1 Samuel 17:55-58 sits inside this longer paragraph.
48When the Philistine arose, and walked and came near to meet David, David hurried, and ran toward the army to meet the Philistine. 49David put his hand in his bag, took a stone, and slung it, and struck the Philistine in his forehead. The stone sank into his forehead, and he fell on his face to the earth. 50So David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and with a stone, and struck the Philistine, and killed him; but there was no sword in the hand of David. 51Then David ran, stood over the Philistine, took his sword, drew it out of its sheath, killed him, and cut off his head with it. When the Philistines saw that their champion was dead, they fled. 52The men of Israel and of Judah arose and shouted, and pursued the Philistines as far as Gai and to the gates of Ekron. The wounded of the Philistines fell down by the way to Shaaraim, even to Gath and to Ekron. 53The children of Israel returned from chasing after the Philistines and they plundered their camp. 54David took the head of the Philistine, and brought it to Jerusalem; but he put his armor in his tent. 55When Saul saw David go out against the Philistine, he said to Abner, the captain of the army, “Abner, whose son is this youth?” Abner said, “As your soul lives, O king, I can’t tell.”
56The king said, “Inquire whose son the young man is!”
57As David returned from the slaughter of the Philistine, Abner took him and brought him before Saul with the head of the Philistine in his hand. 58Saul said to him, “Whose son are you, you young man?” David answered, “I am the son of your servant Jesse the Bethlehemite.”
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On v55 That is, of what family and tribe is he?…
That is, of what family and tribe is he? or else he had forgotten David, albeit he had received so great a benefit by him.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv55–57 1Sa 17:55 And when Saul saw David go forth…
1Sa 17:55 And when Saul saw David go forth against the Philistine, he said unto Abner, the captain of the host, Abner, whose son [is] this youth? And Abner said, [As] thy soul liveth, O king, I cannot tell.
Ver. 55. Whose son is this?] Saul being of a weak brain by reason of his frantic fits, and withal full of business, had, belike, forgotten David, who might be now much altered in his visage and habit, and never haply otherwise taken notice of by Saul than as princes use to do of musicians or servants.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On v55 Whose son is this youth?
Whose son is this youth?
Quest. How could David be unknown to Saul, with whom he had lived? 1Sa 16:21.
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Answ. That might well be, for divers reasons, because David was not constantly with him, nor, as it seems, used by him, but upon extraordinary occasions, and desperate fits of melancholy; from which possibly he had been free for a good while, by God’s special providence and care for his people Israel, that so he might be capable of governing and protecting them against the Philistines, who watched all opportunities against them, and at last broke forth into an open war. Thus David had been for some considerable time dismissed from Saul’s court, and was returned home; and therefore it is not strange, if Saul had for the present forgotten David; for kings, because of the encumbrance of public business, and the multitude of persons who come to them on several occasions, may easily forget some persons; yea, such as have frequently been with them, especially their servants, whom they do not use to observe with so much attention and care as they do others. Add to this, that the distemper of Saul’s mind might make him forgetful; and that David might now be much changed, both in his countenance and in his habit, from what he had before; and it is apparent, that the change of habits makes so great a difference, that it oft keeps us from the knowledge of those persons whom in other habits we very well know. Some give this answer, That this was the first time that Saul had seen David; and that David’s exploit here recorded was performed before that which is recorded 1Sa 17:15, though it be placed after it; but that is confuted by comparing 1Sa 18:1-3.
I cannot tell; which is not strange, because Abner’s conversation and employment was generally in the camp, when David was at the court; and when Abner was there, he took little notice of a person so much inferior to him as David was.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv55–57 And when Saul saw David go forth against the…
And when Saul saw David go forth against the Philistine,.... Set out to meet him, and engage with him, as he might from the side of the mountain, where he was encamped:
he said unto Abner, the captain of the host; his own cousin, whom he had raised to this high post in the army, Sa1 14:50,
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Abner, whose son is this youth? it is thought strange by many that Saul should not know who he was, when he had been often at his court, and served him as a musician, and had been very useful to him, and he loved him, and made him his armourbearer, and even had just now conversed with him about encountering with the Philistine, and had clothed him with his own armour: to get rid of the former part of the objection, some have supposed that this event happened before David was his musician and armourbearer, and is by anticipation spoken of in Sa1 16:14, but that the connection with this and the following chapter will not admit of; and besides, before this event, David is said to return home from Saul, Sa1 17:15; so that it is certain he had been at Saul's court, and in his presence before: but to remove this seeming difficulty it may be observed, that Saul, having laboured under a disorder of body and mind, might easily forget David, and his serving him in the above capacity; and to which the multiplicity of business, and of persons in a court, might greatly contribute; and what with the distance of time, and the different habits in which David appeared, sometimes as a musician, and sometimes as a shepherd, and at other times as a soldier, and always as a servant, it is no wonder the king should not know him again; though after all it is not about his person that he inquires, but whose son he was, what was his father's name, and from what family he sprung; for though Saul was made acquainted with this in the time of his disorder, and therefore sent to his father Jesse for him, and afterwards desired leave for his continuance; yet this might slip out of his memory in a course of time, he having had no personal knowledge of Jesse, nor any correspondence with him, but just at that time; and it behoved him to know the pedigree of David, since, if he was victorious, he was not only to be enriched by him, but to have his daughter for wife, and his family ennobled:
and Abner said, as thy soul liveth, O king, I cannot tell; he swore by the life of Saul, as Joseph by the life of Pharaoh, that he knew nothing of him; which need not at all seem strange, that a general of an army, always employed in military affairs, and often abroad, should know nothing of a domestic servant of Saul's, under the character of a musician, and not always at court either; and still less that he should be ignorant of his family, and know nothing of his father, who lived in obscurity in Bethlehem, and was an old man in those days.
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John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On v55 Whose son - David had been some considerable time…
Whose son - David had been some considerable time dismissed from Saul's court, and was returned home. And therefore it is not strange, if Saul for the present had forgot David. Besides the distemper of Saul's mind might make him forgetful; and that David might be now much changed, both in his countenance and in his habit. I cannot tell - Abner's employment was generally in the camp, when David was at the court; and when Abner was there, he took little notice of a person so much inferior to him as David was.
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Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On v58 Verse 58. Whose son art thou, thou young man?]…
Verse 58. Whose son art thou, thou young man?] That Saul should not know David with whom he had treated a little before, and even armed him for the combat, and that he should not know who his father was, though he had sent to his father for permission to David to reside constantly with him, (1Sa 16:22), is exceedingly strange! I fear all Bishop Warburton's attempts to rectify the chronology by assumed anticipations, will not account for this. I must honestly confess they do not satisfy me; and I must refer the reader to what immediately follows on the authenticity of the verses which concern this subject.
ON the subject of that large omission in the Septuagint of which I have spoken on 1Sa 17:12, I here subjoin the reasons of Mr. Pilkington and Dr. Kennicott for supposing it to be an interpolation of some rabbinical writer, added at a very early period to the Hebrew text.
