jonathan (see 1Sa 13:3, 32; 1Ch 27:32 (comp. also 1Ch 2:13), where it is probable that” nephew” should be read for “uncle”). It is to be noticed that the name of this child of the giant, of twelve fingers and twelve toes, is not mentioned. We are not compelled, therefore, to regard it as remarkable that he of the fifth verse should not be named.
1Ch 20:8
These were born unto the giant in Gath. The parallel place reads, “These four,” etc. The first of the four in view there is not mentioned here. The account is given in 2Sa 21:15-17. And as it was in that encounter that David himself played the chief part (though, apparently, it was Abishai who dealt Ishbi-benob the fatal blow in “succouring” David), the notice of it would have seemed necessary to complete fully the sense of the following clauses, “They fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants.” Still this, it may justly be argued, may have been the very reason of the form of expression here chosen, coupling David’s work and that of his servants. This brief summary in the last verse of this chapter, as also in the last verse of the corresponding chapter, just serves to reveal to us the nexus that bound together the three or four exploits for narration. It consisted in the common descent of the four giant victims.
HOMILETICS
1Ch 20:1.–On the wars of the Israelites, and on war generally.
“At the time that kings,” etc. This chapter also seems to contain little of homiletic interest. Nevertheless it offers abundantly the opportunity of some consideration of the subject of the wars undertaken by the separated people, and thence of the subject of war since and generally. This chapter repeats the word “war“ three times in 1Ch 20:4-6. But yet rather the very turn of the expression in 1Ch 20:1, “At the time that kings go out to battle,” far surpasses any suggestiveness that might arise merely from the repetition of a word. At the outset of any consideration of this subject as it arises in connection with Scripture, attention is arrested, and it may be said universally arrested, by certain patent facts. They are facts from which we cannot run away, and which, however they may suffer explanation in themselves, will soon show that they refuse to be explained away. The more necessary is it to treat them accordingly, and to face them steadily. The facts alluded to are such as these:
1. That a very large part of the whole bulk of Old Testament history is concerned with the recital of matters of war.
2. That war manifestly played a large part in the education and formation of character of the people Israel.
3. That it was by no means entirely or even principally owing to any Just of strife or even of conquest which might have possessed the people that they warred so much, but this was assigned to them as a very part of their duty and part of their mission.
4. That with a directness that cannot be mistaken, war is not only prescribed, and that again and again, by God to his people, but he represents himself as Leader of armies, Captain of hosts, and as “going forth” with men to battle, the impersonation of a mighty warrior. The sovereign right of death, as of life, belongs, no doubt, to Godhis to destroy, as his to create. But the observable thing in war, so far as those of the Old Testament Scriptures are concerned, lies in the fact which would seem infinitely more enormous and astounding than, through our familiarity with it, it now doesthat God destroys human beings by the agency of other human beings. The sweeping away of vast populations by plague and famine, by fire, and by what we call the accident of sea or land, would not present a tithe of the difficulty that lies before our feet when the one element is produced of the sword and weapon of warfare wielded consciously, deliberately, determinedly, by men on the battle-field for the destruction of fellow-men. Yet we must renounce the credibility of the Old Testament Scriptures, or must acknowledge that the destruction of human life was abundantly effected by war, undertaken and carried through to the hitter end by Divine sanction and ordinance. Nothing can be more natural than to ask how this is, and, the facts being indisputable, what account can be given of them. It seems likely enough that we may not be able to feel that we have found under any circumstances a complete solution of the problem before us. It may rest upon deeper reason than we can fathom, be part of a larger justice than we can mete, belong to a wider circle or range of analogy than all we have yet caught sight of. But there can be no question that it is as usual open to us to approach in the direction of the desired result, though we may stop short of the goal. And
I. OF THE DIVINELY COMMANDED WARS AND BATTLES OF ISRAEL. Here the subject of war is relieved at once of one of its greatest difficulties. For in this case we need not stop to debate respecting the abstract possibility of justification of war. Its justification in these cases is for us of the kind called positive. And of war thus conditioned we must remark:
1. That its motive does not come into the question, and cannot be challenged.
2. That its object must be held to have been for the universal benefit.
3. That the fact of its being a method of chastisement and of destruction of human life by the agency of human beings must be held to be the one difficult question at issue. Can there be found compensating and justifying considerations, and these not of such a nature as absolutely to refuse to be reconciled with our moral sense? The following considerations may, at all events, be helpful to those who would not impugn, not even for a moment impugn, the right of God to take human lives, in whatever number, unquestioned, by some method. With others, as matter of course, they could have little weight. For the destruction of human life in battle, on the part of a people constituted and set apart like Israel, at the command of God was
(1) equivalent to a consenting adoption by them of the sovereignty of God. Now, the unity, the absolute soleness, and the sovereignty were the three greatest and most fundamental attributes of Deity, which it was the special business of the Israelites to learn. These their education was to master well.
(2) It was a vital protection for them against both a superstitious and a supine trust of the invisible, superior power. Had the invisible God always swept their enemies, for instance, from before them without their own instrumentality and co-operation, it is not difficult to calculate something of what sort of expectance and what sort of trust would have been engendered in them. But now, though the battle is of the Lord, and the strength is ‘of him, and the victory his, with most strenuous effort must the people do the work, gird themselves for the fight, and suffer much while they win.
(3) Next to those who suffered the infliction of the Divine purpose and justice, it was to those who executed them the most impressive possible manifestation of all that death and slaughter have it in them to brand upon human minds and fasten in human convictions and light up to human imagination. The terrible assertion of the final power to control, to punish, to avenge, was often needed, is often needed, to “sum up the whole matter,” and to be the unchallengeable “conclusion of the whole matter.”
(4) It was the beginning and germ of that constitution of human society which now peremptorily devolves for a while upon men the entire actual visible conduct of the affairs of men. The Ruler, the King, “the Lord of those men,” is gone away awhile into a far distant country, and “the Word of the Lord is precious,” and “there is no vision nor dream.” The day of reckoning and account is assuredly to come, and all are forewarned of it; but as assuredly it is not yet. And this one fact constitutes the most awful view of human responsibility, whether in war or in peace.
II. OF WAR IN GENERAL, AND NOT THOSE CASES OF IT ALONE WHICH WERE OF DIVINE COMMAND.
1. War, horror and scourge that it is, yet snatches its occasion in one of the most necessary and ultimate forms of association of human kind, viz. the nation. Men are associated together in nations by necessity. They are brought together by geographical position. They are held together by community of race The necessity is a natural one, the consequences are full of significance, the advantages are of a high, beneficent, and far-reaching kind. But the final risk involved in war produces a phenomenon, and more than merely a phenomenon, in some aspects among the most terrible, nay, incomparably the most terrible, to be witnessed beneath the sun. There are ever ascending and broadening forms of strife, as of philanthropy among mankind. The strife so familiar, as it shows itself between individuals, is passed, by that of families, and of cliques, and of many and various an association of multitudes of almost every description. The strife that so often appears between such units as these is passed again, by that between Churches, and this finally by that between nations, and nations which even league together in order to prosecute their strife more successfully and on larger scale. Now, for all these forms and occasions of strife there is some .sort of judge, arbiter, or external authority to end it, except for that between nations. Hence the principle of resistance shows itself in its own unqualified hideousness, in its own repulsive malignity of essence. It culminates in war, which is another word for the slaughter in systematic form of numbers of human beings by others animated by no personal ill will, and to whom they are personally unknown.
2. War cannot profess to anything more, anything deeper, than a trial of force against force. The stronger force has to be accepted pro tem; even though the time be prolonged. Nor is it in this respect out of analogy with the decisions of courts of justice in the internal life and administration of a nation. These decisions are respected by those against whom they are given by the judge, not because they are believed to be right, yet less because they are felt to be right, nor even because in all cases they are right, but because they are supported by the overwhelming power of the strong arm of the law, with all which that phrase means. The order of society is pitted against the passion, the misapprehension, or sometimes even the right of the individual in his solitary plaint.
3. Though war can pretend to nothing but the determination of who is the stronger, yet right is presumably one of the combatants. That right sharing the constant present fate of right is often enough overpowered, defeated, the loser. Yet it has had the opportunity of asserting itself. It has asserted itself. It has insisted in a very practical manner on making its voice heard. It has insisted on its presence and its force counting for something. And then again, though stricken and bleeding afresh from many a new-made wound, it is sent back to take its patient though oppressed station yet awhile and to bide its time.
4. The real measure of the condemnableness of war depends on its motives, on the real causes, hidden or proclaimed, which occasion it. But then it is to be observed that the greater and more decisive the condemnation that may be shown on the one hand, the more the defensibleness conceded to the other side, which resists even unto blood. The proportion that greed, vanity, passion, mere pique, or absolute lust of conquest bear in the production of war wilt be the real measurewhoever is in the position to assign itof the guilt of the guilty and of the defence of the innocent.
5. A just estimate of the real nature of war demands that the physical untold misery of it be kept separate in our minds from the moral aspects and results of it. War has offered to view some of the highest possibilities of human nature in its self-devotion, in its sentiment disentangled of individual hostility or animosity, in its obedience of the individual to the principle of the community’s necessity or weal.
6. The long-looked-for time, the long-prayed-for era, when war shall cease, is the goal to be reached only by the purified and heightened moral sense and goodness of the individuals of all nations. This is equivalent to saying, the goal can only be reached by Christianity, in its spread universal, in its diffusion impartial, in its penetratingness individual, in its efficaciousness sovereign. No policy, no wisdom, no external authority seems imaginable that should subdue it, and put it under the feet of men, a destroyed thing. Only the victory of all victories can be looked forward to to lead captive this captivity, and accomplish its end. The clear and sure destruction of this at the same time most barbarous and keenest destroyer of men will be among the last, the grandest, the crowning achievements of Christ, Prince of peace, the promise of “peace on earth,” the expression of “good will to men”
1Ch 20:1.-One cunning bosom sin.
“But David tarried at Jerusalem.” There is not so much as the suggestion of any evidence from which we could justify the inference that David, in thus “tarrying at Jerusalem,” was actuated by any wrong design, or was laying himself open to the charge of neglect of duty, indifference to his high responsibilities or inactivity. It is more probable that duty to his people in the central seat of authority found him more in his place at Jerusalem than in the field of battle. That which reads confessedly as a rather peremptory style of summons on the part of Joab, in the fuller account of 2Sa 12:28, cannot be relied upon as any sufficient indication to the disadvantage of David in such a direction. It is more naturally explainable in other ways. Joab’s message at the crisis which affairs had somewhat suddenly reached may have been either an act of obedience to strict orders of imperial sort, or in yet nobler obedience to the instincts of strict loyalty. The “tarrying at Jerusalem,” however, boded anything but good (2Sa 11:1, 2Sa 11:2). The words of simplicity in which the mere historical fact is announced, provoke inevitably the memory of other words, where it is written on page yet more sacred, of the “greater Son” of David on a certain occasion, “And the child Jesus tarried behind at Jerusalem.” But beyond the irresistible suggestion of the words, thought declinesto go. There is no room for comparison. The case is one the opposite of analogy. And even contrast should seem too gratuitous, and to threaten dishonour to the latter occasion, breathing upon it with an unholy breath, and not with the breath of the Spirit most holy. To this interval, anyway, belonged the greatest blots on all the life of David, the sorest stains on his ‘scutcheon, and wounds that went direct and deep to the soul. And we are taught here something in general of the uncertainty, the untractableness of human nature; but may rather take the instruction of the passage in this more particular formthe strength and blinded headstrong way that “one cunning bosom sin” has with it.
