7 And David saith to him, `Be not afraid; for I certainly do with thee kindness because of Jonathan thy father, and have given back to thee all the field of Saul thy father, and thou dost eat bread at my table continually.'
`And to the sons of Barzillai the Gileadite thou dost do kindness, and they have been among those eating at thy table, for so they drew near unto me in my fleeing from the face of Absalom thy brother.
for all the house of my father have been nothing except men of death before my lord the king, and thou dost set thy servant among those eating at thy table, and what right have I any more -- even to cry any more unto the king?'
And the king saith, `Is there not yet a man to the house of Saul, and I do with him the kindness of God?' And Ziba saith unto the king, `Jonathan hath yet a son -- lame.'
and hath changed the garments of his restraint, and he hath eaten bread continually before him all days of his life,
lo, I have stood at the door, and I knock; if any one may hear my voice, and may open the door, I will come in unto him, and will sup with him, and he with me.
may the Lord give kindness to the house of Onesiphorus, because many times he did refresh me, and of my chain was not ashamed, but being in Rome, very diligently he sought me, and found; may the Lord give to him to find kindness from the Lord in that day; and how many things in Ephesus he did minister thou dost very well know.
and she, having seen, was troubled at his word, and was reasoning of what kind this salutation may be. And the messenger said to her, `Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found favour with God;
and Zacharias, having seen, was troubled, and fear fell on him; and the messenger said unto him, `Fear not, Zacharias, for thy supplication was heard, and thy wife Elisabeth shall bear a son to thee, and thou shalt call his name John,
and the men are afraid because they have been brought into the house of Joseph, and they say, `For the matter of the money which was put back in our bags at the commencement are we brought in -- to roll himself upon us, and to throw himself on us, and to take us for servants -- our asses also.'
And the pierced of Jehovah have been in that day, From the end of the earth even unto the end of the earth, They are not lamented, nor gathered, nor buried, For dung on the face of the ground they are. Howl, ye shepherds, and cry, And roll yourselves, ye honourable of the flock, For full have been your days, For slaughtering, and `for' your scatterings, And ye have fallen as a desirable vessel.
Even mine ally, in whom I trusted, One eating my bread, made great the heel against me,
and the king saith unto Barzillai, `Pass thou over with me, and I have sustained thee with me in Jerusalem.'
And Ziba saith unto the king, `According to all that my lord the king commandeth his servant, so doth thy servant;' as to Mephibosheth, `he is eating at my table (`saith the king') as one of the sons of the king.'
only, fear ye Jehovah, and ye have served Him in truth with all your heart, for see that which He hath made great with you;
and all the people say unto Samuel, `Pray for thy servants unto Jehovah thy God, and we do not die, for we have added to all our sins evil to ask for us a king.' And Samuel saith unto the people, `Fear not; ye have done all this evil; only, turn not aside from after Jehovah -- and ye have served Jehovah with all your heart,
And Boaz answereth and saith to her, `It hath thoroughly been declared to me all that thou hast done with thy mother-in-law, after the death of thy husband, and thou dost leave thy father, and thy mother, and the land of thy birth, and dost come in unto a people which thou hast not known heretofore. Jehovah doth recompense thy work, and thy reward is complete from Jehovah, God of Israel, under whose wings thou hast come to take refuge.'
And his brethren also go and fall before him, and say, `Lo, we `are' to thee for servants.' And Joseph saith unto them, `Fear not, for `am' I in the place of God? As for you, ye devised against me evil -- God devised it for good, in order to do as `at' this day, to keep alive a numerous people; and now, fear not: I do nourish you and your infants;' and he comforteth them, and speaketh unto their heart.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on 2 Samuel 9
Commentary on 2 Samuel 9 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
David's Kindness towards Mephibosheth - 2 Samuel 9:1-13
When David was exalted to be king over all Israel, he sought to show compassion to the house of the fallen king, and to repay the love which his noble-minded friend Jonathan had once sworn to him before the Lord ( 1 Samuel 20:13.; comp. 2 Samuel 23:17-18). The account of this forms the conclusion of, or rather an appendix to, the first section of the history of his reign, and was intended to show how David was mindful of the duty of gratitude and loving fidelity, even when he reached the highest point of his regal authority and glory. The date when this occurred was about the middle of David's reign, as we may see from the fact, that Mephibosheth, who was five years old when Saul died (2 Samuel 4:4), had a young son at the time (2 Samuel 9:12).