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"Had every version of the Hebrew text," says Mr. Pilkington, "agreed to give a translation of this passage, as we now find, the attempts of clearing it from its embarrassments would have been attended with very great difficulties; but, as in several other cases before mentioned, so here, the providence of God seems to have so far secured the credit of those who were appointed to be the penmen of the oracles of truth, that the defence of their original records may be undertaken upon good grounds, and supported by sufficient evidence. For we are now happily in possession of an ancient version of these two chapters, which appears to have been made from a Hebrew copy, which had none of the thirty-nine verses which are here supposed to have been interpolated, nor was similar to what we have at present in those places which are here supposed to have been altered. This version is found in the Vatican copy of the Seventy, which whoever reads and considers, will find the accounts there given regular, consistent, and probable. It will be proper, therefore, to examine the several parts where such alterations are supposed to have been made in the Hebrew text, in order to produce such other external or internal evidence, as shall be necessary to support the charge of interpolation, which ought not to be laid merely upon the authority of any single version.
"The first passage, which is not translated in the Vatican copy of the Greek version, is from the 11th to the 32d verse of the 17th chapter wherein we have an account:
1. Of David's being sent to the camp to visit his brethren.
2. Of his conversation with the men of Israel, relating to Goliath's challenge; and their informing him of the premium Saul had offered to any one that should accept it, and come off victorious.
3. Of Eliab's remarkable behaviour to his brother David, upon his making this inquiry. And,
4. Of Saul's being made acquainted with what David had said upon this occasion.
"It is obvious to remark upon this passage: -
"1. That, after David had been of so much service to the king, in causing the evil spirit to depart from him; after its being recorded how greatly Saul loved him, and that he had made him his armour-bearer; after the king had sent to Jesse to signify his intention of keeping his son with him; all of which are particularly mentioned in the latter part of the preceding chapter; the account of his keeping his father's sheep afterwards, and being sent to his brethren upon this occasion, must appear to be somewhat improbable.
2. That what is here said of the premium that Saul had offered to him who should conquer the Philistine, is not well consistent with the accounts afterwards given, of which we shall have occasion to take particular notice.
3. That Eliab's behaviour, as here represented, is not only remarkable but unaccountable and absurd. And,
4. That the inquiries of a young man, who is not said to have declared any intentions of accepting the challenge of the Philistine, would scarcely have been related to the king. But now, if this passage be supposed to have been interpolated, we must see how the connection stands upon its being omitted.
"Verse 11. 'When Saul and all Israel heard these words of the Philistine, they were dismayed, and greatly afraid.'
"Verse 32. 'Then David said unto Saul, Let no man's heart fail because of him; thy servant will go and fight with this Philistine.'
"No connection can be more proper, and in this view David is represented as being at that time an attendant upon the king; and when we had been told just before, (1Sa 16:21), that Saul had made him his armour-bearer, we might justly expect to find him with him when the battle was set in array; 1Sa 17:2. In this connection David is also represented as fully answering the character before given of him: 'A mighty valiant man, and a man of war,' 1Sa 16:18, and ready to fight with the giant upon the first proposal, (for the account of the Philistine presenting himself forty days is in this passage here supposed to have been interpolated, 1Sa 17:16). I shall leave it to the critical Hebrew reader to make what particular remarks he may think proper in respect to the style and manner of expression in these twenty verses, and let Jesse go for an old man amongst men in the days of Saul, c." -PILKINGTON'S Remarks upon several Passages of Scripture, p. 62.
"The authorities," says Dr. Kennicott, "here brought to prove this great interpolation are the internal evidence arising from the context, and the external arising from the Vatican copy of the Greek version. But how then reads the Alexandrian MS.? The remarks acknowledge that this MS. agrees here with the corrupted Hebrew and therefore was probably translated, in this part, from some late Hebrew copy which had thus been interpolated; see pages 72, 75. Now that these two MSS. do contain different readings in some places, I observed in pages 398-404, and 414. And in this 17th chapter of Samuel, 1Sa 17:4, the Alexandrian MS. says, agreeably to the present Hebrew, that the height of Goliath was six cubits and a span, i.e., above eleven feet; but the Vatican MS., agreeably to Josephus, that it was four cubits and a span, i.e., near eight feet. And in 1Sa 17:43, what the Vatican renders he cursed David by his gods, the Alexandrian renders by his idols. But though the Hebrew text might be consulted and a few words differently rendered by the transcriber of one of these MSS., or by the transcribers of the MSS. from which these MSS. were taken; yet, as these MSS. do contain, in this chapter, such Greek as is almost universally the same, (in verb, noun, and particle), I presume that they contain here the same translation with the designed alteration of a few words, and with the difference of the interpolated verses found in the Alexandrian MS.
"But, after all, what if the Alexandrian MS., which now has these verses should itself prove them interpolated? What if the very words of this very MS. demonstrate that these verses were not in some former Greek MS.? Certainly if the Alexandrian MS. should be thus found, at last, not to contradict, but to confirm the Vatican in its omission of these twenty verses, the concurrence of these authorities will render the argument much more forcible and convincing.
"Let us then state the present question; which is, Whether the twenty verses between ver. 11 and 32, which are now in the Hebrew text, are interpolated? The Vatican MS. goes on immediately from the end of the 11th verse (και εφοβηθησαν σφοδρα) to ver. 32, which begins καιειπεδαυιδ: whereas the 12th verse in the Hebrew begins, not with a speech, but with David's birth and parentage. If then the Alexandrian MS. begins its present 12th verse as the 32d verse begins, and as the 12th verse could not begin properly, I appeal to any man of judgment whether the transcriber was not certainly copying from a MS. in which the 32d verse succeeded the 11th verse; and if so, then from a MS. which had not these intermediate verses? Now that this is the fact, the case will at once appear upon examining the Alexandrian copy, where the 12th verse begins with καιειπεδαυιδ; as the 32d verse begins, and as the 12th verse could not begin properly.
"The case seems clearly to be, that the transcriber, having wrote what is now in the 11th verse, was beginning what is now the 32d verse; when, after writing καιειπεδαυιδ, he perceived that either the Hebrew, or some other Greek copy, or the margin of his own copy, had several intermediate verses: upon which, without blotting out the significant word ειπε, he goes on to write the addition: thus fortunately leaving a decisive proof of his own great interpolation. if this addition was in the margin of that MS. from which the Alexandrian was transcribed, it might be inserted by that transcriber; but if it was inserted either from the Hebrew, or from any other Greek copy, the transcriber of this MS. seems to have had too little learning for such a proceeding. If it was done by the writer of that former MS., then the interpolation may be a hundred or a hundred and fifty years older than the Alexandrian MS. Perhaps the earliest Christian writer who enlarges upon the strong circumstance of David's coming from the sheep to the army, is Chrysostom, in his homily upon David and Saul; so that it had then been long in some copies of the Greek version. The truth seems to be, that the addition of these twenty verses took its first rise from what Josephus had inserted in his variation and embellishment of this history; but that many circumstances were afterwards added to his additions.