I. THE INTERVAL OF REST IS SET AT NOUGHT BY IT. Granted that David did not stay behind at Jerusalem in order to escape all work and elude the activity of duty; granted that business of government, the government of his city and his nation, occupied him; yet the very change of occupation, and the fact that it was at home, was a rest. It was very different from camp life and military superintendence. The hand that holds the pen knows how great the change is, after it has been rather holding the sword and wielding the sword for months, ay, for years past. The greatest warrior, the most successful general, the bravest soldier must surely awhile feel the repose sacred and delicious which permits him to sheathe the sword, forsake the field, and do the works of peace rather than of war. Yet this privilege as soon as enjoyed is abused; this interval as soon as given becomes the mournful and miserable occasion of indelible disgrace and shame.
II. THE SANCTITIES OF HOME ARE SET AT NOUGHT BY IT. Nothing will ever divest home of its sacred claims. They dwell in it, they haunt its retreats, they pervade its air. Not truer that “the heart knoweth his own bitterness,” than that home knoweth its own ineffable sweetness. The nursery of purest affections, the school of sound instruction, the point of departure for young ambition, the beacon of good principle to the ends of the earth, the incentive to honourable effort and noble exploit, and anon as age grows, the realm and very throne of most benign authority,it is this home which the cunning bosom sin of passion discredits, dishonours, disgraces. David knew what the blessing of home was. He often shows it by the way he speaks directly and indirectly of home and of “father and mother.” But he knew the blessing yet more certainly by evidence of the too reliable aphorism that we then first best know our blessing when it is taken from us. And for years the blessing had been a lost one to David. How he hungered and thirsted and craved for it! And now he has it, fearfully to desecrate it, because he is led captive, blinded by what he saw, headstrong by what he feltreason and goodness and conscience all dragged in chains behind the triumph of passion!
III. THE INSPIRATION OF THE ASSOCIATIONS OF JERUSALEM IS SMOTHERED BY IT. It is the metropolis of the country, but sacred beyond the sacredness of any other metropolis, and to David beyond what it was to any other king. How he thought of Jerusalem! How he spoke and sang of it, with the joy that was growing brighter and brighter to perfect day, and long before those strains which others sang to minor key, plaintive wail, and exquisitely saddened memories! How much he had lately joyed in it! What honour had been his to bring to it the ark! What glorious heart-stirring festival of the whole kingdom had centred within its walls thereupon I Place has ever bad its quantum of influence. The hardest heart and most callous insensibility will be touched by it. The tender heart and sensitive nature will be responsive to it as to but a lower grade of inspiration And now, almost for the firs/; time, David has the opportunity of surrendering himself to the religion of the place, of giving undivided thanks and grateful praise in the place, and enjoying in it some earnest of the Jerusalem above. But no; lust smears the sight of his eye, which sees no longer even the Jerusalem that is below, its fame and glory and pride.
IV. THE IMPERIAL CLAIMS OF DUTY, CONSCIENCE, OF RELIGION AND HUMANITY, ARE SET AT NOUGHT BY IT. To the hot fire of passion these are but as straws. They resist nothing at all. They do serve to bystanders to increase the show of the disastrous, destructive fire. The pride of imperial position and the throne stoop for the time without a struggle, and come down from their exaltation to do homage to creature-lust. So much, then, human nature has to say of itself, and so little! So much we are taught do we ever need watchfulness and prayer! The high plateau of honour, glorious opportunity, religion, restfulness, and home enjoyment may be the accursed ground of our own worst dereliction of duty, devotion, and even decency. Unsafe when we are left to self, we are not more safe when we are left by ourselves. “Let him alone” is the darkest doom that even Divine judgment and justice can decree. But when left alone (and that our wish and petition) only for an hour, we shall not be safe, however secure, unless we can take back the words as Jesus on so signal an occasion did, and say, “And yet I am not alone, for the Father is with me.”
HOMILIES BY J.R. THOMSON
1Ch 20:3.-The barbarity of man to man.
There are signal inconsistencies in the character of David. He was capable of kindness, self-denial, and generosity, but he was capable also of cruelty amounting to inhumanity and savagery. Perhaps no act more disgraceful and inexcusable is related to have been performed by him than that recorded in the text. The people of Rabbah had long resisted his arms; and when the city fell David seems to have given the reins to his passions, and to have treated the captive population with what seems to us all but incredible cruelty. But allowance must be made for the manners and morals of the age. Humanity towards enemies is comparatively a modern virtue. Though history records a few striking exceptions to the general rule, that rule was undoubtedly one of utter insensibility to the miseries of a vanquished foe. The chronicler here relates, evidently as a matter calling for no surprise or indignation, that David in cold blood cut the people with saws, broke their limbs with threshing-instruments, and flung them, whilst still alive, into the red-hot brick-kilns!
I. CRUELTY IS AN OUTCOME AND A FORM OF SIN. From the time, and in consequence of, man’s original departure from God, human society has been cursed with all the horrors which result from the violation of Divine law, the defiance of Divine authority. Hatred, envy, and strife have run riot, and their manifestations have been the main factors in what is called human history. Hence the barbarities heartlessly and ruthlessly practised among all rude nations. Modern war is nothing but a disgraceful survival of the savage barbarism of the sinful and inhuman past. Even now the practices common in war are enough to sadden and to sicken every sensitive mind. “Whence come wars and fightings? Come they not hence of your lusts?”
II. RESTRAINTS AND CHECKS UPON CRUELTY HAVE BEEN COMPARATIVELY FEEBLE AND INEFFECTIVE. David was a very religious man, but his religion did not preserve him from adultery and murder; nor did it restrain him from cold-blooded cruelty. The ancient civilizations, the ancient religions, failed to check the prevalent insensibility to suffering, the prevalent habit of revenge. Even the religion of the Old Testament had very partial power to secure these ends. Mitigations of the horrors of war have doubtless been introduced by Christianity and by chivalry. Yet the professed servants of the meek and holy Jesus have too often sanctioned and applauded the barbarities of war, the infamies of slavery, the tortures of the Inquisition.
III. VITAL AND SCRIPTURAL CHRISTIANITY ALONE CAN COPE WITH AND VANQUISH THIS EVIL. Rules and maxims are of little avail to contend with the fierce passions of our fallen nature. The new heart, with its changed dispositions, is alone sufficient. The example and the spirit of our Divine Saviour are incompatible with cruelty. In proportion as Christ himself lives in the hearts and governs the lives of men, will inhumanity diminish until it disappear, and until such deeds as those described in the text become impossible. The prophecies and promises of God’s Word point forward to a day when the “new commandment” shall be everywhere observed, and when cruelty shall be no more.T.
HOMILIES BY W. CLARKSON
1Ch 20:1-3.–Further consequences of folly, etc.
We learn these five lessons
I. THE LONG TRAIN OF THE CONSEQUENCES OF FOLLY. It is long before the whole penalty of a great mistake is paid. Hanun and his foolish princes (1Ch 19:3) doubtless felt crestfallen enough when they were miserably defeated in battle, but they probably comforted themselves with the consideration that they had borne their punishment, and would have no more bitter fruits to swallow. If so, they were mistaken. In the next chapter we meet with more consequences of their folly. The next spring, they had to encounter another army in the field (1Ch 20:1). Often, when we think we have escaped from the wretched results of our thoughtlessness or our sin, we find that we have not: there they are again, walking at our side, or meeting us sword in hand. Let us earnestly pray and vigilantly watch, that we may not be surprised into folly, may not fall into the power of temptation, so that our life may not be darkened by the appearance and reappearance of the penalties of wrong-doing.
II. THE EVIL OF ABSOLUTISM. No doubt this little kingdom of Ammon was autocratic. It is true, indeed, that the princes advised, but the king decided. And what terrible penalties his poor people paid for his decision! The city of Rabbah was sacked (1Ch 20:2), and its inhabitants not only lost their property but were subjected to cruel tortures; and “even so dealt David with all the cities,” etc. (1Ch 20:3). Our heart is touched with sorrow and indignation as we think how one man’s (or how a few men’s) incensate folly brought down upon thousands of the innocent such a wretched fate. Let us thank God that public policy is largely taken out of the hands of one man who may be shamelessly selfish or utterly incapable, and is deposited with the many who consult the large and general interests of the nation.
III. THE PERILS OF POWER. One may well believe that Hanun had little happiness, if any at all, in the subsequent years of his reign. Surely the cries that came from these mutilated subjects and from these bereaved homes must have rung in his ears, and made discord of every other sound that greeted him. Men covet power, but it is a perilous thing to possess. One great mistake, and we involve numbers of our fellow-men in suffering and sorrow.
1. How should they who wield it be solicitous and prayerful that they may be preserved from abusing it!
2. How well may those who are denied it be content to take the lower place, and be secure from such solemn and weighty responsibilities as they would otherwise incur!
IV. THE NEED FOR REFLECTION IN THE HOUR OF ANGER. It would be altogether unjust to judge David by the humane and merciful standards of our own age; yet we cannot but regret that he inflicted such cruelties on the children of Ammon (1Ch 20:8). We should have liked it (and him) better if he had entertained and acted upon the thought which, on another occasion, he admitted to his mind, “These sheep, what have they done?” (2Sa 24:17). He had been greatly provoked, but he carried his indignation further than he was obliged to do, and beyond the point at which a large-minded, God-taught man should surely have stopped. In anger we should pause and think, for we are in great danger of speaking too harshly and striking too hard (Rom 12:19).
V. THE BEST CROWN TO WIN AND WEAR. (1Ch 20:2.) David seems to have set much store on this crown, which was taken from the King of Ammon and placed on his head (Psa 21:3). Better far the crown of God’s favour, the crown of righteousness, the crown of grateful love, the crown of glory. These are
(1) untarnished with severities;
(2) adornments of our true selves (our souls);
(3) unfading with time.C.
1Ch 20:4-8.–Little things and great.
How small and insignificant in our esteem are the physical peculiarities of these “children of the giant”! How little we care to treasure their names and deeds in our memories! They probably thought much of themselves, and were made much of by their contemporaries; but they have sunk into entire insignificance now. We feel that
I. DISTINCTION BASED ON BODILY PECULIARITY IS OF LITTLE WORTH. Great stature makes its possessor conspicuous among his fellows, if that be a desirable thing; great muscular strength serves in good stead on those rare occasions when a man has to resist by physical force. Unusual beauty of countenance attracts the eye and wins the admiration of the opposite sex. But these visible specialities have their drawbacks, if not their evils. The first of these often secures a most undesirable and even painful notoriety; the second tempts to acts of violence which are regrettable; the last exposes to peculiar perils of its own. And how speedily they perish! In this war with the Philistines these giants “were subdued” (1Ch 20:4). Lahmi’s great spear did not save him from the skill of Elhanan (1Ch 20:5); nor the immense stature of the giant with twenty-four fingers and toes, from the courage and capacity of Jonathan (1Ch 20:6, 1Ch 20:7). “They fell by the hand of David’s servants” (1Ch 20:8). Mere size of body, mere power of muscle, mere skill of fence, and even beauty of face and charm of manner,all these are either overmatched with something that is stronger, or they soon fade and fall under the resistless ravages of time. And when they pass, how soon they are forgotten! We hardly recognize some of these names; or, if we remember them, we associate them with other men who bore them, but were distinguished by other and nobler features. The next generation will care little for those who have nothing better to claim than great strength, or commanding stature, or some other bodily peculiarity. On the other hand, we feel that
II. DISTINCTION BASED ON SPIRITUAL WORTH IS A DESIRABLE EXCELLENCY.
1. Mental strength, when gained by diligent self-culture and devoted to useful ends, enjoys a more lasting honour and effects a far greater good.
2. But spiritual worth is the most valuable acquisition; that is the true greatness of man.
(1) It raises him highest in the scale of being.
(2) It renders nobler and truer service.
(3) It yields a finer fragrance in grateful recollection (Pro 10:7).
(4) It lives on to distant generations in benignant influence.
The “good men do” is not “interred with their bones;” it lives and blossoms, and bears precious fruit in the hearts and lives of men.C.
HOMILIES BY F. WHITFIELD
1Ch 20:1-8.-The wasting of the Ammonites, and David’s wars with the giants.