2 Samuel 9:1-4
When David inquired whether there was any one left of the house of Saul to whom he could show favour for Jonathan's sake ( ישׁ־עוד הכי : is it so that there is any one? = there is certainly some one left), a servant of Saul named Ziba was summoned, who told the king that there was a son of Jonathan living in the house of Machir at Lodebar, and that he was lame in his feet. אישׁ עוד האפס , “is there no one at all besides?” The ל before בּית is a roundabout way of expressing the genitive, as in 1 Samuel 16:18, etc., and is obviously not to be altered into מבּית , as Thenius proposes. “The kindness of God” is love and kindness shown in God, and for God's sake (Luke 6:36). Machir the son of Ammiel was a rich man, judging from 2 Samuel 17:27, who, after the death of Saul and Jonathan, had received the lame son of the latter into his house. Lodebar ( לודבר , written לאדבר in 2 Samuel 17:27, but erroneously divided by the Masoretes into two words in both passages) was a town on the east of Mahanaim, towards Rabbath Amman, probably the same place as Lidbir (Joshua 13:26); but it is not further known.
2 Samuel 9:5-7
David sent for this son of Jonathan ( Mephibosheth : cf. 2 Samuel 4:4), and not only restored his father's possessions in land, but took him to his own royal table for the rest of his life. “Fear not,” said David to Mephibosheth, when he came before him with the deepest obeisance, to take away any anxiety lest the king should intend to slay the descendants of the fallen king, according to the custom of eastern usurpers. It is evident from the words, “I will restore thee all the land of Saul thy father,” that the landed property belonging to Saul had either fallen to David as crown lands, or had been taken possession of by distant relations after the death of Saul. “Thou shalt eat bread at my table continually,” i.e., eat at my table all thy life long, or receive thy food from my table.
2 Samuel 9:8
Mephibosheth expressed his thanks for this manifestation of favour with the deepest obeisance, and a confession of his unworthiness of any such favour. On his comparison of himself to a “dead dog,” see at 1 Samuel 24:15.
David then summoned Ziba the servant of Saul, told him of the restoration of Saul's possessions to his son Mephibosheth, and ordered him, with his sons and servants, to cultivate the land for the son of his lord. The words, “that thy master's son may have food to eat,” are not at variance with the next clause, “Mephibosheth shall eat bread alway at my table,” as bread is a general expression, including all the necessaries of life. Although Mephibosheth himself ate daily as a guest at the king's table, he had to make provision as a royal prince for the maintenance of his own family and servants, as he had children according to 2 Samuel 9:12 and 1 Chronicles 8:34. Ziba had fifteen sons and twenty servants (2 Samuel 9:10), with whom he had probably been living in Gibeah, Saul's native place, and may perhaps have hitherto farmed Saul's land.
Ziba promised to obey the king's command. The last clause of this verse is a circumstantial clause in form, with which the writer passes over to the conclusion of his account. But the words שׁלחני על שׁלחן , “at my table,” do not tally with this, as they require that the words should be taken as David's own. This is precluded, however, not only by the omission of any intimation that David spoke again after Ziba, and repeated what he had said once already, and that without any occasion whatever, but also by the form of the sentence, more especially the participle אכל . There is no other course left, therefore, than to regard שׁלחני (my table) as written by mistake for דּוד שׁלחן : “but Mephibosheth ate at David's table as one of the king's sons.” The further notices in 2 Samuel 9:12 and 2 Samuel 9:13 follow this in a very simple manner. בּית מושׁב כּל , “all the dwelling,” i.e., all the inhabitants of Ziba's house, namely his sons and servants, were servants of Mephibosheth, i.e., worked for him and cultivated his land, whilst he himself took up his abode at Jerusalem, to eat daily at the king's table, although he was lamed in both his feet.