"For (and it is extremely remarkable) though Josephus has some, he has not half the improbabilities which are found at present in the sacred history: as for instance: Nothing of the armies being fighting in the valley, or fighting at all, when David was sent by his father, as in 1Sa 17:19. Nothing of the host going forth, and shouting for the battle, at the time of David's arrival, as in 1Sa 17:20. Nothing of all the men of Israel fleeing from Goliath, as in 1Sa 17:24; on the contrary, the two armies, (it should seem,) continued upon their two mountains. Nothing of David's long conversation with the soldiers, 1Sa 17:25-27, in seasons so very improper, as, whilst they were shouting for the battle, or whilst they were fleeing from Goliath; and fleeing from a man after they had seen him and heard him twice in every day for forty days together, 1Sa 17:16, the two armies, all this long while, leaning upon their arms, and looking very peaceably at one another. Nothing of Goliath's repeating his challenge every morning and every evening, as in 1Sa 17:16. David, (it is said, 1Sa 17:23,) happened to hear one of these challenges; but if he heard the evening challenge, it would have been then too late for the several transactions before, and the long pursuit after, Goliath's death; and David could not well hear the morning challenge, because he could scarce have arrived so early, after travelling from Beth-lehem to the army, (about fifteen miles,) and bringing with him an ephah of parched corn, and ten loaves, and ten cheeses, as in 1Sa 17:17-18. Nothing of encouraging any man to fight Goliath, by an offer of the kinds daughter, 1Sa 17:25; which, as it seems from the subsequent history, had never been thought of; and which, had it been offered, would probably have been accepted by some man or other out of the whole army. Nothing of Eliab's reprimanding David for coming to see the battle, as in 1Sa 17:28; but for a very different reason; and, indeed, it is highly improbable that Eliab should treat him at all with contempt and scurrility, after having seen Samuel anoint him for the future king of Israel, see 1Sa 16:1-13. Nothing of a second conversation between David and the soldiers, as in 1Sa 17:30-31. Nothing of Saul and Abner's not knowing who was David's father, at the time of his going forth against the Philistine, as in 1Sa 17:55. Nothing of David's being introduced to the king by Abner, in form, after killing the Philistine, 1Sa 17:57, at a time when the king and the captain of the host had no leisure for complemental ceremony; but were set out, 1Sa 17:57, in immediate and full pursuit of the Philistines. Nor, lastly, is any notice taken here by Josephus of what now begins the 18th chapter, Jonathan's friendship for David, which is related elsewhere, and in a different manner; on the contrary, as soon as Josephus has mentioned Goliath's death, and told us that Saul and all Israel shouted, and fell at once upon the Philistines, and that, when the pursuit was ended, the head of Goliath was carried by David into his own tent, (and he could have then no tent of his own if he had not been then an officer in the army:) I say, as soon as Josephus has recorded these circumstances, he goes on to Saul's envy and hatred of David, arising from the women's songs of congratulation; exactly as these capital parts of the history are connected in the VATICAN MS. And with this circumstance I shall conclude these remarks; earnestly recommending the whole to the learned reader's attentive examination.
"It must not however be forgot, that the learned F. Houbigant has, in his Bible, placed these twenty verses (from the 11th to the 32d) between hooks, as containing a passage which comes in very improperly.
"If it be inquired as to this interpolation in Samuel, when it could possibly be introduced into the text? It may be observed that, about the time of Josephus, the Jews seem to have been fond of enlarging and, as they vainly thought, embellishing the sacred history, by inventing speeches, and prayers, and hymns, and also new articles of history, and these of considerable length; witness the several additions to the book of Esther; witness the long story concerning wine, women, and truth, inserted amidst parts of the genuine history of Ezra and Nehemiah, and worked up into what is now called the First Book of Esdras; witness the hymn of the three children in the fiery furnace, added to Daniel; and witness also the many additions in Josephus. Certainly, then, some few remarks might be noted by the Jews, and some few of their historical additions might be inserted in the margin of their Hebrew copies; which might afterwards be taken into the text itself by injudicious transcribers.
"The history of David's conquest of the mighty and insulting Philistine is certainly very engaging; and it gives a most amiable description of a brave young man, relying with firm confidence upon the aid of the GOD of battle against the blaspheming enemy. It is not therefore very strange that some fanciful rabbin should be particularly struck with the strange circumstances of the Philistines daring to challenge all Israel; and David's cutting off the giant's head with the giant's own sword. And then, finding that Josephus had said that David came from the sheep to the camp, and happened to hear the challenge, the rabbin might think it very natural that David should be indignant against the giant, and talk valorously to the soldiers, and that the soldiers should mightily encourage David; and then, to be sure, this was the most lucky season to introduce the celebrated friendship of Jonathan for David; particularly when, according to these additions, Jonathan had seen Abner leading David in triumph to the king's presence; every one admiring the young hero, as he proudly advanced with the grim head of the Philistine in his hand. So that this multiform addition and fanciful embellishment of the rabbin reminds one of the motley absurdity described by the poet in the famous lines: -
Humano capiti cervicem pictor equinam
Jungere si velit, et varias inducere plasmas, c.
"The passage supposed to be interpolated here, was in the Hebrew text before the time of Aquila because there are preserved a few of the differences in those translations of it which were made by Aquila, Theodotion, and Symmachus. These verses, being thus acknowledged at that time, would doubtless be found in such copies as the Jews then declared to be genuine, and which they delivered afterwards to Origen as such. And that Origen did refer to the Jews for such copies as they held genuine, he allows in his epistle to Africanus; for there he speaks of soothing the Jews, in order to get pure copies from them." - KENNICOTT'S Second Dissertation on the Hebrew Text, p. 419.
In the general dissertation which Dr. Kennicott has prefixed to his edition of the Hebrew Bible, he gives additional evidence that the verses in question were not found originally in the Septuagint, and consequently not in the Hebrew copy used for that version. Several MSS. in the royal library at Paris either omit these verses or have them with asterisks or notes of dubiousness. And the collation by Dr. Holmes and his continuators has brought farther proof of the fact. From the whole, there is considerable evidence that these verses were not in the Septuagint in the time of Origen; and if they were not in the MSS. used by Origen, it is very probable they were not in that version at first; and if they were not in the Septuagint at first, it is very probable that they were not in the Hebrew text one hundred and fifty years before Christ; and if not then in the Hebrew text, it is very probable they were not in that text originally. See Dissertation on Gen., p. 9; and Remarks on Select Passages, p. 104.
I have only to remark here, that the historical books of the Old Testament have suffered more by the carelessness or infidelity of transcribers than any other parts of the sacred volume; and of this the two books of Samuel, the two books of Kings, and the two books of Chronicles, give the most decided and unequivocal proofs. Of this also the reader has already had considerable evidence; and he will find this greatly increased as he proceeds.
It seems to me that the Jewish copyists had not the same opinion of the Divine inspiration of those books as they had of those of the law and the prophets; and have therefore made no scruple to insert some of their own traditions, or the glosses of their doctors, in different parts; for as the whole must evidently appear to them as a compilation from their public records, they thought it no harm to make different alterations and additions from popular statements of the same facts, which they found in general circulation. This is notoriously the case in Josephus; this will account, and it does to me very satisfactorily, for many of the various readings now found in the Hebrew text of the historical books. They were held in less reverence, and they were copied with less care, and emended with less critical skill, than the pentateuch and the prophets; and on them the hands of careless, ignorant, and temerarious scribes, have too frequently been laid. To deny this, only betrays a portion of the same ignorance which was the parent of those disorders; and attempts to blink the question, though they may with some be an argument of zeal, yet with all the sincere and truly enlightened friends of Divine revelation, will be considered to be as dangerous as they are absurd.