The outrage inflicted on the Hebrew ambassadors was still further to be avenged by David. Joab was sent out with the power of the army to waste the country of the Ammonites. The former campaign had been disastrous because of the hired auxiliaries of the Ammonites. Now the full strength of David’s army was to be led forth to complete the ruin both of the people and their land. “At the time that kings go out to battle,” i.e. spring-time, the expedition set out. Having besieged the capital, Rabbah, and having after a protracted siege taken the lower town, or “city of waters,” and knowing that the royal city would soon fall, Joab invited King David to come in person and have the honour of taking it himself (see 2Sa 12:26). We are thus enabled to reconcile the two statements, that “David tarried at Jerusalem” (1Ch 20:1), and “David and all the people returned to Jerusalem” (1Ch 20:3). David took the king’s crown, and it was set on David’s head. This crown weighed a talent, or one hundred and fourteen pounds’ weight of gold. The crowns of Eastern kings were not usually worn on the head (and could not have been in this case), but were suspended by chains of gold over the throne. We again notice the cruelties of war and especially of that time (1Ch 20:3). These are recorded, not for example, but to deepen our sense of gratitude for the blessings which Christianity has brought in introducing a humane mode of warfare. It may also make us long for the time when “nations shall learn war no more,” and when “righteousness shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea.” We see here David’s victories over the giants. The “stripling” in God’s hand has overthrown kingdoms and slain the giants of wickedness. In God’s hand “the worm Jacob shall thresh the mountains.” As we review David’s rise from the “stripling” of the wilderness to the highest place in the land, we may say, “What hath God wrought!” “Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord of hosts.” To the outward eye of sense a man may be a “stripling,” and in his own eyes “a dead dog” and “a flea;” but it is such instruments God ever uses to accomplish his mighty works and to advance his kingdom in the world. Gideon’s “lamps and pitchers,” Naaman’s “little maid,” the widow’s “pot of oil,” Jonah’s “worm” and “gourd,” and Samson’s “jawbone of an ass,”these God uses for in these he can be glorified. Man’s might and power is passed by, for there is no room in them for God to be glorified. If we are only low enough, only little enough, only nothing before him, he can and will use us; and the reason he has so often to pass by the “vessel” is, that it is too full and not “fit for the Master’s use.” “God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and the weak things of the world to confound the things that are mighty; and base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not [too contemptible to be named], to bring to nought things that are: that no flesh should glory in his presence“ (1Co 1:27-29).W.
HOMILIES BY R. TUCK
1Ch 20:3.–The horrors of war.
All actions, both of nations and of individuals, should be judged in the light of the prevailing standards and sentiments of the age in which they are done. This is a most important principle, but it is a difficult one to apply wisely; and it is one that may be easily misrepresented. Right can never be other than right, and wrong can never be other than wrong. But custom and sentiment give a temporary character to many actions which tend to confuse our apprehension of their essential rightness or wrongness. Limited knowledge also leads to the permission of things which advancing civilization shows to be unworthy and even wrong. These points may be illustrated from slavery, truthfulness, sense of the value of life, ideas of property, and war. Another important consideration, which greatly helps to explain Old Testament narratives, is that national judgments must of necessity take national character. An old divine well says, “God can punish individuals both in this life and in the next; but he can only punish nations in this.” There are distinctly personal and individual sins, and there are as distinctly national sins; wrong done by the rulers in the name of the people; or a wrong spirit pervading the people; or times when vice is permitted to run an unrestrained and ruinous course. And such national sin Jehovah ever regards, using such agencies as famine, plague, or war, for its due punishment. In this light the Old Testament ever regards war; the aggressive force is always treated as the executioner who carries out the Divine judgments. And it may be urged that this is still the deeper view to take of war, and that it is quite consistent with a clear recognition of the fact that such an aggressive force may act in mere wilfulness, or in furtherance of wicked schemes of self-aggrandizement. God makes the very “wrath of man” praise him. In treating the incidents of this chapter, it may be well to point out the distinction between what usually happens under the excitements of a siege, and the deliberate judgment that may be pronounced upon a conquered people. As may be painfully illustrated from the conduct of the British soldiers in India and in Spain, when a city is taken by storm, a scene of wild and awful rioting usually follows. Illustrate also from the Roman siege of Jerusalem. For Rabbah, the city here referred to, see the Expository portion of this Commentary, and 2Sa 11:1.
I. ANCIENT HORRORS OF WAR. Illustrate from different kinds of warwars of races, the young and strong pushing out the old and weak; hardy mountain races occupying the cultured plains of the over-civilized and effeminate; dynastic wars, occasioned by the rivalries of different royal houses; sacred wars, such as the Crusades, to recover possession of the Lord’s tomb; and wars of revenge, undertaken to clear off supposed or real insults. Of this latter kind was the war with Ammon (see 2Sa 19:1-43.). Modern ideas concerning war make it impossible for us to approve of the treatment to which the conquered Ammonites were subjected. Some writers have urged that David merely condemned the captives to severe bodily labours, to hewing and sawing wood, to burning of bricks, and to working in iron-mines; but probably the more terrible translation of the language must be accepted, in view of the common war-law of that stern age. And, with its best mitigations, war must still be regarded as a dreadful thing. The whole world sighs for the day when “the nations shall learn war no more.”
II. CHRISTIAN MITIGATIONS OF THE HORRORS OF WAR. Illustrate from modem treatment of the dead, the wounded, the prisoner, and the conquered. Show how a prolonged period of comparative peace has influenced national sentiment concerning war. Explain, illustrate, and impress that the Christian law of the universal human brotherhood seeks to destroy all forms of war; and the day of its full triumph is surely coming.R.T.
1Ch 20:6, 1Ch 20:7.–Strong in body, and strong in God.
Here are introduced to us “a man of great stature,” and of abnormal development; a striking instance of mere bodily power: and a man who could overcome this giant, by virtue of his loyalty to God and reliance on his strength. It seems to be a fact that hugeness of body is usually associated with dulness of mind. The quick-witted David is always more than a match for the ponderous Goliath. It seems to be the factat least under our present human conditionsthat the culture of the mind tends to ensure the frailty of the body. It seems to be now very difficult, if it may not be called impossible, to gain and to keep the mens sana in corpore sano. Yet we should feel that both the body and the soul are sacred trusts, and that we are responsible to God for the full and wise and harmonious culture of them both. The “body is to be for the Lord,” and we are to “prosper even as our souls prosper.” There are two principles by which our life should be toned. We should seek to be
I. STRONG IN BODY; that is, in the bodily powers and resources. Applications may be made to health, vigour offrame, due control of passions, and proper training of mental faculties. But it should be shown that there are limitations to the success which we may reach in these matterslimitations from constitutional peculiarities, from hereditary tendencies, and from disabilities of circumstance. In this each of us can but reach his best possible.
II. STRONG IN GOD; that is, in the higher moral capacities and forces. In the culture of these there need be no qualifications or limitations. Due training of these will ensure complete dominion over the bodily powers and relations, so that all the lower faculties take their due place of ministry or service. And this is the high ideal after which we all should strivethe true man, who is like the Man Christ Jesus, strong in God, and therefore strong in body.R.T.
Fuente: The Complete Pulpit Commentary
CHAP. XX.
Joab takes the city of Rabbah. The Philistines are three times overcome by David and his servants.
Before Christ 1037.
REFLECTIONS.While Joab conquered the country of the Ammonites, David stayed at Jerusalem: we learn, with grief, to how bad purpose, 2 Samuel 11. Here his crime is passed over. A veil should be drawn ever the sins which are repented of, and they should no more be mentioned to a man’s shame.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
.Davids Wars and Officers of State, especially his Victorious Battles with the Ammonites and the Philistines: 1 Chronicles 18-20
1Ch 18:1 And after this it came to pass, that David smote the Philistines, and subdued them, and took Gath and her daughters out of the hand of the Philistines. 2And he smote Moab; and the Moabites became Davids servants, and brought gifts.
3And David smote Hadadezer1 king of Zobah towards Hamath, as he went to set up his sign at the river Euphrates. 4And David took from him a thousand chariots, and seven thousand horsemen, and twenty thousand footmen: and 5David lamed all the teams, but reserved of them a hundred teams. And the Syrians of Damascus2 came to help Hadadezer king of Zobah; and David slew 6of the Syrians twenty and two thousand men. And David put [men3] in Syria Damascus; and the Syrians became Davids servants, and brought gifts: and the Lord preserved David wherever he went. 7And David took the arms of gold that were on the servants of Hadadezer, and brought them to Jerusalem. 8And from Tibhath and from Chun, cities of Hadadezer, David took very much brass, of which Solomon made the brazen sea, and the pillars, and the brazen vessels.
9And Tou king of Hamath heard that David had smitten all the host of Hadadezer king of Zobah. And 10he sent Hadoram his son to King David, to greet him and to bless him, because he had fought against Hadadezer and smitten him; for Tou was at war with Hadadezer; and [with him] all manner11of vessels of gold, and silver, and brass. These also King David dedicated unto the Lord, with the silver and the gold that he had taken from all the nations, from Edom, and from Moab, and from the sons of Ammon, and from the Philistines, and from Amalek.
12And Abshai the son of Zeruiah slew of Edom in the valley of salt eighteen thousand. 13And he put garrisons in Edom; and all the Edomites became servants of David: and the Lord preserved David wherever he went.
14And David reigned over all Israel, and executed judgment and justice for all his people. 15And Joab the son of Zeruiah was over the host; and Jehoshaphat the son of Ahilud was recorder. 16And Zadok the son of Ahitub, and Abimelech4 the son of Abiathar, were priests; and Shavsha was scribe. 17And Benaiah the son of Jehoiada was over the Cherethi and Pelethi; and Davids sons were the chief beside the king.
1Ch 19:1 And it came to pass after this, that Nahash king of the sons of Ammondied, and his son reigned in his stead. 2And David said, I will show kindness unto Hanun the son of Nahash, because his father showed kindness to me; and David sent messengers to comfort him concerning his father: and the servants of 3David came to the land of the sons of Ammon, to Hanun, to comfort him. And the princes of the sons of Ammon said to Hanun: Thinkest thou that David doth honour thy father, that he hath sent comforters unto thee ? are not his servants come to thee to search and to turn over, and to spy out the land? 4And Hanun took Davids servants, and shaved them, and cut off half their 5garments by the breech, and sent them away. And they went, and they told David about the men, and he sent to meet them; for the men were greatly ashamed: and the king said, Tarry at Jericho until your beard be grown, and then return.
6And the sons of Ammon saw that they had made themselves stink with David: and Hanun and the sons of Ammon sent a thousand talents of silver to hire them chariots and horsemen out of Mesopotamia, and out of Syria-maachah, and7out of Zobah. And they hired them thirty and two thousand chariots, and the king of Maachah and his people; and they came and pitched before Medeba: and the sons of Ammon gathered together from their cities, and came to battle. 8, 9And David heard,, and sent Joab, and all the host of the mighty men. And the sons of Amnion came out, and set the battle in array at the gate of the city; and the kings that were come stood by themselves in the field.
10And Joab saw that the battle was directed against him before and behind; and he chose out of all the choice in Israel, and drew up against the Syrians. 11And the rest of the people he gave into the hand of Abshai his brother, and they drew up against the sons of Ammon. 12And he said, If the Syrians be too strong for me, then thou shalt come to my help; and if the sons of Ammon be 13too strong for thee, then I will help thee. Be courageous, and let us do valiantly for our people and for the cities of our God; and the Lord do that which is good 14in His sight. And Joab, and the people that were with him, drew nigh before 15the Syrians to the battle; and they fled before him. And the sons of Ammon saw that the Syrians fled, and they also fled before Abshai his brother, and went into the city; and Joab went to Jerusalem.
