15 and it cometh to pass, when thou hearest the sound of the stepping at the heads of the mulberries, then thou goest out into battle, for God hath gone out before thee to smite the camp of the Philistines.'
`And those who are left of you -- I have also brought a faintness into their heart in the lands of their enemies, and the sound of a leaf driven away hath pursued them, and they have fled -- flight from a sword -- and they have fallen, and there is none pursuing.
And Deborah saith unto Barak, `Rise, for this `is' the day in which Jehovah hath given Sisera into thy hand; hath not Jehovah gone out before thee?' And Barak goeth down from mount Tabor, and ten thousand men after him.
And it cometh to pass, when Gideon heareth the narration of the dream and its interpretation, that he boweth himself, and turneth back unto the camp of Israel, and saith, `Rise ye, for Jehovah hath given into your hand the camp of Midian.'
if thus they say unto us, `Stand still till we have come unto you,' then we have stood in our place, and do not go up unto them; and if thus they say, `Come up against us,' then we have gone up, for Jehovah hath given them into our hand, and this to us `is' the sign. And revealed are both of them unto the station of the Philistines, and the Philistines say, `Lo, Hebrews are coming out of the holes where they have hid themselves.' And the men of the station answer Jonathan, and the bearer of his weapons, and say, `Come up unto us, and we cause you to know something.' And Jonathan saith unto the bearer of his weapons, `Come up after me, for Jehovah hath given them into the hand of Israel.' And Jonathan goeth up on his hands, and on his feet, and the bearer of his weapons after him; and they fall before Jonathan, and the bearer of his weapons is putting to death after him. And the first smiting which Jonathan and the bearer of his weapons have smitten is of about twenty men, in about half a furrow of a yoke of a field, and there is a trembling in the camp, in the field, and among all the people, the station and the destroyers have trembled -- even they, and the earth shaketh, and it becometh a trembling of God. And the watchmen of Saul in Gibeah of Benjamin see, and lo, the multitude hath melted away, and it goeth on, and is beaten down. And Saul saith to the people who `are' with him, `Inspect, I pray you, and see; who hath gone from us?' and they inspect, and lo, Jonathan and the bearer of his weapons are not. And Saul saith to Ahiah, `Bring nigh the ark of God;' for the ark of God hath been on that day with the sons of Israel. And it cometh to pass, while Saul spake unto the priest, that the noise which `is' in the camp of the Philistines goeth on, going on and becoming great, and Saul saith unto the priest, `Remove thy hand.' And Saul is called, and all the people who `are' with him, and they come in unto the battle, and, lo, the sword of each hath been against his neighbour -- a very great destruction. And the Hebrews `who' have been for the Philistines as heretofore, who had gone up with them into the camp, have turned round, even they, to be with Israel who `are' with Saul and Jonathan, and all the men of Israel, who are hiding themselves in the hill-country of Ephraim, have heard that the Philistines have fled, and they pursue -- even they -- after them in battle.
seeing Jehovah hath caused the camp of Aram to hear a noise of chariot and a noise of horse -- a noise of great force, and they say one unto another, `Lo, the king of Israel hath hired against us the kings of the Hittites, and the kings of Egypt, to come against us.'
Lo, I am giving in him a spirit, and he hath heard a report, and hath turned back to his land, and I have caused him to fall by the sword in his land.'
A voice of a multitude in the mountains, A likeness of a numerous people, A voice of noise from the kingdoms of nations who are gathered, Jehovah of Hosts inspecting a host of battle!
Thus said Jehovah, To His anointed, to Cyrus, Whose right hand I have laid hold on, To subdue nations before him, Yea, loins of kings I loose, To open before him two-leaved doors, Yea, gates are not shut: `I go before thee, and crooked places make straight, Two-leaved doors of brass I shiver, And bars of iron I cut asunder,
I do surely gather thee, O Jacob, all of thee, I surely bring together the remnant of Israel, Together I do set it as the flock of Bozrah, As a drove in the midst of its pasture, It maketh a noise because of man. Gone up hath the breaker before them, They have broken through, Yea, they pass through the gate, Yea, they go out through it, And pass on doth their king before them, And Jehovah at their head!