Where the rash or ignorant hand of man has fixed a blot on the Divine records, let them who in the providence of God are qualified for the task wipe it off; and while they have the thanks of all honest men, God will have the glory.
There have been many who have affected to deny the existence of giants. There is no doubt that the accounts given of several are either fabulous or greatly exaggerated. But men of an extraordinary size are not uncommon even in our own day: I knew two brothers of the name of Knight, who were born in the same township with myself, who were seven feet six inches high; and another, in the same place, Charles Burns who was eight feet six! These men were well and proportionately made. I have known others of this height, whose limbs were out of all proportion; their knees bent in, and joints rickety.
Ireland, properly speaking, is the only nation on the earth that produces GIANTS; and let me tell the poor, that this is the only nation in the world that may be said to live on potatoes; with little bread, and less flesh-meat.
I have seen and entertained in my house the famous Polish dwarf, the Count Boruwlaski, who was about thirty-six inches high, every part of whose person was formed with the most perfect and delicate symmetry. The prodigious height and bulk of Charles Burns, and the astonishing diminutiveness of Count Boruwlaski, could not be properly estimated but by comparing both together. Each was a perfect man; and yet, in quantum, how disproportionate! Man is the only creature in whom the extremes of minuteness and magnitude are so apparent, and yet the proportion of the parts in each strictly correlative.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On v55 1Sa 17:55. Whose son is this youth? — It…
1Sa 17:55. Whose son is this youth? — It may, at first sight, appear strange that Saul should be represented here as not knowing who David was, when we have a relation in the foregoing chapter of his sending for him to court, being highly pleased with his behaviour, and much delighted with his music, making him his armour-bearer, and sending to his father Jesse to ask his leave for his continuance at court. But it may be observed that Saul, in this place, does not express an entire ignorance of David, but only inquires whose son he was — A question of the more consequence to him, as he had promised his daughter in marriage to the conqueror of Goliath. Either Saul had never before made any inquiry about his parentage, or both he and Abner had forgotten whence he was. And this might very easily happen to a king and a general of an army, who daily see and have to do with so many different faces, and who pay so little regard to things of this sort. Nay, if Saul had entirely forgotten David, it would not have been strange, considering that he had been but little with him, had some time ago been dismissed from the court, and was returned home, where he had remained at least a year or two, during which time Saul had not seen him. Besides, the distemper of Saul’s mind might make him forgetful, and David might now be much changed, both in his countenance and in his habit. Abner said, I cannot tell — Abner’s employment was generally in the camp, when David was at the court; and when Abner was there he probably took little notice of a youth so much inferior to him as David was.
“We may learn from the whole of this pleasing chapter,” says Dr. Dodd, “how ready God is to help those who trust in him; for whose defence and protection he makes use of means apparently the most weak, to humble the pride of the wicked, and to destroy the powers which seem most formidable. Some writers have considered this destruction of Goliath by David as a type of the victory of Jesus Christ, in his state of weakness and humiliation, over the strong and gigantic powers of hell and the grave.”
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On v55 Whose son ... - See the marginal reference note.
Whose son ... - See the marginal reference note.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On v55 Saul . . . said unto Abner . .…
Saul . . . said unto Abner . . . whose son is this youth?--A young man is more spoken of in many Eastern countries by his father's name than his own. The growth of the beard, and other changes on a now full-grown youth, prevented the king from recognizing his former favorite minstrel [Sa1 16:23].
Next: 1 Samuel Chapter 18
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On v55 55. Whose son is this youth — But did…
55. Whose son is this youth — But did not Saul remember David, whose services on the harp had been of so much advantage to him in his madness?
1Sa_16:20-23. Perhaps not, for probably some time had elapsed since the youth had left his court, and Saul’s memory may have suffered somewhat from his disease. A man of Saul’s varying moods would be quite likely to forget even a benefactor; or if he remembered David’s musical service, he may have forgotten his looks, so as not to have recognised him on this occasion. But now, having promised to reward not only him who slew Goliath, but his father also, (1Sa_17:25,) and seeing the youth go forth against the giant confident of victory, he begins to inquire after the tribe and position of his father’s house.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv55–56 55–58. Saul’s inquiry concerning David’s parentage
55–58. Saul’s inquiry concerning David’s parentage
55. he said unto Abner] This section is not found in the Septuagint (B). On the difficulty of reconciling it with ch. 16 see Note VI. P. 241.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On v55 (55) Whose son is this youth?—A grave difficulty, at…
(55) Whose son is this youth?—A grave difficulty, at first sight, indisputably exists here. It is briefly this. In the preceding chapter (1Sa_17:18-23), David, the son of Jesse, is chosen to play before the mentally sick king; his playing relieved the sufferer, who became attached to the young musician, and in consequence appointed him to a position about his person that certainly would have involved a lengthened, if not a continuous, residence at the court. In this and the following verses we read how this same David, at the time of his great exploit, was apparently unknown to the king and to Abner, the captain of the host. The LXX., fully conscious of the difficulty, determined to solve it by boldly, if not wisely, cutting the knot. They literally expunged from their version all the later passages which they could not easily bring into harmony with the earlier. The Greek Version, then, simply omits these four last verses of 1 Samuel 17, together with the first five verses of 1 Samuel 18, and the whole of the section 1Sa_17:12-31.
Various ingenious explanations have been suggested by scholars.
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(a) The mental state of Saul when David played before him was such that the king failed to recognise him on the present occasion, and Abner probably had never seen him before.
(b) Some length of time had elapsed since his last visit to the court, and as he was then in very early manhood, he had, so to speak, grown, in a comparatively speaking short space of time, out of Saul’s memory.
(c) The purpose of Saul’s inquiry was not to find out who David was—that he knew well already—but to ascertain the position and general circumstances of the young hero’s father, as, according to the promise (in 1Sa_17:25), in the event of his success (which evidently the king confidently looked for), the father of the champion and his family would receive extraordinary honours.
The real solution of the difficulty probably lies in the fact that, as has been before stated, this and the other historical books of the Old Testament were made up by the inspired compiler from well-authenticated traditions current in Israel, and most probably preserved in the archives of the great prophetic schools. (See Notes on 1Sa_17:1; 1Sa_17:15.) There were, no doubt, many of these traditions connected with the principal events of David’s early career. Two here were selected which, to a certain extent, covered the same ground. The first—preserved, no doubt, in some prophetic school where music and poetry were especially cultivated—narrates the influence which David acquired over Saul through his great gift of music. The power of music and poetry in Saul’s mental disease was evidently the great point of interest to the original writer of 1Sa_16:14-23. Now, in the narrative contained in these ten verses no note of time occurs. The events related evidently were spread over a considerable, possibly over a very long, period. The afflicted king might have seen the young musician perhaps in a darkened tent once or twice before the Goliath combat, but the great intimacy described in 1Sa_16:21-23, we may well assume, belonged to a period subsequent to the memorable combat with the giant.
Following out this hypothesis, we may with some confidence assume that King Saul failed entirely to recognise the young player whom he had only seen (possibly only heard in his darkened tent) on one or two sad occasions; and Abner probably had never seen him.
As for the great love on the part of the king, and position of royal armour-bearer these things we have little doubt came to David after the victory over the giant Philistine, and very likely indeed in consequence of it.