16And when the Syrians saw that they were smitten before Israel, they sent messengers, and drew forth the Syrians that were beyond the river; and Shophach, captain of the host of Hadadezer, went before them. 17And it was told David; and he gathered all Israel, and passed the Jordan, and came to them,5 and drew up against them; and David drew up against the Syrians for battle, 18and they fought with him. And the Syrians fled before Israel; and David slew of the Syrians seven thousand teams, and forty thousand footmen; and he killed Shophach, captain of the host. 19And when the servants of Hadadezer saw that they were smitten before Israel, they made peace with David, and served him; and the Syrians would not help the sons of Ammon any more.
1Ch 20:1.And it came to pass, when the year was ended, at the time when the kings go out, that Joab led forth the strength of the host, and wasted the land of the sons of Ammon, and came and besieged Rabbah; but David tarried in Jerusalem; and Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it. 2And David took the crown of their king from his head, and found it in weight a talent of gold, and set with precious stones; and it was put upon Davids head, and he brought very much spoil out of the city. 3And he brought out the people that were in it, and cut them with saws, and iron threshing-carts and saws;6 and so David did to all the cities of the sons of Ammon; and David returned with all the people to Jerusalem.
4And it came to pass after this, that a war arose at Gezer with the Philistines; then Sibbecai the Hushathite slew Sippai, one of the sons of Rapha; and they were subdued. 5And there was a war again with the Philistines; and Elhanan the son of Jair slew Lachmi, brother of Goliath the Gittite; and his 6spears staff was like a weavers beam. And again there was war in Gath, where was a man of [great] stature, and his fingers were six and six, twenty and four 7[in all]; and he also was born to Rapha. And he reproached Israel; and Jonathan the son of Shima, Davids brother, slew him. 8These were born to Rapha in Gath; and they fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants.
EXEGETICAL
Preliminary Remark.The present group of war reports runs parallel to four sections of 2 Samuel, separated from one another by other accounts. To the present summary accounts of the victorious warfare of David with all surrounding enemies in general, in 1 Chronicles 18, corresponds 2 Samuel 8; to the more copious description of the peculiarly difficult war with Ammon, in 1 Chronicles 19, corresponds 2 Samuel 10; the close of this war, described in 1Ch 20:1-3, by the taking of Rabbah, has its parallel in 2Sa 12:26-31; the shorter reports of the several heroic acts of Davids warriors in conflict with giants from the land of the Philistines, 1Ch 20:4-8, corresponds with the section 2Sa 21:18-22. The statements of 2 Samuel coming between these sections (namely 1 Chronicles 9 and 1Ch 11:1-12; 1Ch 11:25; but also 1 Chronicles 13, 14-18) are particulars from the private life and domestic history of David, which the Chronist, in conformity with his plan, neither could nor would take up.
1. General Report of Davids Victorious Wars with his Neighbours: 1Ch 18:1-13. 1Ch 18:1 treats of the victories over the Philistines.And took Gath and her daughters out of the hand of the Philistines. This statement is surprising, because 2Sa 8:1 has the more general and withal poetical expression: and David took the arm-bridle from the hand of the Philistines( for ). To assume a purely arbitrary change of text on the part of ourauthor is questionable; and against, at least, a passing seizure of the metropolis Gath with its daughter towns (1Ch 7:28) by David, it can scarcely be maintained that in Solomons time Gath was again an independent city under its own king.
1Ch 18:2. And the Moabites became Davids servants, and brought gifts, in short, became tributary subjects (1Ch 18:6). Why our author has omitted the notice, following here in 2Sa 8:2, of the severe handling of the Moabites by David, is uncertain. It scarcely rests on an apologetic tendency in favour of David; comp. in 1Ch 20:3 the account of the cruel punishment of Rabbath Ammon. Moreover, this war of David with Moab seems to be that in which Benaiah slew the two sons of the king of Moab, 1Ch 11:22.
1Ch 18:3-8. The War with Hadadezer of Zobah.King of Zobah towards Hamath. This closer determination of the situation of Zobah (), which is peculiar to our text, places it pretty far north, not far from Hamath, the later Epiphania, on the Orontes; scarcely Haleb or Nisibis, both of which lay farther north than Hamath, and can scarcely, from an Israelitish point of view, be described as lying towards Hamath (against the Rabbis of the middle ages on the one hand, and J. D. Mich on the other). Zobah is perhaps = Zabe of Ptolemy; at all events, it is to be sought north or north-east of Damascus (with Ew., Then., Berth., etc.).7 On the spelling peculiar to Chronicles and 2Sa 10:16-19, Hadarezer (Sept. ) see Crit. Note.As he went to set up his sign at the river Euphrates, to establish his power (properly hand) there; comp. 1Sa 15:12. Whether these words refer to David or Hadadezer is doubtful; the latter (which J. H. Mich., Ew., Berth., etc., assume) may be the more probable, on account of the mention of David as subject at the beginning of the following verse. The various reading in 2Sa 8:3 : , to turn his hand, is perhaps to be amended from our passage, as it gives a less suitable sense.
1Ch 18:4. And David took from him a thousand chariots, and seven thousand horsemen, and twenty thousand footmen. For this 2Sa 8:4 has 1700 horsemen and 20,000 footmen, perhaps defectively; after , and before , it appears necessary to insert there, for which also the Sept. speaks. Yet comp. Wellh. on this passage, who questions the insertion of , on account of the close of the verse.And David lamed all the teams, but reserved of them a thousand teams, for his own use; in fact, therefore, he lamed only 900. For this custom of laming () war-horses, comp. Jos 11:6; Jos 11:9.
1Ch 18:6. And David put in Syria Damascus, men, soldiers, garrison troops. From 2Sa 8:6 and 1Ch 18:13 of our chapter the word appears to have fallen out after ; comp. also 1Ch 13:3; 1Sa 10:5.
1Ch 18:7. And David took the arms (or equipments) of gold,; so rightly the moderns, instead of the golden collars () of the Sept., the quivers (pharetr) of the Vulg., and the golden shields of the Chald., of some Rabbis, and of Luther.Which were on the servants of Hadadezer, his military servants, soldiers. On the addition of the Sept., in 2Sa 8:7 relative to the later capture and carrying away of these golden arms by Shishak of Egypt, under Rehoboam, comp. the expositors of that passage.
1Ch 18:8. And from Tibhath and from Chun, etc. Tibhath (), or, as it is perhaps to be read, Tebah (, for which, 2 Samuel 8, stands erroneously ), appears to be identical with the family mentioned, Gen 22:24, among the descendants of Nahor; whether it be the present Taibeh, on the caravan road between Aleppo and the Euphrates, is questionable. In place of 2 Samuel gives (= Barathena, Ptol. v. 19? or , Eze 47:16?). On what this diversity of name rests, whether on the corruption of the original into , as Berth. thinks, or on a double name of the place in question, must remain doubtful.Of which Solomon made the brazen sea, and the pillars, and the brazen vessels. These words, wanting in 2Sa 8:8 in the Masoretic text, are perhaps to be restored according to our passage, and according to the Sept. and Vulg.
1Ch 18:9-11. Embassy and Present of Tou King of Hamath to David. In the parallel account, 2Sa 8:9-12, this Tou is called Toi ()
1Ch 18:10. And he sent Hadoram his son. 2 Samuel: Joram, at all events incorrect, as a name compounded with would scarcely have suited a member of a Syrian royal house; and the Sept. gives there (here)To greet him, to wish him health. So is to be taken, according to the parallel passages, as Gen 43:27, not, with the Sept. and Vulg., in the sense of a prayer for peace (ut postulant ab eo pacem).For Ton was at war with Hadadezer, literally, For Hadadezer was a man of wars of Tou, a constant assailant and adversary to him; comp. 1Ch 28:3; Isa 42:13. After these words, which form a parenthetical explanation to the foregoing, follows the wider object of : and all manner of vessels of gold and silver and brass, which Luther erroneously refers to 1Ch 18:11.
1Ch 18:11. With the silver and the gold that he had taken. For 2 Samuel presents , perhaps the original form.From all the nations . . . and from Amalek. In 2 Samuel a more complete and probable text is found (in which, besides, is to be read for .
1Ch 18:12-13. Abshais Victory over the Edomites in the Valley of Salt.And Abshai . . . slew of Edom (literally, slew Edom) in the valley of salt, 18,000 men. In Bertheaus combination of the very different reading in 2Sa 8:13 with our passage, for Abshai son of Zeruiah would have to be read Joab, etc., and after slew of Edom would have fallen out the words when he (Joab) returned from the conquest of Aram. Otherwise Ew., Then., Wellh., Keil, etc., the latter of whom upholds the statement of Chronicles, that Abshai gained this victory, by reference to 1Ch 10:10 ff. of our book (where Abshai appears as commander under his brother Joab), and declares it consistent as well with Psa 60:2 as with 1Ki 11:15.
1Ch 18:14. And all the Edomites became servants of David. For this 2 Samuel has more fully, and perhaps originally: and in all Edom he appointed officers; and all the Edomites became Davids servants.
2. Davids Officers of State: 1Ch 18:14-17,a list in 2 Samuel 8 also appended to the above summary war reports ( = 2Sa 8:15-18), that was certainly found here in the old common sources of both authors, introduced by the general remark on the ability and excellence of the government of David (1Ch 18:14).
1Ch 18:15. For Joab, comp. on 1Ch 2:16.Jehoshaphat the son of Ahilud was recorder., properly remembrancer, that is, not annalist (Sept. Vulg. a commentariis), but chancellor, who makes to the king a report of all that takes place in the kingdom, and conveys his commands; comp. the magister memori of the later Romans, and the Waka Nuvis in the Persian court (Chardin, Voyages, v. p. 258).
1Ch 18:16. For Zadok, comp. on 1Ch 5:30 ff.Abimelech the son of Abiathar. For is certainly to be read, with the Sept., Vulg., and 2Sa 8:17, ; for so is this priest called in 1Ch 24:3; 1Ch 24:6; 1Ch 24:31, where he is likewise named as the representative of Ithamar with Zadok of Eleazar, and where he appears as the son of Abiathar. That Abiathars father was also called Ahimelech, 1Sa 22:20, does not warrant the assumption that in our passage, as in 24, there is an exchange of the father and the son; and thus a transposition of the names into Abiathar the son of Ahimelech is necessary (as Movers, Then., Ew., Wellh. think). Rather is our Ahimelech to be regarded as a son of the same name with his grandfather, according to the known Hebrew custom, who, even during his fathers lifetime, acted in the priestly office. Comp. the frequent recurrence of the grandfathers name in the grandson in 1Ch 5:3041.And Shavsha was scribe, that is, secretary of state. This Shavsha (Luth. Sausa) is called in 1Ki 4:3 Shisha (, differing only in spelling from ), but in 2Sa 20:25 () If 2Sa 8:17 exhibits , this is to be considered, perhaps, an error of the pen.
1Ch 18:17. And Benaiah . . . was over the Cherethi and the Pelethi. So also 2Sa 8:18, with the more correct reading for , as in 2Sa 20:23. That Cherethi and Pelethi denote the two divisions of the royal guard (the , Joseph. Antiq.vii. 5. 4) is undoubted, though, with Gesen., Then., Bhr (on 1Ki 1:36), Keil, etc., the former name be explained by confossores, lictores, executioners, the latter by celeres, , runners (couriers), and thus both appellatively, for which the passages 1Ki 2:25, 2Ki 11:1 appear to speak, or though (with Lakemacher, Movers, Ew., Berth., Hitz., etc.) they be regarded as the nationalities of the Cretans (Carians) and the Philistines. Comp. the latest discussion of this controversy by J. G. Mller (Die Semiten in ihrem Verhaltniss zu Chamiten und Japhetiten, 1872, p. 263 ff.), who decides for the latter interpretation. For Benaiah, comp. also 1Ch 11:22 ff.And Davids sons were the chief beside the king, the next to him. In 2Sa 8:18 the ancient term , privy counsellors, is chosen to designate the high rank of the royal princes (comp. 1Ki 4:5).