and there came suddenly out of the heaven a sound as of a bearing violent breath, and it filled all the house where they were sitting,
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on 1 Chronicles 14
Commentary on 1 Chronicles 14 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
David's palace-building, wives and children , 1 Chronicles 14:1-7; cf. 2 Samuel 5:11-16. Two victories over the Philistines , 1 Chronicles 14:8-17; cf. 2 Samuel 5:17-25. - The position in which the narrative of these events stands, between the removal of the ark from Kirjath-jearim and its being brought to Jerusalem, is not to be supposed to indicate that they happened in the interval of three months, curing which the ark was left in the house of Obed-edom. The explanation of it rather is, that the author of our Chronicle, for the reasons given in page 170, desired to represent David's design to bring the ark into the capital city of his kingdom as his first undertaking after he had won Jerusalem, and was consequently compelled to bring in the events of our chapter at a later period, and for that purpose this interval of three months seemed to offer him the fittest opportunity. The whole contents of our chapter have already been commented upon in 2 Samuel 5:1, so that we need not here do more than refer to a few subordinate points.
Instead of נשּׂא כּי , that He (Jahve) had lifted up ( נשּׂא , perf. Pi.), as in 2 Samuel 5:12, in the Chronicle we read למעלה נשּׂאת כּי , that his kingdom had been lifted up on high. The unusual form נשּׂאת may be, according to the context, the third pers. fem. perf. Niph., nisaa't having first been changed into נשּׂאת , and thus contracted into נשּׂאת ; cf. Ew. §194, b. In 2 Samuel 19:43 the same form is the infin. abs. Niph. למעלה is here, as frequently in the Chronicles, used to intensify the expression: cf. 1 Chronicles 22:5; 1 Chronicles 23:17; 1 Chronicles 29:3, 1 Chronicles 29:25; 2 Chronicles 1:1; 2 Chronicles 17:12. With regard to the sons of David, see on 1 Chronicles 3:5-8.
In the account of the victories over the Philistines, the statement (2 Samuel 5:17) that David went down to the mountain-hold, which has no important connection with the main fact, and would have been for the readers of the Chronicle somewhat obscure, is exchanged in 1 Chronicles 14:8 for the more general expression לפניהם ויּצא , “he went forth against them.” In 1 Chronicles 14:14, the divine answer to David's question, whether he should march against the Philistines, runs thus: מעליהם הסב אחריהם תּעלה לא , Thou shalt not go up after them; turn away from them, and come upon them over against the baca-bushes; - while in 2 Samuel 5:23, on the contrary, we read: אל־אחריהם הסב תעלה הסב אל־א לע , Thou shalt not go up (i.e., advance against the enemy to attack them in front); turn thee behind them (i.e., to their rear), and come upon them over against the baca-bushes. Bertheau endeavours to get rid of the discrepancy, by supposing that into both texts corruptions have crept through transcribers' errors. He conjectures that the text of Samuel was originally אחריהם תּעלה לא , while in the Chronicle a transposition of the words עליהם and אחריהם was occasioned by a copyist's error, which in turn resulted in the alteration of עליהם into מעליהם . This supposition, however, stands or falls with the presumption that by תּעלה לא (Sam.) an attack is forbidden; but for that presumption no tenable grounds exist: it would rather involve a contradiction between the first part of the divine answer and the second. The last clause, “Come upon them from over against the baca-bushes,” shows that the attack was not forbidden; all that was forbidden was the making of the attack by advancing straight forward: instead of that, they were to try to fall upon them in the rear, by making a circuit. The chronicler consequently gives us an explanation of the ambiguous words of 2 Samuel, which might easily be misunderstood. As David's question was doubtless expressed as it is in 1 Chronicles 14:10, הפל על האעלה , the answer תּעלה לא might be understood to mean, “Go not up against them, attack them not, but go away behind them;” but with that the following וגו להם וּבאת , “Come upon them from the baca-bushes,” did not seem to harmonize. The chronicler consequently explains the first clauses of the answer thus: “Go not up straight behind them,” i.e., advance not against them so as to attack them openly, “but turn thyself away from them,” i.e., strike off in such a direction as to turn their flank, and come upon them from the front of the baca-bushes. In this way the apparently contradictory texts are reconciled without the alteration of a word. In 1 Chronicles 14:17, which is wanting in Samuel, the author concludes the account of these victories by the remark that they tended greatly to exalt the name of David among the nations. For similar reflections, cf. 2 Chronicles 17:10; 2 Chronicles 20:29; 2 Chronicles 14:13; and for שׁם ויּצא , 2 Chronicles 26:15.