In the later of the two sections of the Goliath history, the compiler cared little for the musical detail; his work was to show that the foundation stone of David’s brilliant and successful life was intense faith in the Jehovah of Israel, a perfect child-like trust in the power of the Invisible King.
In the former of the two sections the relater—no doubt in his day a famous teacher in some school of prophetic music—was, only concerned to show the mighty influence of his Divine art upon the souls and the lives of men, as exemplified in the story of the early days of the sweet Psalmist-King of Israel.
The musical details connected with the early life of David, the composer of so many of the famous hymns sung in the Tempie Service and also in the public gatherings of the people, would be—in the eyes of this writer—of the deepest interest to coming generations.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On v55 SAUL"S INQUIRY CONCERNING DAVID"S PARENTAGE (vers. 55-58).
SAUL"S INQUIRY CONCERNING DAVID"S PARENTAGE (vers. 55-58).
Vers. 55-58. Abner, whose son is this youth? Hebrew, "lad," na"ar. We have seen that the narrative in 1Sa_16:21-23 carries the history of David"s relations with Saul down to a much later period, and that in ver. 15 of this chapter David is represented as not dwelling continuously at Saul"s court, but as having returned to Bethlehem and resumed his pastoral occupations there, whence he would be summoned back in case of the recurrence of Saul"s malady. It is plain from what is stated here that David had not thus far spent time enough at Gibeah to be personally well known either to Saul or his officers (see note on ver. 15). Stripling. Not na"ar, but "alem, the masculine of the word "almah, used in Isa_7:14. It means a young man fully grown, and arrived at the age to marry, and so is more definite than na"ar, which Saul uses in ver. 58. As David returned, etc. Abner, as captain of the host, would naturally watch the combat, and as soon as it was possible would bring the young warrior into the king"s presence. But what is recorded here could have taken place only after the pursuit of the Philistines was over, and really these five verses should be united with ch. 17., as their object is to introduce the account of the love. of Jonathan for David. Starting then with the inquiry made by the king of Abner, asking for fuller information as to the young man"s parentage, the historian then tells how after the chase he was brought before Saul, and then, in 1Sa_18:1, that the result of their conversation was the warm love that henceforward knit together these two kindred souls.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On v58 Whose son art thou, young man?
1Sa_17:58
Whose son art thou, young man?
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Relation of ancestry to character
I am not surprised that when this shepherd boy (ushered in and introduced by Abner, commander-in-chief) entered the Royal presence with the ghastly trophy, his fingers clutching the hair of Goliaths head, the king looked at him with admiring wonderment, and put the plain, straightforward question of my text, Whose son art thou, young man? It was natural that Saul should wish to know something of the antecedents of so brave a youth; doubtless, he wanted all the particulars about his age, the place of his birth, his upbringing, his occupation, and so forth; but he conceived that such signal valour must be hereditary and ancestral; so his first and main inquiry touched the parentage of the juvenile warrior, Young man, who was your father? Whatever views we may hold upon the subject of heredity, there cannot be a doubt as to the fact that qualities, moral, intellectual, and physical, are transmitted from father to son. Some families are noted for longevity; others for good looks; others for love of adventure. The aquiline nose runs in the line of the Buonapartes; the large lip in the House of Hapsburg; the bald head in the House of Hanoverse In some instances there is a certain expression of countenance traceable to the third or fourth generation. I call on one of you at your lodging, and take up the portrait album on your table; and instantly say, as I point to a photograph there, though I never saw the original, You dont need to tell me who that is; one can see at a glance that you are a chip of the old block. Mental qualities are transmitted too. In one case it is musical talent that descends; in another, the love of poetry; in a third, the gift of acquiring languages. And what is yet more to the point, moral tendencies, bad, good, and indifferent, are passed on from parent to child. Only last week I heard of a case in which a confirmed slave of alcohol actually said, My father was a drunkard, and my grandfather was a drunkard before him; I shall be a drunkard too; we belong to a race of drunkards. I may as well accept my fate, it cannot be helped. On the other hand, noble and generous features of character appear sometimes to run in the blood. If there could be anything like a pious momentum coming from a long line of Christian progenitors, some of us ought to be godly indeed. St. Paul was not afraid of being misunderstood by Timothy when he wrote to him, I thank God when I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice. And this suggests the truth, that on the mothers side, perhaps even more than the fathers, this law of heredity seems to prevail. When David answered King Sauls question he made no mention of his mother, but there is nothing in that omission; for he quite understood the monarchs object, that he wished to know his family connection Could I be near you in the hour of strong temptation, when you are ready to belie all the holy memories of a pious home, I would whisper in your ear the question--till you would start back with loathing from the vice to which you were going to yield--Whose son art thou, young man?
I. My first word is to those of you who save sprung from a lowly parentage. If there is anything more utterly contemptible than for one who has risen a bit in the world to be ashamed of his humble origin, it is the conduct of him who ridicules his low-born brother. Sometimes we hear it remarked, with a sneer and a curl of the lip, concerning some young man who is doing well, and carrying all before him, Oh, he has risen from the ranks! Well, the more honour to him, if it is so; and the more shame upon the silly, contemptible snobbishness that could be guilty of such an utterance. It is in no spirit of cheap Radicalism that I say this. It is not a question either of patrician or plebeian sympathies at all. I will venture to say it is simple common sense. Blue blood, as it is called, is by no means the purest blood. I believe that some of you have far more reason to be proud of your pedigree than could you trace it to Tudor or Plantagenet.
II. My next word is upon the heavy responsibility that rests on you who have been born in the line of a Christian parentage. We shall not talk of rank now, but of character. You come out of a godly nest. Your father was a man of God, your mother a sincere believerse A long line of Christian inheritance is something to rejoice in. When a man can make out a genealogical tree of his own family, and point cub to me, that root, stem, branch, and twig were all holy, I say he has good cause to thank God, and esteem himself as belonging to the peerage of the skies. Well did William Cowper say--
My boast is not that I deduce my birth
From loins enthroned, the rulers of the earth;
But higher far my proud pretensions rise--
The son of parents passed into the skies.
Whose son art thou, young man? It is a frightful aggravation of a mans guilt when his whole life is a contradiction given to his fathers counsels and his mothers prayers; when the child of a godly ancestry tramples on all the holy traditions and memories of the past, and determinedly breaks through the moral fences that had been set around him. Such persons generally make an awful rebound. The worst of men are apostates from the purest faith. Tell me what good influence a young man has resisted and defied, and I will give you the gauge of his depravity.
III. I am not afraid to put the question even to those of you who have had no such advantage. I thank God that I have seen many a clean bird come out of a foul nest. If ever a man might have been supposed to have had bad blood in his veins, it was Hezekiah, who was the son of one of the worst monarchs that ever reigned over Israel. He was cursed with a most polluted parental example. One might have said of that young man that he was born to vice. And yet he turned out a devout and holy man of God. Yes, Divine grace is stronger even than blood. History can supply many an instance, to the praise of Him who ofttimes finds the brightest diamonds in the darkest mines, and the richest pearls in the deepest seas.