3. The War with Ammon and Syria: 1Ch 19:1 to 1Ch 20:3; comp. 2 Samuel 10.And it came to pass after this. The loose form of connection serves sometimes to introduce new reports, even if there be no strict chronological order, or if, as here (comp. 1Ch 18:3-5 with 1Ch 19:16 ff.), that which is to be related has been partly mentioned before. Comp. for example, 2Sa 8:1; 2Sa 10:1; 2Sa 13:1. For the Ammonite king Nahash, and his war with Saul, see 1 Samuel 11.And his son reigned in his stead. The following certainly shows that this son was called Hanun; yet the name , from 2Sa 10:1, appears to have originally stood in the text after , as inversely there, the omitted name must apparently be supplied from our passage.
1Ch 19:3. Thinkest thou that David doth honour thy father? literally, Does David honour thy father in thine eyes? The emphasis in this question rests on the notion of honouring, of which the questioners doubt whether it really forms the object of Davids embassy.To search and to turn over (turn up side down, examine thoroughly), and to spy out the land. This sentence is also in Hebrew a question, but, as an affirmative answer is expected, introduced, not with , but with Are they not come to search, etc.? In 2Sa 10:3, the sentence runs somewhat different, so that riot the land (), but the city (), is the object of the verbs, and the removed to the end has the sense, not of turning over, but of destroying. But it is scarcely necessary to change our text accordingly (against Berth.).
1Ch 19:4. And shaved them. 2 Samuel more exactly: shaved off the half (the one side) of their beard.And cut off half their garments by the breech., properly, the step, the step-region in the middle of the body, here euphemistic for , nates, which is used in 2 Samuel.
1Ch 19:5. And they went. This is wanting in 2 Samuel, but not therefore to be erased as superfluous (against Berth.).And the king said, Tarry at Jericho. So far they were then come on their way to Jerusalem. The following then return is naturally completed by adding to Jerusalem or hither.
1Ch 19:6. That they had made themselves stink with David, had drawn his hatred on them. For the Hithp. 2 Samuel has the Niph. of the same verb, in the same reflexive sense.Hanun . . . sent a thousand talents of silver to hire, etc. The statement that this hiring of auxiliaries took place is wanting in 2 Samuel, but is certainly genuine.For Mesopotamia = Aram-naharaim, 2 Samuel names, as the first of the countries from which Hanun hired his auxiliaries, Aram-beth-rehob, which can scarcely be only another name of Mesopotamia (as some ancients have assumed, identifying the city Beth-rehob with Rehobath, now Rahabe, on the Euphrates, Gen 36:37), but the kingdom or territory of Beth-rehob, a Syrian city, Num 13:21, Jdg 18:28, lying south of Hamath. For the following name, Aram-Maachah, 2 Samuel 10. (as 1Ch 19:7 of our ch.) has only Maachah (on which region, bordering northward on the trans-jordanic Palestine, comp. Deu 3:14; Jos 12:5; Jos 13:11). On the contrary, Zobah is there called more fully: Aram-Zobah (comp. on 1Ch 18:3).
1Ch 19:7. And they hired them 32,000 chariots, that is, chariots with riders, , as the foregoing verse shows. The number 32,000 agrees substantially with the deviating statement in 2 Samuel, in which these auxiliaries appear rather as footmen, and, indeed, consisting of 20,000 footmen from Aram and Aram-beth-rehob, 1000 men from Maachah, and 12,000 men from the kingdom of Tob (Jdg 11:3), which latter our author has left undistinguished.And they came and pitched before Medeba, the city of the tribe of Reuben mentioned Jos 13:16, two miles (about nine English miles) south-east of Heshbon. This statement as well as the following, relative to the simultaneous assembling of the Ammonite troops, is wanting in 2 Samuel 10, but was found no doubt in the old sources used by our writer, in common with the author of the books of Samuel.
1Ch 19:8. And all the host of the mighty. Different, but merely in expression, from 2 Samuel: the whole host, the mighty men.
1Ch 19:9. And the sons of Ammon . . . at the gate of the city, before the gates of Rabbah, their capital. This reading: , is to be preferred, as clearer than that in 2Sa 10:1 , at the gate, outside the gate.
1Ch 19:10. And Joab saw that the battle was directed against him before and behind, literally, that the face of the battle ( = the front of the line) was before and behind him: that before him stood the Ammonites, and in his rear the Syrians. Opposite the latter, as the stronger foe, Joab took his ground, while, 1Ch 19:11, he entrusted the engagement with the Ammonites to his brother Abshai.
1Ch 19:13. For our people, and for the city of our God: that these may not fall into the hands of the heathen, and from cities of the Lord become cities of idols.
1Ch 19:15. And went into the city, fled into their capital Rabbah, while Joab first returned to Jerusalem, reserving the siege and capture of this strong fortress for the following campaign.
1Ch 19:16-19. The Conquest of the Syrians allied with the Ammonites.They sent messengers, and drew forth the Syrians that were beyond the river Euphrates, the Mesopotamians, who must have been somehow subject to Hadadezer, and laid under tribute; comp. 2Sa 10:16.
1Ch 19:17. And came to them. Instead of this notice, which is superfluous, along with the following words: and drew up against them, should be read, with 2Sa 10:16 (see Crit. Note): and he came to Helam. This elsewhere not occurring local name or (Sept., Vulg. Helam) the Chronist quite omits in its first place (in 2 Samuel 10, 16 = 1Ch 19:16 of our ch.), and changes it the second time, whether intentionally or not, into . Comp. Joseph. Antiq.vii. 6, 3, where the name is regarded as a proper name of a king beyond the Euphrates, the master of the general Shophach (Sabekos). It is, moreover, not impossible that the local name Helam corresponds to the Alamatha on the Euphrates in Ptolem. 1Ch 15:5, in which case 1Ch 18:3 might be combined with our passage, if the same war with Hadadezer and the Syrians be spoken of there as here.
1Ch 19:18. And David slew of the Syrians 7000 teams (chariot horses) and 40,000 footmen. On the contrary, 2 Samuel has 700 teams and 40,000 horsemen. Perhaps the smaller number of teams in 2 Samuel and the designation of the 40,000 as footmen in our text deserve the preference; comp. Wellh. p. 180.
1Ch 19:19. And when the servants of Hadadezer, here not his warriors, but his allies or subject kings (vassals); comp. 2Sa 10:19 : .
1Ch 20:1-3. The Siege and Conquest of Rabbah, here more briefly related than in 2Sa 11:1; 2Sa 12:26-31, and therefore without any reference to the death of Uriah.When the year was ended, at the time when the kings go out, in the spring, as most suitable for re-opening the campaign. The last described battle with the Syrians appears accordingly to have fallen in the autumn of the previous year.Joab led forth the strength of the host; more circumstantially 2Sa 11:1 : David sent Joab, and his servants with him, and all Israel. On , comp. the similar , 2Ch 26:13.And Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it, properly, pulled it down; comp. Eze 16:39; Eze 26:4; Eze 26:12; Lam 2:2; Lam 2:17. Compared with 2Sa 12:26 ff, where it is reported that Joab first only took the so-called city of waters, but called King David to the taking of the proper fortress (citadel, acropolis), that the honour of completing the conquest and destruction of the city might be his, the present report appears brief and summary.
1Ch 20:3. And cut them with saws, and iron threshing-carts and saws., . ., from the root , cut; comp. saw, from the cognate root . In 2Sa 12:31, is perhaps only an error of the pen for or (Bttcher).For , as in 2 Samuel, , and with scythes (or like iron-cutting instruments, scarcely wedges, as Luther, or axes, as Kamph., thinks), is perhaps to be read. A twofold mention of saws, first in the sing., then in plur., would be an intolerable tautology. Moreover, this cutting and grinding of the vanquished Ammonites with iron saws, threshing sledges, and the like, is in itself horrible and barbarous enough (comp. Pro 20:26; Amo 1:3); and we need not assume that the Chronist intentionally, and from an apologetic tendency, passed over a still more horrid kind of punishment then inflicted on the vanquished Ammonites, burning in tile-kilns (2Sa 12:31); comp. on 1Ch 18:2.
4. Appendix: Briefer Report of the Heroic Deeds of some of Davids Warriors in the Conflict with Philistine Giants: 1Ch 20:4-8.This report is also treated as an appendix in 2 Samuel, where it is found quite at the end of the history of David, 1Ch 21:15-22, and, indeed, enlarged by a fourth heroic deed (1Ch 21:15-17), there related in the first place, but here wantingthe dangerous conflict of David with the giant Ishbi-benob, whom Abshai at length slew. It appears as if the Chronist had omitted this story intentionally, because it might have lessened the military fame of David. Comp. Lightfoot, Chronol. V. T. p. 1Chr 68: lllud prlium, in quo David in periculum venit et unde decore et illsus prodire non potuit, omissum est; as Starke: The dangerous combat of David with Ishbi is not mentioned here, as the book of Chronicles, as some remark, conceals or passes over the shame of the saints; whence also nothing occurs here of the adultery and murder by David, or of the idolatry of Solomon.
1Ch 20:4. And it came to pass after this. This formula stood here originally not so unconnected as in 1Ch 19:1; but the event to which it referred, 2Sa 21:18, was that history of the combat with Ishbi which is intentionally omitted by our author, on which account the formula does not now appear very suitable.A war arose at Gezer. (perhaps arising out of , 2Sa 21:18), here = , according to later usage. For Gezer (in the tribe of Ephraim, to the south-west, near the north border of the Philistines), sec 1Ch 7:28. For , moreover, we should apparently (2Sa 21:18) read , or perhaps ; that passage is not inversely to be amended from ours (against Berth.).Then Sibbecai the, Hushathite (one of Davids Gibborim; see 1Ch 11:29 and 1Ch 27:11) slew Sippai, one of the sons of Rapha, one of the Rephaites or descendants of Rapha, that gigantic tribe that before the invasion of the Philistines inhabited the south-west of Canaan, and of which several families of gigantic size still lived among the Philistines; comp. Jos 11:22; Deu 2:6; Deu 2:23.And they were subdued, namely, by the conquest of this giant; comp. Jdg 11:33; 1Sa 7:13. The absence of this remark in 2 Samuel does not make its originality suspicious.
1Ch 20:5. And there was a war again with the Philistines, namely, 2Sa 21:19, at Gob (or Nob), and so at the same place as the former.Elhanan the son of Jair slew Lachmi, brother of Goliath the Gittite. According to this certainly original reading is the defective text, 2Sa 21:19 : Elhanan the son of Jaare-oregim, a Bethlehemite, slew Goliath the Gittite, to be amended (with Piscat., Cleric, Mich., Mov., Then., Keil, Wellh.). The form , instead of of Chronicles, would be caused by the following , the accidental insertion of which from the line underneath is easily understood (Wellh.). Besides, the here quite unexplained mention of the celebrated captain of David, Elhanan of Bethlehem (1Ch 11:26), will have occasioned a change of into . Accordingly, the question started by Berth., as defender of the originality of the text of Samuel: Have there been two Goliaths? falls to the ground as an idle one.
1Ch 20:6 ff. The Last of the Four Heroic Deeds.Where was a man of (great) stature: = the , vir mensurarum, in 2 Samuel.And his fingers were, six and six (namely, on the hands and the feet, therefore in all), twenty and four. Comp. the sedigiti mentioned by Plin. . H. N. xi. 43; also Trusen, Sitten, Gebruche, and Krankheiten der alten Hebrer, p. 198 f.; Carlisle, An account of a family having hands and feet with supernumerary fingers and toes (in Philos. Transac. 1814, part 1, p. 94); Rosbach, Diss, de numiero digitorum adaucto, Bonn 1838; Blasius, Fall von Ueberzahl der Zehen, in Siebolds Journ. fr Geburtshlfe, vol. xiii. Art. 1; also Lond. Medic. Gaz. vol. xiv. Apr. 1834, and Friedrich, Zur Bibel, i. p. 298 f. Recently the well-known Arabian traveller F. v. Maltzan, in the Berlin Anthropological Society, reported as follows: Among the Himyarites (in South Arabia), in the dynasty of Forli, the six fingers are hereditary, and the pride of the ruler and the people. Indeed, this property of six fingers, a sign of bodily or, if not bodily, of mental strength among the Arabs, is still kept up artificially, as the six-fingered princes of the reigning house are allowed to marry only six-fingered members of the family, to avoid as much as possible the appearance of five fingers. In short, the twenty-four fingers and toes of the ruler are the pride of the country; and any one out of the country might prove his nearer or further connection with the ruling house by a greater or smaller superfluity of fingers (Correspondence Sheet of the German Society for Anthropology, Ethnol., etc., 1872, No. 8, p. 60).
