7 Now a certain man of the servants of Saul was there that day, kept back before the Lord; his name was Doeg, an Edomite, the strongest of Saul's runners.
<To the chief music-maker. Maschil. Of David. When Doeg the Edomite came to Saul saying, David has come to the house of Ahimelech.> Why do you take pride in wrongdoing, lifting yourself up against the upright man all the day? Purposing destruction, using deceit; your tongue is like a sharp blade. You have more love for evil than for good, for deceit than for works of righteousness. (Selah.) Destruction is in all your words, O false tongue. But God will put an end to you for ever; driving you out from your tent, uprooting you from the land of the living. (Selah.) The upright will see it with fear, and will say, laughing at you: See, this is the man who did not make God his strength, but had faith in his goods and his property, and made himself strong in his wealth. But I am like a branching olive-tree in the house of God; I have put my faith in his mercy for ever and ever. I will give you praise without end for what you have done; I will give honour to your name before your saints, for it is good.
And there was an argument between the keepers of Abram's cattle and the keepers of Lot's cattle: at that time the Canaanites and Perizzites were still living in the land. Then Abram said to Lot, Let there be no argument between me and you, and between my herdmen and your herdmen, for we are brothers.
Will you take the goods of others, put men to death, and be untrue to your wives, and take false oaths, and have perfumes burned to the Baal, and go after other gods which are strange to you; And come and take your place before me in this house, which is named by my name, and say, We have been made safe; so that you may do all these disgusting things? Has this house, which is named by my name, become a hole of thieves to you? Truly I, even I, have seen it, says the Lord.
Then Paul took the men, and on the day after, making himself clean with them, he went into the Temple, giving out the statement that the days necessary for making them clean were complete, till the offering was made for every one of them. And when the seven days were almost ended, the Jews from Asia, seeing him in the Temple, got the people together and put their hands on him,
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on 1 Samuel 21
Commentary on 1 Samuel 21 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 21
David has now quite taken leave both of Saul's court and of his camp, has bidden farewell to his alter idem-his other self, the beloved Jonathan; and henceforward to the end of this book he is looked upon and treated as an outlaw and proclaimed a traitor. We still find him shifting from place to place for his own safety, and Saul pursuing him. His troubles are very particularly related in this and the following chapters, not only to be a key to the Psalms, but that he might be, as other prophets, an example to the saints in all ages, "of suffering affliction, and of patience,' and especially that he might be a type of Christ, who, being anointed to the kingdom, humbled himself, and was therefore highly exalted. But the example of the suffering Jesus was a copy without a blot, that of David was not so; witness the records of this chapter, where we find David in his flight,
Justly are troubles called temptations, for many are by them drawn into sin.
1Sa 21:1-9
Here,
Thus was David well furnished with arms and victuals; but it fell out very unhappily that there was one of Saul's servants then attending before the Lord, Doeg by name, that proved a base traitor both to David and Ahimelech. He was by birth an Edomite (v. 7), and though proselyted to the Jewish religion, to get the preferment he now had under Saul, yet he retained the ancient and hereditary enmity of Edom to Israel. He was master of the herds, which perhaps was then a place of as much honour as master of the horse is now. Some occasion or other he had at this time to wait on the priest, either to be purified from some pollution or to pay some vow; but, whatever his business was, it is said, he was detained before the Lord. He must attend and could not help it, but he was sick of the service, snuffed at it, and said, What a weariness is it! Mal. 1:13. He would rather have been any where else than before the Lord, and therefore, instead of minding the business he came about, was plotting to do David a mischief and to be revenged on Ahimelech for detaining him. God's sanctuary could never secure such wolves in sheep's clothing. See Gal. 2:4.
1Sa 21:10-15
David, though king elect, is here an exile-designed to be master of vast treasures, yet just now begging his bread-anointed to the crown, and yet here forced to flee from his country. Thus do God's providences sometimes seem to run counter to his promises, for the trial of his people's faith, and the glorifying of his name, in the accomplishment of his counsels, notwithstanding the difficulties that lay in the way. Here is,