IV. I feel that I cannot part with the text without giving it a purely spiritual meaning, in respect of which there are but two paternities, and one or other of these each of you must own. Would to God that, as I address to you all the question, Whose sons are ye, young men? you could with one voice reply, Behold, now are we the sons of God. Ye are of your father, the devil, said Christ, with awful plainness of speech, to the unbelieving Jews; and let it never be forgotten that, unless we are the subjects of Divine adoption, we are all the children of the wicked one. I tell you that, whether you realise it or not, you have, each of you, Royal blood in your veins. Your pedigree traces back to the King of kings. St. Luke goes right up to the fountain head when he finishes his genealogical table thus: Which was the son of Enos, which was the son of Seth, which was the son of Adam, which was the Son of God. Awake to the glorious fact, and claim your high inheritance! Amen. (J. T. Davidson.)
Your pedigree
The king saw, what you and I see, that this question of heredity is a mighty question. The longer I live the more I believe in blood--good blood, bad blood, pure blood, humble blood, honest blood, thieving blood, heroic blood, cowardly blood. The tendency may skip a generation or two, but it is sure to come out, as in a little child you sometimes see a similarity to a great grandfather whose picture hangs on the wall. That the physical and mental and moral qualities are inheritable is patent to anyone who keeps his eyes open. The similarity is so striking sometimes as to be amusing. Great families, regal or literary, are apt to have the characteristics all down through the generation, and what is more perceptible in such families may be seen on a smaller scale in all families. A thousand years have no power to obliterate the difference. Scottish blood means persistence, English blood means reverence for the ancient, Welsh blood means religiosity, Danish blood means fondness for the sea, Indian blood means roaming disposition, Celtic blood means fervidity, Roman blood means conquest. The Jewish facility for accumulation you may trace clear back to Abraham, of whom the Bible says he was rich in silver and gold and cattle, and to Isaac and Jacob, who had the same characteristics. This law of heredity asserts itself without reference to social or political condition, for you sometimes find the ignoble in high place and the honourable in obscure place. A descendant of Edward I, a toll gatherer. A descendant of Edward II, a doorkeeper. A descendant of the Duke of Northumberland a trunk maker. Some of the mightiest families of England are extinct, while some of those most honoured in the peerage go back to an ancestry of hard knocks and rough exterior. This law of heredity is entirely independent of social or political conditions; for you find avarice and jealousy and sensuality and fraud having full swing in some families. The violent temper of Frederick William is an inheritance from Frederick the Great. It is not a theory founded by worldly philosophy, but by Divine authority. Do you not remember how the Bible speaks of a chosen generation, of the generation of the righteous, of the generation of vipers, of an untoward generation, of a stubborn generation, of the iniquity of the fathers visited upon the children unto the third and fourth generation? So that the text comes today with the force of a projectile hurled from mightiest catapult, Whose son art thou, young man? Well, says someone, that theory discharges me from all responsibility. Born of sanctified parents, we are bound to be good, and we cannot help ourselves. Born of unrighteous parentage, we are bound to be evil, and we cannot help ourselves. Two inaccuracies. As much as if you should say, The centrifugal force in nature has a tendency to throw out everything to the periphery, and therefore everything will go out to the periphery. You know as well as I know that you can make the centripetal force overcome the centrifugal, and you can make the centrifugal overcome the centripetal. As when there is a mighty, tide of good in a family that may be overcome by determination to evil, as in the case of Aaron Burr, the libertine, who had for father President Burr, the consecrated; as in the case of Pierrepont, Edwards, the scourge of New York society seventy years ago, who had a Christian ancestry; while, on the other hand, some of the best men and woman of this day are those who have come of an ancestry of which it would not be courteous to speak in their presence. The practical and useful object of this sermon is to show to you that if you have come of a Christian ancestry, then you are solemnly bound to preserve and develop the glorious inheritance; or if you have come of a depraved ancestry, then it is your duty to brace yourself against the evil tendency. I want to arouse the most sacred memories of your heart while I make the impassioned interrogatory in regard to your pedigree: Whose son are thou, thou young man?
I. I accost all those who are descended of a Christian ancestry. I do not ask if your parents were perfect. There are no perfect people now, and I do not suppose there were any perfect people then. You have a responsibility vast beyond all measurement. God will not let you off with just being as good as ordinary people when you had such extraordinary advantage. Ought not a flower planted in a hothouse be more healthy than a flower planted outside in the storm? Ought not a factory turned by the Housatonic do more work than a factory turned by a thin and shallow stream? Ought not you of great early opportunity be better than these who had cradle unblessed? Your Heavenly Father charges against you all the advantage of a pious ancestry--so many prayers, so much Christian example, so many kind entreaties--all these gracious influences, one tremendous aggregate, and He asks you for an account of it. Ought not you to be better than those who had no such advantage? Better have been a foundling picked up off the city commons than with such magnificent inheritance of consecration to turn out differently. Oh, the power of ancestral piety! Oh, the power of ancestral prayer!
II. I turn for a moment to those who had evil parentage, and I want to tell you that the highest thrones in heaven and the mightiest triumphs and the brightest crowns will be for those who had evil parentage, but who by the grace of God conquered--conquered. Find out what the family frailty is, and set body, mind, and soul in battle array. Conquer you will. I think the genealogical table was put in the first chapter of the New Testament not only to show our Lords pedigree, but to show that a man may rise out of an ancestral line and beat back successfully all the influences of bad heredity. See in that genealogical table that good King Asa was born of vile King Abia. See in that genealogical table that Joseph and Mary and the most illustrious Being that ever touched our world, or ever will touch it, had in His ancestral line scandalous Rahab and Thamar, and Bathsheba. Perhaps the star of hope may point down to your manger. Perhaps you are to be the hero or the heroine that is to put down the brakes and stop that long line of genealogical tendencies, and switch it off on another track from that on which it has been running for a century. Estranged children from the homestead come back through the open gate of adoption. There is royal blood in our veins; there are crowns on our escutcheon. Our Father is King, our Brother is King; we may be kings and queens unto God foreverse Whose son art thou, thou young man? Son of God! Heir of immortality! Take your inheritance! (T. De Witt Talmage.)
Heredity and celebrity
I confess I am rather interested in the whole subject of heredity. I have been at some pains to inform myself as to the calling or occupation of the fathers of many men who have risen to honourable distinction in the world; and, perhaps, you would like to have some of the results of that inquiry. I shall select a few at random taken from a very varied list. The distinguished astronomer Kepler was the son of an officer in the army; the poet Wordsworth and Sir Walter Scott, of attorneys; Chatterton, of a schoolmaster; Handel, of a surgeon; Thomas Hood and Samuel Johnson, of booksellers; Mozart, of a bookbinder; Blackstone, the eminent lawyer, of a silk mercer; the poet Pope, of a linen draper; Sir Isaac Newton, of a farmer; Thomas Arnold, of a tax collector; De Foe and Akenside, of butchers; Dr. Jeremy Taylor, of a hairdresser; the artist Turner, of a berber; Christopher Columbus, of a wool comber; the great astronomer Halley, of a soap boiler; Haydn, of a wheelwright; Luther, of a miner; Lord Eldon, the famous lawyer, of a collier; George Fox, of a weaver; Captain Cook, of an agricultural labourer; and last, but not least, John Bunyan, of a tinker. (Great Thoughts.)