1Ch 20:7. Jonathan the son of Shima, Davids brother, Slew him. Comp., on this Shima, 1Ch 2:13.
1Ch 20:8. These were born. for is an archaism, that occurs eight times in the Pentateuch, but always with the article (), and stands only here without it, for which reason it appears suspicious; the following also probably contains an error; comp. the regular in 2Sa 21:22, Where it is preceded by the number four (Which is naturally omitted by the Chronist).And they fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants, namely, by Davids hand in a mediate way, as he was the supreme commander and military chief of the victorious Israelites, but immediately by the hand of his so-called servants or heroes. The whole remark forms a concluding subscription, that appears no less suitable in our passage than in 2Sa 21:22 (against Berth.).
Footnotes:
[1] is the Kethib in all passages of our chapter, but the Keri: (so in 2Sa 10:16-19). The first form, the more usual in the books of Samuel and Kings, is also the more original, because , a Syrian idol name, occurs in other Syrian proper names.
[2]Properly Darmascus (so here and 1Ch 18:6, also 2Ch 16:2; 2Ch 24:23, without variation; elsewhere always ).
[3]After there seems to have fallen out ; comp. Sept. () and Vulg. (milites), and see Exeg. Expl.
[4]For read rather (with the Sept., Vulg., and 1Ch 24:3; 1Ch 24:6) .
[5]For the text in Samuel (2Sa 10:17) has , and went to Helam, perhaps more correct and original (comp. Exeg. Expl.), though all translations and mss. conform the of our passage.
[6]Rather, perhaps, and scythes, as for is (with 2Sa 12:31) no doubt to be read.
[7]Recently Th. Bischoff (Das Ausland, 1873, p. 136) thinks he has found the ruins of Zobah south-east of Aleppo, near the salt lake Jabul. He appears to mean the same ruins which J. W. Helfer (Helfers Reisen in Vorderasien, by Countess Pauline Nostitz, Leipz. 1873, i. p. 174 ff.) saw in 1830.
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
CONTENTS
This Chapter contains a further account of the wars of David. Rabbah is besieged and taken. The Philistines are again overthrown.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
The Reader will recollect the circumstances which are here related have been before noticed, and with more particulars in 2Sa 11 and 2Sa 12 . I refer therefore to the account there given. I would only desire the Reader to recollect, that while Joab was thus engaged at Rabbah, this was the sad period when David was falling into the fool sin of adultery at Jerusalem. It is remarkable, however, that though the relation of that sin is immediately connected with the account of the war at Rabbah in the book of Samuel, yet it is not inserted here. Perhaps as it said there on David’s confession, the Lord hath put away thy sin, the Holy Ghost thought proper not to record it in the Chronicles, which was written so many years after. Sweet thought to the poor sinner, whose sins are blotted out, when the times of refreshing are come from the presence of the Lord. So saith one prophet, and the same is confirmed by another. The sin of Judah shall not be found, saith Jeremiah, Jer 1:19 . And the Prophet Micah adds, the Lord will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea. Mic 7:19 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Great Giants and Small
1Ch 20:4-8
You tremble when you read the names of these giants. There is no need to tremble; a deadlier giant is aiming at your heart today. The heroics have changed as to apparatus and nomenclature and environment, and all that sort of vanishing vapour; the great fight goes on, the tremendous rush of armies, Philistine and Israelite still meet face to face. I. What giants have you been fighting? You have got through the first crude lot. I know it; so have we all. But it was a mere mob of blackguards; the hostility itself was vulgar, coarse, contemptible. The mischief is, lest having got through that mob of scoundrelism and villainy detestable and palpable, we think that therefore the fighting is done. The fighting never ends until the body is in the grave or is laid out on its last bed. You have killed the giant of Falsehood, you would not for the world be thought to be a liar; long ago you killed the giant Untruth, the black-faced giant Lies. But it does not therefore follow that you are now a true man, that you have escaped the lap and the shame of another falsehood, deeper, subtler, deadlier. Take care! You have overthrown the giant Dishonesty, there is no thief in your family. Take care! oh, take care! Thou shalt not steal ‘ That commandment have I kept from my youth up’; and in the King’s name I stop thee and bid thee be less fluent.
II. Not until we distinguish between crime and sin can we make any real progress in Gospel studies. Have you fought down and conquered the giant of Ingratitude? Who thinks about the spiritual sins? Who is not horrified by crime and draws its garments round it in attestation of its shocked refinement? There may be more sin in ingratitude than in some murders. The murder may have been done in hot blood, in haste, to be repented of evermore, through ages eternal to be regretted and deplored as a lasting bruise of the soul. Ingratitude is slow, mean, deliberate, calculating, cruel; ingratitude may proceed by system, it means the most horrible of all neglect, it means death that swallows up the soul in some black pool. The giant of ingratitude takes a great deal of fighting.
III. The danger does not lie always along what may be called the line of giants. There are more difficult forces to contend with than the visibly and measurably gigantic. There is not a giant to fight every one of us, but there is a foe that every soul must know and confront and be thrown by or must overthrow.
Are you fully aware that there are many assailants and enemies who are not giants by name, but are giants in influence, in obstinacy of purpose, in a cruel determination to ruin your soul?
We have often been told of the insect in certain countries that eats away all the woodwork of the door and leaves nothing but a coat of paint, so that going to the door and endeavouring to open it, it tails to pieces under the slightest pressure. That is translated into the life of today and into the life of every day. The paint is right, the externalism is beyond criticism, all seems to be well; but take care, for the white ant has eaten up all the interior character, and nothing is left but some flakes of paint. You have read the wonderful travels of Livingstone; the great missionary traveller tells of the tsetze fly; it is a stinging winged insect. There is the noble ox, a symbol of things strong and massive; Livingstone says that the tsetze fly will light upon that ox, puncture the shining skin of the unsuspecting and undefended beast, and tomorrow and the next day and the next, and a week hence and that noble quadruped will have sunk upon the ground a mass of putrid flesh. These are the giants we have to fear, when morally defined and understood. We are not called upon to fight with fire and water and great hordes and rabbles of enemies and shocking vulgarities of incarnation, but we are called upon to fight the tsetze fly, the stinging insect that punctures the character, and little by little the poison penetrates the whole tissue and outgo of the character, and he who may have been a prince in the house of God is there a foul carcase on the roadside that no dog would attempt to devour. How are the mighty fallen! how is the fine gold become dim!
Joseph Parker, City Temple Pulpit, vol. I. p. 198.
Fuente: Expositor’s Dictionary of Text by Robertson
1Ch 20
1. And it came to pass, that after the year was expired, at the time that kings go out to battle, Joab led forth the power of the army, and wasted the country of the children of Ammon, and came and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried at Jerusalem. And Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it. [We learn from 2Sa 12:27-29 , that before the actual fall of the Ammonite capital, Joab sent for David, that the honour of the capture might be his; and that David took the command before the final assault was made. But, as the real merit of the success was Joab’s ( 2Sa 12:26-27 ), the writer of Chronicles, studying brevity, speaks of Joab as the captor.]
2. And David took the crown of their king [ or, according to some, “of Malcam,” i.e., Moloch, their god. Here David’s presence at the time of the fall of the city is assumed as known from Samuel, though the writer of Chronicles has not mentioned it (comp. the last clause of 1Ch 20:3 )] from off his head, and found it to weigh a talent of gold, and there were precious stones in it; and it was set upon David’s head: and he brought also exceeding much spoil out of the city.
3. And he brought out the people that were in it, and cut them with saws, and with harrows of iron, and with axes. Even so dealt David with all the cities of the children of Ammon. And David and all the people returned to Jerusalem.
4. And it came to pass after this, that there arose war at Gezer with the Philistines; at which time Sibbechai the Hushathite slew Sippai, that was of the children of the giant: and they were subdued.
5. And there was war again with the Philistines; and Elhanan the son of Jair slew Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite, whose spear staff was like a weaver’s beam.
6. And yet again there was war at Gath, where was a man of great stature [ Heb. a man of measure], whose fingers and toes were four and twenty, six on each hand, and six on each foot: and he also was the son of the giant.
7. But when he defied [ or, reproached] Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimea David’s brother slew him.
8. These were born unto the giant in Gath; and they fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants.
Subduing Giants
HERE is a custom referred to as if it were quite a commonplace, yet it is associated with all that is devastating and tragical. Without any apology or explanation a time is indicated for conflict, murder, the overturning of one nation by another; the whole narration proceeds as if it were recording a very commonplace transaction. There is something pathetic in the time that is indicated, “At the time that kings go out to battle,” the usual time, the well-known period, the occasion that needs no further indication, because it is so well known. What time was it that kings went out to battle? It was the springtime, which surely God never meant to have associated with blood and sorrow, loss and pain. Is there not an intolerable irony here? The winter has been passed in reflection, regarding the best means of assailing enemies, and no sooner does the sun return and the days brighten than the hearts of kings are stirred towards battle. This is wrong; this is a discord in the process and issue of things; this is rough reading. There comes into the mind at a certain time of education a sense of the fitness of things. Sometimes we get round our difficulties rather than go straight through them; we have a way of twisting language to suit our purpose, and to take away some, of the more ghastly and revolting features of our policy. What cunning there is in the use of terms in this statement, “At the time that kings go out to battle”! Who could have sat down and plainly written in visible ink, “In the springtime, which is dedicated to the cause of war”? But by referring to the time anonymously we seem to be landed in the battle before we have opened the gate of the occasion. Since these lines were written, has the world advanced in civilisation? Are the seasons now married to appropriate duties and services? Has the springtime entered into living-association with better policies, healthier ideas, constructive arrangements, beneficent discipline and endeavour? Do men now long for the spring as they would long for a friend? Do we say, In the spring things will be better, brighter, cheerier for everybody; no sooner will the days lengthen than our hope will brighten, and all our attempts will become inspirations and successes? There should be a time when men go out to sing. Who can help singing in the vernal days, when all nature seems to be struggling into the utterance of praise? There should be a time when men go forth to holy war, to battle with all evil because it is evil, not to win a momentary or personal victory, but to rid the land of some giant enemy. There is a holy war, there is a sacred battle, there is a fighting on which God looks with approval: wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, and, clothed in that burning invincible panoply, go on to the victorious end. War can never be put an end to by argument. The case of war is now given up by all kings and statesmen so far as argument is concerned; they admit that little or nothing can be said in its favour. How, then, is war to be ended? By itself. All wickedness is suicidal. Whenever war goes forth it carries with it the weapon with which it will stab itself. The ages, guided by the benign spirit of peace and righteousness and harmony, will put an end to war: war will so swell with the vanity and idolatry of its own power as to burst and dissolve and pass away. All this is involved in the providence of God. Do not suppose that there is a single invention in the arsenal that is not adjusted by God. Do not imagine that wickedness has in any way got in advance of the divine kingdom, and is giving God more work to do than his omnipotence can undertake. Everything is under God’s control, and in his own time and in his own way he will cleanse the earth, and leave it without one corner in which putrescence can rot or evil can repeat its machinations. This seems to be a long way off, simply because our vision is dull. We cannot see far, and because we cannot see clearly we blame distance: there is no distance with God; with God there is no time. “O rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for him.” Meanwhile, it is interesting and instructive to observe what men did in the olden days.