The value of a noble ancestry
There is the prophecy of a holy ancestry. (2Ti_1:5.) Oliver Wendell Holmes remarks that most people think that any difficulty of a physical sort can be cured if a physician is called early enough. Yes, Dr. Holmes replies, but early enough would commonly be two hundred years in advance. There is the tremendous law of heredity, the awful sweep and reach of which science is just now beginning to throw some adequate light upon. But this law takes in its strong grasp not only features and damages and incitements which are physical; it pushes onward into coming generations characteristics which are mental and moral also. And if one be budded out of a religious ancestry, it is a vast boon and blessing. And to be steadily determined to he true to such ancestry, and to refuse to run athwart the strain of it, is a tremendous help and impetus in warring the good warfare. (W. Hoyt, D. D.)
I am the son of thy servant Jesse, the Bethlehemite.--
Undeclared royalty
That is a very simple account for a man to give of himself, yet it answered the question which elicited it. Standing before the king, grasping the head of a man who made Israel quake, a nation looking at him, yet he speaks as if a stranger had accosted him in some peaceful retreat of the pasturage! David might have said, Samuel came to my fathers house in search of a king. He passed by my brethren one by one; I was seat for at length from the sheep fold, and Samuel anointed me king of Israel. Behold in this bleeding head the first sign and pledge of my kingly power! Instead of speaking so, he merely said, with a childs beautiful simplicity, I am the son of thy servant Jesse the Bethlehemite.
1. Learn that men may be anointed long before their power is officially and publicly declared. God may have put his secret into their heart long before he puts the diadem upon their brow. We do not know to whom we are speaking.
2. Learn that Gods arrangements are not extemporaneous. The men who shall succeed to all good offices are known to Him from the beginning to the end. To us the prospect may be dark, but to God the whole course is clear; the successor is anointed, but, not yet declared.
3. In studying the period of Davids history which is comprised between his anointing and the killing of Goliath, we shall discover some qualities in David which we may well imitate. Soon after his anointing, David became harp player to the king. This seems to be a descent. Are there not many apparent anti-climaxes in life? Is this a conspicuous example of them? Play the harp! Why, I am king, David might have said. Why should I waste my time in attempting to prolong the life of the man who is upon my throne? The sooner he dies, the sooner I shall reign; not one soothing note will I evoke from my harp! Had David spoken so, he would have dropped from the high elevation which becomes the spirit of a king. Are we skilled in music? Let us help those who are sad. Have we this worlds goods? Let us seek out the poor, that, they may bless us as the messengers of God. Have we power to say beautiful words? Let us speak to men who are weary of the common tumult which is around them. To help a man is the honour of true kingliness. After this engagement as harp player, David went home to pursue his usual avocations. How well he carried the burden of his prospects! We see no sign of impatience. He did not behave himself as a child who, having seen a toy, cries until it is put into his hands. David had the dignity of patience. He carried the Lords secret, in a quiet heart. When David came to see his fighting brethren, by the express instructions of his father Jesse, he disclosed a feature in his character in true keeping with what we have seen. When he had become acquainted with the case, he at once looked at outward circumstances in their moral bearing. Other men, including Saul himself, were talking about, mere appearances. They did not see the case as it, really was. Their talk, in fact, was strongly atheistic. Now for another tone! David called Goliath, not a giant, not a soldier, but an uncircumcised Philistine, who had defied the armies of the living God! This is a moral tone. This is precisely the tone that was wanted in the talk of degenerate Israel! As used by David, the very word uncircumcised involved a moral challenge. This tone retrieves the honour of any controversy. It brings strength with it, and hope, and dignity. Oh, for one David in every controversy! Men lose themselves in petty details, they fight about straws, they see only the surface; David saw the spiritual bearing of all things, and redeemed a controversy from vulgarity and atheism by distinctly and lovingly pronouncing the name of God. The atheist counts the guns, the saint looks up to God; the atheist is terrified by the size of the staff, the saint is inspired by his faith in right and purity. Such a man cannot fail. David interpreted the past so as to qualify himself for the future. When Saul doubted his inability to cope with the Philistine, David recounted some of his recollections as a shepherd. The past should be our prophet. David confided in the unchangeableness of God. Forms of danger vary; but the delivering power remains the same. The great fight of life is a contention between the material and the spiritual. Goliath represents the material; he is towering in stature, vast in strength, terrible in aspect. David represents the spiritual: he is simple, trustful, reverent; the merely fleshly side of his power is reduced, to the lowest possible point,--he fights under the inspiration of great memories, in a deeply religious spirit, not for personal glory but for the glory of the living God. As a contest between strength and strength, the scene was simply ridiculous. Viewed materially, the Philistine was perfectly right when he disdained David, and scornfully laughed at the weapons which the stripling produced. Goliath showed a most justifiable contempt; as a materialist he could indeed have adopted no other tone. David made no boast of his weapons. He pronounced the name of God, and put his life in the keeping of the Most High. The application of the truths of this lesson is easy as a matter of inference, but hard as a matter of realisation. Some men save, others are saved. Such is the law of sovereignty. This law of sovereignty penetrates the whole scheme and fabric of life. David saved, Israel was saved; activity and passivity make up the sphere of this life. Without any attempt at fanciful spiritualising, we see in David the type of the one Saviour of the world, Jesus Christ, who bruised the serpents head, and won for us the one victory through which we may have eternal life. Crown Him Lord of all. (J. Parker, D. D.)
Spiritual incongruities
I have tried to apprehend the character of David. David was a prophet, but I shall speak most of him as a man; and I desire most to call your attention to him in his actual and his merely human life. This it will be my effort, briefly to sketch, and, as I sketch it, to connect such reflections with the statements as arise naturally out of the incidents. The opening of Davids public course glows with sublime ardour, and is full of heroism. He will go forward against presumptuous sell-confidence. He understood where the noblest strength lay, and nobly he used it. He showed, what the whole history of man exhibits--that faith in Divine protection, that devotion to conscience, that intellectual skill, that moral enthusiasm, can trample down resistance, however gigantic. What is muscle at any time against mind? What is passion against belief? What is frenzied anger against deliberative conviction? Reverence and Reason are the true conqueror of the earth. To them belong the victory, and to them belong dominion. David stands out, as a type of this great power. The monster fell dead before his missile, and he, the victor, has left, a record of our learning, to reveal to us, for everlasting ages, what is the potency of the gifted and the inspired mind. He may be placed as the deathless incarnation of what, trust and thought can accomplish against tyranny and force.