We read, “And Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it” in the springtime. Here is a specimen of what we know as condensation. The statement occupies but a line: but we should look into all these condensed statements with some idea of grasping the detail which is involved or hinted at. We are too off-handed in some of our summaries. A railway collision occurs, and fifty lives are sacrificed: so we speak hurriedly, with a cruel condensation. The fifty lives were but a small number in relation to the population of the country, but in relation to their own households, their own particular circles, to the hearts that looked to them for daily joy, to the mouths that turned to them for daily sustenance, how cruel, how irreparable the loss! How easy to say “And Joab destroyed it”! Thus it is but the end of an anecdote, an allusion, and on the story goes into broader paragraphs, or into fuller eloquence, dwelling upon more fascinating and entertaining themes. Do not overleap the tragedies of the world, and say there are none. Stop at this grave, and read the history that is there represented. The gravestone is always brief. We should write more on the gravestone; we should not crush our eloquence or our sympathy into terse epitaphs. Pause before that gravestone, and read, “Born…;” “died….” That is all. Yes, that is all that the stone knows, that the stone represents: but what lies between that “born” and that “died”? We should be more learned if we paid more attention to the opening out of terse and crude summaries, and went into the detail of human education and development. How easy to say the man “failed “! Who would not stop before that expression, and begin to wonder about the inner family suffering? How did the man fail? What suffering preceded his collapse, what stinging reproaches took away his sleep, what noble endeavours perished in abortion and futility, the world does not care to inquire; the world condenses the occurrence into a brief sentence, and passes on, merely saying the man “failed.” How easy to say a man is “poor”; but who knows the meaning of the word “poor”? How easily it is said! Is there one man in ten thousand who knows the meaning of the word “poverty”? It may be questioned whether that proportion does exist. Most men know comparative poverty, the want of luxuries, and even the abridgment of necessaries: but that is not poverty. Nor is poverty mere destitution; a breadless cupboard, a fireless grate, a naked body, these are not the whole of poverty: there is the disabled influence, the infinite discouragement, the black despair, the awful shape that things take, and the awful voice that the shape assumes when it tells a man to give up and die. The man himself is lessened in force and quality, and the last flickering spark dies: that is poverty. There is a point at which we can turn our hunger to advantage; there are circumstances under which destitution becomes a kind of blessed inspiration: but after that there comes a time when man’s poor frail strength turns into positive weakness, and the man himself crouches down by the wayside and says he must die unseen and unknown. We should look into this matter of poverty; it would be a blessed religious exercise to take that word to pieces and follow it in all its significations. When we have seen the destitution of other men, probably once as happily circumstanced as ourselves, with what gratitude should we contemplate our surroundings, and with what thankfulness eat our bread! We have been too crude in our summaries; we have passed on to better themes; we have said, after hearing some gloomy narration of poverty and sorrow and pain, “Change the subject, if you please.” Who said so? No philanthropist, no hero, no saint. Philanthropist, hero, saint, would often say, “Change the subject,” but that would be when the subject was one of frivolity, superficiality, a subject which ignores the poverty that gnaws and never dies, the tragedy that is never satisfied till the life it smites is out of sight. It should be the business of the Church to expand the summaries of a rude insensibility.
In the process of events we read, “And David took the crown of their king from off his head.” The loss of a crown is much or nothing. The crown itself is a mere bauble, but it is full of significance as a token; we must look at the ideality and the sign of things. Every office points in the direction of supremacy. The doorkeeper is on the road to the highest seat; the man who sets himself in his little cottage in the obscure country village to master letters, has begun what may end in the British Museum. Look at idealised action. Let a man lie down in slothfulness, and give up the whole battle of life, and we know what his end will be; but no sooner does a young life resolutely take to letters and figures, and history and philosophy, and like it all, and long for the morning to come to resume the sacred pursuit, than there opens a vista, bright, charming, fascinating, through which the youth follows to the crown. Do not have a crown that anybody can take from you; men may steal your clothes, but they cannot steal your character. He is poor who has nothing but what he can handle. Sometimes a man can be inventoried all through and through, and there can be nothing belonging to him that is not in the inventory, either on the first page or the last, or somewhere between. Do not be one of such paupers. “A man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth.” Let no man take thy crown. Start your son with fifty thousand golden pounds, and he may lose it all, and want fifty thousand more: start him with a fine sense of honour, with a sound practical education, with a love of wisdom, with a knowledge of things real, simple, practical, and of daily occurrence; start him as a practical man of sense, and not as a decorated pro-nouncer of things that are useless; and he will be rich all the time: no man can rob his memory, no thief can break through and steal his beautiful simplicity, his sterling honour, his real determination to walk worthy of the influences which shaped and inspired him; alas, he himself may give way, but no thief can break through and steal. If any bankruptcy take place in that instance it takes place within, not without. Let no man take thy crown. When Carlyle was so poor as hardly to have a loaf, he was walking by the popular side of Hyde Park, and looking upon all that gay tumult, he said to himself, with what in another man might have been conceit, but what in him was heroic audacity, “I am doing what none of you could do;” that is to say, he was writing one of his profoundest and most useful books: there he was rich; in original conception, in powerful expression, in daring valour of mind, he was wealthy beyond all the banks in all their uncounted bullion. Let no man take thy crown. Have ideas, convictions, resolutions, ideals, and be faithful as a steward ought to be faithful, and it will never be written of thee that any man took thy crown. A man may throw away such a crown, a man may play the fool even in old age: call no man happy until he is dead. But the truth now to be inculcated is this, that no man, or combination of men, can take away the moral crown, the spiritual diadem, the educational supremacy, without the man’s own consent.
Now we come to the subduing of giants “And it came to pass after this, that there arose war at Gezer with the Philistines…. And there was war again with the Philistines…. And yet again there was war at Gath, where was a man of great stature, whose fingers and toes were four and twenty, six on each hand, and six on each foot: and he also was the son of the giant. But when he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimea David’s brother slew him” crushed him as if he had been a fly. An easy accommodation of the text, and an allowable one, will permit us to see several practical lessons here. Do not under-estimate the powers that are opposed to you; count their fingers, count their toes, measure their stature, take their weight, calculate them to a nicety as to what they can possibly do. He is a fool who calls a giant a dwarf. The powers of this world are not to be sneered at. When young men imagine that by a wave of the hand they can brush away all difficulties, they are in the state of intoxication which is worse than positive drunkenness. Be sober, be vigilant; for your adversary the devil goeth about like a cripple? like a weakling? like a thing that may be despised? No like a roaring lion; and no man has ever sneered at a lion. Men have been in awe of the beast, they have called him king of beasts, they have written respectfully about him; it is not on record that any man ever sneered at a lion as a thing that he could handle easily, and dispose of with a thought, your adversary goeth about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. It will be a great omission if you fail to add up the forces that are against you: sometimes they are blatant, sometimes they are undemonstrative; sometimes they give you warning, sometimes the net is spread in the sight of the bird, and the bird is treated with contempt; sometimes they are subtle, insidious, so that the wise man becomes a fool under the plying temptation; he walks forward, a singular feeling, as of the operation of a magical opiate overcomes him; he sees rainbows in the darkness, he beholds opening heavens at midnight, he calls the earth a paradise, and he walks on, not knowing whither, until he takes the last step and no more is heard of him. Understand that the world is full of pitfalls, snares, and man-traps: that the devil never allows any man to get through his life easily if he can help it. Life is a battle, life is a daily conflict, life with the most of us is a tremendous struggle; if we get into heaven at all, it will be, as it were, by the merest hair’s-breadth, the door will just close upon us, there will be no margin within which we can take liberties as if heaven had been easily won. It is hard for some men to pray; it is all but impossible for others to believe; and there are men who would tell us, in a condensed expression that they would not willingly amplify, that life is a terrible unendurable conflict, and that oftentimes it seems as if this day would be the last, for their poor strength is dying out, and the enemy seems to grow by what he feeds on. The power is not in you, but it is in God. If we had to fight the enemy, a very short account might be made out, for our fight would end in defeat: but God is our inspiration and strength and confidence. They that be with us are more than they that can be against us; we are crucified with Christ; nevertheless, we live; yet not we, but Christ liveth in us; and the life which we now live in the flesh we live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved us, and gave himself for us. Take unto you the whole armour of God, the sword, and the shield, and the breast-plate, and the girdle, and be shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace. The panoply is provided: do not attempt to amend it. God’s grace is sufficient for us: do not attempt to add to it. The spiritual will eventually prove itself to be the omnipotent. Meanwhile, it cuts but a poor figure at certain stages in the development of human history. What is argument against a sword? The fool would say nothing; the wise man will tell you that an argument will by-and-by put an end to all swords, turning them into ploughshares. What is an argument against a vested interest? Why talk against institutions that have millions at their disposal? Why come with your puling Christian sentimental eloquence to plead against men who are entrenched behind countless gold? The argument will win, the prayer will succeed; the time will come when all that countless gold will change hands, and the men who trusted to it will be left without one refuge; yea, so destitute will they be as to ask those who were their enemies in name, but their real friends, for quarter and asylum. What is an argument against a custom? The custom is centuries old; men have become used to it, they expect its recurrence, it is second nature, they have done this, and their families have done it for generations past. The argument will uproot the custom, will take every fibre out of the ground, and when the ground is cleansed of the upas root the argument will sow the ground with the seed of the kingdom, and even in that spot shall grow flowers beautiful in the sight of heaven. Have faith in spirituality, in conviction, in moral persuasion, in ideas. For a time we shall be called fanatics, enthusiasts. So Christ was called, so Paul was denominated. But it lies within the power of reason to comprehend the proposition that mind must be mightier than matter, and that conviction is a greater force in history than is mere prejudice, and that enthusiasm is but logic on fire, and that passion is the least sacrifice we can render to him whose symbol is the Cross.
Prayer
We bless thee, thou Son of God, that thou art also Son of man. Thou lovest all mankind; we have heard of thee that thou didst taste death for every man; O wondrous miracle of love! This is none other than the work of God, the counsel of the Most High, made perfect before our eyes. What love thou hast expended upon man! The Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost. Thou didst not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. They that be whole, thou dost say, need not a physician, but they that are sick. Lord, thou art our physician, thou art our healer; other redeemer have we none, and we are not ashamed to worship thee, and to call upon thy name in the public assembly, asking for a renewal of thy grace, and for every encouragement we need in the pursuits of this life. We bless thee for all thy care and tenderness; thy tears have helped to dry our tears; because thou hast felt for us we have known that our misery has been lessened, and where thou hast not taken the sorrow wholly away thou hast whispered that thy grace is sufficient for us; we have tested this, this we have known in very deed, and now we say, The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want. Help us to live in this faith, and in this faith to be noble, true, heroic, courageous, self-denying, self-sacrificing, always looking in the spirit of the Cross at the miseries and the necessities of mankind. Amen.
Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker
1Ch 20:1 And it came to pass, that after the year was expired, at the time that kings go out [to battle], Joab led forth the power of the army, and wasted the country of the children of Ammon, and came and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried at Jerusalem. And Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it.
Ver. 1. And it came to pass. ] See 2Sa 11:1 , See Trapp on “ 2Sa 11:1 “
But David tarried at Jerusalem.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
1 Chronicles Chapter 20
In chapter 20 we see David tarrying at Jerusalem, and Joab leading forth the army against Rabbah. This was a sad epoch for David; but, strikingly enough, the book of Chronicles says nothing about it. Its object is not at all to refer to a single sin, except what was connected with the purpose of God. I do not mean by this that God ever prompts a man to sin, but there are those sorrowful passages in our history which God connects with His great mercy and His purpose respecting us. Others are merely the wilfulness of our nature without any such connection. Hence, therefore, we find that there is not a word here said about the matter of Bath-sheba.
Fuente: William Kelly Major Works (New Testament)
it came to pass. Compare 2Sa 11:1; 2Sa 12:26-31.
children = sons.
David tarried at Jerusalem. No reference is made here to the result of this tarrying, which is recorded in 2Sa 11:1, 2Sa 12:25.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
By Chuck Smith
And it came to pass, after the year was expired, and the time that the kings go out to battle, Joab led forth the power of the army, and he wasted the country of the children of Ammon, and came and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried at Jerusalem. And Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it. And David took the crown of their king from off his head, and found it to weigh a talent of gold, and there were precious stones in it; and it was set upon David’s head: and he brought also exceeding much spoil out of the city. And he brought out the people that were in it, and cut them with saws, and with harrows of iron, and with axes. Even so dealt David with all the cities of the children of Ammon. And David and all the people returned to Jerusalem ( 1Ch 20:1-3 ).
Now there is seemingly a discrepancy in the story here. First of all, the time of year when they went out to war. There were times of the year which were better for fighting than other times of the year, and so they just had time. This is the time to go to war. They had appointed times for warfare. We just fight all the time, but in those days there were just certain periods, you know, get the crops all in, everything is all set. Now let’s go out and fight for a while before the spring planting. And so the times for the war.
Now the seeming discrepancy is that Joab went out against the Ammonites, fought and defeated the city of Rabbah, and David stayed in Jerusalem. But then we have David returning to Jerusalem with the crown and the jewels of the crown upon his head. So we go back to Samuel for clarification, and we find in the book of Samuel that it gives us just a little fuller insight on this story, how that Joab went against the king of the Ammonites. He came to Rabbah and he saw that the city was delivered into his hand. In other words, he had more or less taken the city and he sent a message back to David and he said, “You know, the city is ready to fall. Come and lead the army in the actual capture of the city lest they say that Joab captured the city.” And so it’s a very magnanimous act on the part of Joab in sending to David to let David be the actual conqueror of the city. So David then went on and led the forces as the city of Rabbah fell to David, and they took the beautiful crown embedded with jewel that was worn by the king of Rabbah and put it then upon David’s head. And David and all of them returned back to Jerusalem.
And so as often is the case, a seeming discrepancy of the Scripture has a very simple explanation. It is interesting how that so many people get all upset because they imagine there to be these contradictions in the Scripture and all. And they point out these things, but yet if you dig a little bit, you’ll usually find an extremely simple explanation for the apparent difficulties that people are always finding in the Scripture. And this, of course, as I say is really told about in Second Samuel, chapter twelve, and the story is amplified a little bit more so we find out exactly what did happen.
Now in verses four through eight we have the final conquest of David over the Philistines and the slaying of some more of the giants, no doubt relatives to Goliath, and the one with the twenty-four fingers and toes. That is, six on each hand and six on each foot. That is not really too unusual a thing for a child to be born with six toes. They usually amputate it immediately upon birth and it makes no difference. It’s just that it’s sort of odd to have six toes and so they’ll amputate the sixth one.
“
Fuente: Through the Bible Commentary
1Ch 20:1-3
1Ch 20:1-3
DAVID’S BARBAROUS TREATMENT OF THE AMMONITES;
MORE WAR WITH THE PHILISTINES;
MORE INFORMATION REGARDING THE GIANTS OF GATH;
TRAGIC END OF THE SIEGE OF RABBAH
“And it came to pass at the time of the return of the year, at the time when kings go out to battle, that Joab led forth the army, and wasted the country of the children of Ammon, and came and besieged Rabbah. But David tarried at Jerusalem. And Joab smote Rabbah, and overthrew it. And David took the crown of their king from off his head, and found in it the weight of a talent of gold; and there were precious stones in it; and it was set upon David’s head: and he brought forth the spoil of the city, exceeding much. And he brought forth the people that were therein, and cut them with saws and harrows of iron, and with axes. And thus did David to all the cities of the children of Ammon. And David and all the people returned to Jerusalem.”
These verses are parallel with 2Sa 11:1,2Sa 12:26; 2Sa 12:30-31;. We might add here that this chapter marks a terrible turning point in David’s life. Not only is there the matter of his torturing the Ammonites, but his adultery with Bathsheba, and his heartless murder of Uriah the Hittite and seventeen of his fellow-soldiers in a vain effort to hide his sin – all took place in connection with this siege of Rabbah. The bad days of David’s life began right here.
E.M. Zerr:
1Ch 20:1-2. This corresponds with the account in 2Sa 11:1, but nothing is said here about the affair with Bath-sheba and her husband, although it is the same period. After the year was expired means the time of year had come when the kings waged a campaign of war. David was the king and hence was commander-in-chief of all the forces. He directed Joab, his general of highest rank, to lead the army out in the war with the Ammonites, while he, the king, tarried at home. It was at this time that David had his affair with Bath-sheba. At that time Joab attacked the royal city of Rabbah and captured the king. As a loyal subordinate, Joab turned the conquest over to his chief, who took the crown from the head of the captured king. This crown weighed 100 pounds, made of gold. It was set upon David’s head means the jewel of precious stones was placed on his head, not the heavy crown. There was much other valuable material in the royal city of the Ammonites, and David took possession of That.
1Ch 20:3. Them is not in the original and should not have been in the translation for it conveys a false impression. The verse means that David made these people work for him by using cutting tools and other implements of iron.
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Joab’s conquest of the children of Ammon was complete. They were despoiled of their possessions and reduced to servitude. There is practically no doubt that this is the meaning of the story as it is written here. In the Revised Version, verse 1Ch 20:3, if the italicized word “them” is omitted, this sense is at once apparent. The people were put to the menial work of cutting with saws, with harrows, and with axes. The last mention of David’s wars by the chronicler occupies the latter half of this chapter. It tells of the defeat of the Philistines at Gezer.
There is a statement in the first verse which is full of significance. “But David tarried at Jerusalem.” That is the only reference in this Book to the most awful sin and failure of David’s career. Its insertion would have no meaning in the purpose of this Book, but we ought not to allow ourselves to forget the warning it affords. Nothing is more subtly dangerous to the man of faith than to remain inactive when the business of God demands that he be out on the field of conflict. How many have found the place of ease to be of deadliest peril when the enterprises of God were calling them to strenuous endeavor. It is a very old adage, and very simple, and we are inclined to smile at it, but it is well to remember, not only in childhood, but to the end of the pathway, that Satan finds some mischief still For idle hands to do.
If I ought to be at Rabbah with the army, and am not, some Bathsheba waits to work my ruin.
Fuente: An Exposition on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 20 Joab and David take Rabbah
1. Rabbah destroyed (1Ch 20:1-3)
2. The Philistine giants slain (1Ch 20:4-8)
Rabbah was the capital of Ammon (Deu 3:11; Jos 13:25) and was taken by Joab. David tarried in Jerusalem (so fatal to him, 2Sa 11:1) and Joab smote Rabbah and destroyed it. Then David appeared also upon the scene. Joab had summoned David to help in the overthrow of the city (2Sa 12:27, etc). The crown mentioned was probably the crown of Milcom, their idol-king. It was of solid gold set with precious stones. David received the crown and precious stones, even as our Lord Jesus receives the glory and will appear crowned with many crowns (Rev 19:12). On verse 3 see annotations 2Sa 2:31. The overthrow of the giants followed. First Sibbechai slew Sippai of the children of the giants; in 2 Sam. 21 his name is given as Saph. Elhanan slew Lahmi of Goliath. (The words the brother of are in italics and must be omitted. It was another giant who had the same name as the giant of 1 Sam. 17.) Then Davids nephew Jonathan, the son of Shimea, Davids brother, slew the last of the giants. He had six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot and was of great stature. These giants were the special instruments of the power of darkness. They have a typical significance.
The notion of a giant in Scripture is always connected with evil, the lifting up of man against God, the symbol of pride and self-sufficiency, as well as of oppressive power. He is the opposite of the little and the lowly, the humble in heart, with whom God delights to dwell; but thus may stand for the tyranny of a lust, as in the case of Og, or of a Satanic delusion, as with Goliath himself. In those before us we must see, what we have seen in their kinsman, the monstrous delusions which abide in a system of error such as Philistinism depicts, the ecclesiastical mystery of lawlessness of Christian times (Numerical Bible).
And in the last one overcome by Jonathan (gift of the LORD), we see a type of the final ecclesiastical leader of the apostasy, the man of sin. The number six points to this (Rev 13:11-18).
Fuente: Gaebelein’s Annotated Bible (Commentary)
David
Here should be read 2Sa 11:2 to 2Sa 12:25; Psa 51:1-19.
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
am 2969, bc 1035, An, Ex, Is, 456
And it came: 2Sa 11:1
after the year was expired: Heb. at the return of the year, 1Ki 20:22, 1Ki 20:26, 2Ki 13:20
wasted: Isa 6:11, Isa 54:16
Rabbah: Deu 3:11, 2Sa 12:26, 2Sa 17:27, Jer 49:2, Jer 49:3, Eze 21:20, Eze 25:5, Amo 1:14
Joab smote: 2Sa 11:16-25, 2Sa 12:26-31
Reciprocal: 1Ch 18:11 – the children
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
A.M. 2969. B.C. 1035.
A repetition of Davids wars with the Ammonites, and the taking of Rabbah, 1Ch 20:1-3; with the giants of the Philistines, 1Ch 20:4-8.
NOTES ON CHAPTER 20.
1Ch 20:1. Joab led forth the army, and wasted, &c. For this verse, see note on 2Sa 11:1; for 1Ch 20:2-3, on 2Sa 12:30-31; and for the rest of the chapter, on 2Sa 21:15, &c. And came and besieged Rabbah It was at this time, while Joab was besieging Rabbah, that David fell into that great sin in the matter of Uriah. And it is observable, that though the rest of the story be repeated here, that is not. The sacred writer, however, seems to have intended to give a hint of it, when he says, But David tarried at Jerusalem This gave occasion to his sin. If he had been abroad with his army, he would have been out of the way of that temptation; but indulging his ease he fell into sin, and involved himself in many and great calamities, brought upon him and his house by a just and holy God. Now as the recording of his fall, and the circumstances of it in the former history, is an instance of the impartiality and fidelity of the sacred writers; so the avoiding the repetition of it here, when there was a fair occasion to speak of it again, is designed to teach us, that though there may be a just occasion to speak of the faults and miscarriages of others, yet we should not take delight in the repetition of them. Of those persons or actions of which we can say no good, we had best say nothing.
1Ch 20:7. When he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimea slew him None are more visibly marked for ruin than those that reproach God and his Israel. God will do great things rather than suffer the enemy to behave themselves proudly, Deu 32:27.
1Ch 20:8. They fell by the hand of David, and of his servants The servants of David were quite too hard for the giants of Gath in every encounter, because they had God on their side, who takes pleasure in abasing the lofty looks, and humbling the pride and haughtiness of the giants of the earth. Never let the churchs friends be disheartened by the power and pride of the churchs enemies. We need not fear great men against us, while we have the great God for us. But let it be observed that, as Davids victories, so those of the Son of David, are gradual. We do not yet see all things put under him; but we shall see this shortly, and death itself, the last enemy, like these giants, shall be subdued and triumphed over.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
1Ch 20:1. Joab besieged Rabbah. This is related more at large in 2 Samuel 12. David humanely left Shobi on the throne, after putting the rebel chiefs to death.
1Ch 20:7. When he defied Israel, as unable to find a man to fight him in single combat.
Fuente: Sutcliffe’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
1Ch 20:1-3. The Ammonites Subdued (see notes on 2Sa 11:1; 2Sa 12:30 f.).
1Ch 20:4-8. Incidents during the Philistine War (see notes on 2Sa 21:18-22).
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
20:1 And it came to pass, that after the year was expired, at the time that kings go out [to battle], Joab led forth the power of the army, and wasted the country of the children of Ammon, and came and besieged {a} Rabbah. But David tarried at Jerusalem. And Joab smote Rabbah, and destroyed it.
(a) Which was the chief city of the Ammonites.