1. David was one of those great and original men, whom humanity at rare intervals produces. His mind was of that order which creates the age in which it lives, and that saves or destroys the nation which it rules. His character was that which Time, if it would, is not able to kill; that which History is forced to remember. It is the destiny of transcendent power, whether it be good or whether it be bad, to leave everlasting impression on the affairs of mankind. David was a man of power, various and exalted. Strong in intellect, and wise in experience; strong in will, end commanding in expression; strong in every attribute which compels obedience, he was accomplished also in the qualities that win it. Poetry, music, architecture, he loved with extreme desire; he advanced them with a noble zeal. In some points he resembled Bonaparte. Like Bonaparte, he arose from the people, and sat upon his throne by their will; like Bonaparte, his people adored him, and would endure to the last extremity of human nature for his interest. Like Bonaparte, he was a conqueror. His circumstances were created by the age, and not by himself. He had to meet and to subdue them as best be could. Like Bonaparte, he was a dictator. He had, to be sure, his great and mighty men, for he knew, by the glance of a look, the man who was born to control his associates; and as he knew the man, he selected him. Like Bonaparte, he was a legislator. He gave his people laws, and he established among them a settled and systematic administration. But he had a piety, and a faith, and a devotional sensibility, of which the mighty modern had not a single impulse. There is another modern, to whom David also bears, in some degree, a resemblance--Peter the Great, of Russia. David, as Peter, found only barbarism in the land; but, ere he died, it was exalted and civilised. The great king of Israel, as the great czar of Russia, was the patron of every art, and the friend of every genius who could raise his country into prosperity and dignity. He found his brethren dwelling in tents; he departed from among them living in palaces. He found them scattered tribes; he left them a collected and compacted nation. Under the guidance of his stupendous mind, the land was filled with plenty, the sea was covered with commerce, literature was encouraged, industry was successful, victory waited on arms, and wisdom prevailed in counsel. If we contrast David with Saul, David appears as superior as heaven is to earth. It is superiority, not of an improved succession, but of a new creation. Saul, like David, was exalted from common to kingly life. Saul, like David, was a man of battle, and a man of blood; and here the resemblance closes. To the end, Saul was only the savage warrior, a man of might and daring, a man of prowess and enthusiasm. This agrees fully with his personal qualities, and is in nowise opposed to his original condition. It is all that we might imagine, and our expectations are neither surpassed nor contradicted. Commanding in the qualities which make a man of war, David had, in more signal perfection, those which in a better period would have made a man of peace.
2. The history of David leaves one impression on the mind deeply and plainly; and that, is that moral principle does not always correspond with devotional sensibility. I do not say that devotional sensibility is not a fine element in moral action; nay, I hold that,, without it, the highest beauty is wanting to character and to virtue. But still, devotional sensibility may be found in many persons, who are weak in right principles, and unstable in right purposes. How fervently could David pray, but bow feebly did David practise! Yet David was not really insincere. It is well and wisely written--The heart is deceitful above all things; who can know it? Much and strange contradiction there is in life, but less of positive hypocrisy than is imagined. David is a type of many kings and many men. The example, in this character which Scripture gives us, is ever and ever repeated in history; and it is as often corroborated in daily life. And, in our own experience, how changeful and uncertain are our characters? In an hour we passionately resolve, and in another as recklessly break our resolution. Instability and inconsistency there are in this, but sincerity there is in it also. The real philosophy of the matter is that the religious element, like the other elements of our nature, must be good or bad, as it is directed. By the religious clement I mean, in this connection, the faculty which connects us with the invisible and eternal world; and this, directed by ignorance and passion, may do, without remorse, deeds that have no name, but, influenced by knowledge and by benignity, raises a man, not simply to be a little lower than the angels, but to be their equal and their companion. But the merely devotional man is not necessarily a virtuous man; nay, he is not necessarily a benevolent man; he may fail in rectitude, or he may fail in humanity. Of this principle, the whole history of the Church gives sufficient evidence; for many a devout man has been dishonest, and many a devout man has been cruel. I do not join in the common cry which stigmatizes all such as hypocrites. I do not believe that the failings of those on whom the world charged inconsistency always sprang from deceit: I simply believe that they were men of partial development, and that, in the exaggerated expression of some faculties, others were disproportionately, and thence injuriously, weakened. Wickedness there is abundantly in the world, and so far there is, in the world, a universal subject and cause of grief. But, when sin unites with noble gifts, it is exceedingly sinful. Let me offer a few words--a few words on that, blood-guiltiness, for which some men, through David, assault the Bible. We are to judge David as we judge other men, by his times and by his circumstances. His age was one of rudeness and it was one of blood. It was a period when men got readily into conflict, and when conflict was associated with little that was forbearing or magnanimous. The barbarian instincts to contention were those which then were the most developed. Prowess was the great test of excellence. Might was the principle of right. The military hero was the highest style of man. Shall we make that Davids sin, which was Davids fate? Was he not a warrior by the necessity of events, rather than by any personal contrivance? What else could his life have been, but that of warfare? By what means could he have avoided being, throughout his course, a warrior? Davids career was splendid and successful. Was he happy? Was he even moderately happy? When David sat upon the throne of Israel did he never recall, in melancholy vision, the green pastures and the still waters, where his breast, was calm, and where his step was free. David was not a happy man. Despondency settled on his soul, and calamities, treading fast upon each other, haunted all his latter days. He is an example that no grandeur, no prosperity, no impunity from station, no glory of command, no flattery of obedience, can strip sin of its hatefulness or rob it of its sting; that Gods eye is on the monarch as thy, beggar; that, in the depth of millions, their transgression can find them out; and that, in the stern truth of Gods own sentence, it can shriek within their conscience the terrible rebuke of Divine condemnation. David, too, is an evidence, if evidence were wanted, that grandeur is a poor shelter against grief. When shame fell upon Davids house, when hatred placed one child in deadly feud against another, the glare of royalty was a small matter in the sadness of nature. What was kingship to the English Charles, when, after arraignment before his own people, he clasped his children for the last time to his bosom, before his going to the block? What was kingship to the French Louis when he felt he must leave his helpless wife and orphans to the mercies of the mad avengers, who began in his own blood the retaliation for centuries of suffering, which was only to be accomplished in a wilderness of death? What was kingship to David when his own flesh were his enemies? I have spoken of David as I proposed, as one within the circle of our imperfect humanity, and I have spoken of him in the spirit of humanity. In this spirit I view in him an incarnation of its capacities, and an example of its weakness. In this spirit I cannot think of him otherwise than in solemn reverence and solemn sorrow. With this solemn sorrow and solemn reverence, I contemplate his mighty mind; with reverence I see its grandeur; with sorrow I behold its fall from that grandeur, to wilder itself in madness, or to lose itself in folly. I learn how strength may work for wretchedness, how privileges may turn to penalties. Looking upon David comprehensively, in his greatness, in his abasement, in his repentance, in his guilt, in his aspiration, in his affliction, I am reminded of his own words, suggested doubtless by his own experience--Verily, every man at his best estate is altogether vanity! (Henry Giles.)
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The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v56 Cf. (See Scofield "1Sa 16:21").
son
Cf. (See Scofield "1Sa 16:21").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv55, 57 When Saul saw David
When Saul saw David
The conversation in 1Sa 17:55-56 happened before David killed Goliath. AT: "When Saul had seen David" or "Earlier when Saul saw David" (See: Order of Events)
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go out against the Philistine
"go to fight against the Philistine"
whose son is this youth
"who is this youth's father"
As you live
This was a way of swearing that what he was about to say was true.
whose son the boy is
"who the boy's father is"
translationWords
Saul (OT)
David
Philistines
Abner
king
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On v55 17:55-58 In light of 16:14-23, it is surprising that…
17:55-58 In light of 16:14-23, it is surprising that neither Saul nor Abner knew who David was. It is possible that the events of ch 17 happened either before or long after David’s tenure of intermittent service mentioned in ch 16 (Saul probably served as king for forty-two years, 13:1).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.