1Sa 22:9-20 | KD | STEP | The Edomite Doeg could not refrain from yielding to this appeal, and telling Saul what he had seen when staying at Nob; namely, that Ahimelech had inquired of God for David, and given him food as well as Goliath’s sword. For the fact itself, see , where there is no reference indeed to his inquiring of God; though it certainly took place, as Ahimelech ( ) does not disclaim it. Doeg is here designated נצּב, “ the superintendent of Saul’s servants ,” so that apparently he had been invested with the office of marshal of the court.

‏ 1 Samuel 22:9-20

The Edomite Doeg could not refrain from yielding to this appeal, and telling Saul what he had seen when staying at Nob; namely, that Ahimelech had inquired of God for David, and given him food as well as Goliath’s sword. For the fact itself, see 1Sa 21:1-10, where there is no reference indeed to his inquiring of God; though it certainly took place, as Ahimelech (1Sa 22:15) does not disclaim it. Doeg is here designated נצּב, “the superintendent of Saul’s servants,” so that apparently he had been invested with the office of marshal of the court. 1Sa 22:11-15

On receiving this information, Saul immediately summoned the priest Ahimelech and “all his father’s house,” i.e., the whole priesthood, to Nob, to answer for what they had done. To Saul’s appeal, “Why have ye conspired against me, thou and the son of Jesse, by giving him bread?” Ahimelech, who was not conscious of any such crime, since David had come to him with a false pretext, and the priest had probably but very little knowledge of what took place at court, replied both calmly and worthily (1Sa 22:14): “And who of all thy servants is so faithful (proved, attested, as in Num 12:7) as David, and son-in-law of the king, and having access to thy private audience, and honoured in thy house?” The true explanation of אל־משׁמעתּך סר may be gathered from a comparison of 2Sa 23:23 and 1Ch 11:25, where משׁמעת occurs again, as the context clearly shows, in the sense of a privy councillor of the king, who hears his personal revelations and converses with him about them, so that it corresponds to our “audience.” סוּר, lit. to turn aside from the way, to go in to any one, or to look after anything (Exo 3:3; Rth 4:1, etc.); hence in the passage before us “to have access,” to be attached to a person. This is the explanation given by Gesenius and most of the modern expositors, whereas the early translators entirely misunderstood the passage, though they have given the meaning correctly enough at 2Sa 23:23. But if this was the relation in which David stood to Saul, - and he had really done so for a long time, - there was nothing wrong in what the high priest had done for him; but he had acted according to the best of his knowledge, and quite conscientiously as a faithful subject of the king. Ahimelech then added still further (1Sa 22:15): “Did I then begin to inquire of God for him this day?” i.e., was it the first time that I had obtained the decision of God for David concerning important enterprises, which he had to carry out in the service of the king? “Far be from me,” sc., any conspiracy against the king, like that of which I am accused. “Let not the king lay it as a burden upon thy servant, my whole father’s house (the omission of the cop. ו before בּכל־כּית may be accounted for from the excitement of the speaker); for thy servant knows not the least of all this.” בּכל־זאת, of all that Saul had charged him with. 1Sa 22:16-17

Notwithstanding this truthful assertion of his innocence, Saul pronounced sentence of death, not only upon the high priest, but upon all the priests at Nob, and commanded his רצים, “runner,” i.e., halberdiers, to put the priests to death, because, as he declared in his wrath, “their hand is with David (i.e., because they side with David), and because they knew that he fled and did not tell me.” Instead of the Chethibh אזנו, it is probably more correct to read אזני, according to the Keri, although the Chethibh may be accounted for if necessary from a sudden transition from a direct to an indirect form of address: “and (as he said) had not told him.” This sentence was so cruel, and so nearly bordering upon madness, that the halberdiers would not carry it out, but refused to lay hands upon “the priests of Jehovah.” 1Sa 22:18

Saul then commanded Doeg to cut down the priests, and he at once performed the bloody deed. On the expression “wearing the linen ephod,” compare the remarks at 1Sa 2:18. The allusion to the priestly clothing, like the repetition of the expression “priests of Jehovah,” serves to bring out into its true light the crime of the bloodthirsty Saul and his executioner Doeg. The very dress which the priests wore, as the consecrated servants of Jehovah, ought to have made them shrink from the commission of such a murder. 1Sa 22:19

But not content with even this revenge, Saul had the whole city of Nob destroyed, like a city that was laid under the ban (vid., Deu 13:13.). So completely did Saul identify his private revenge with the cause of Jehovah, that he avenged a supposed conspiracy against his own person as treason against Jehovah the God-king. 1Sa 22:20-23

The only one of the whole body of priests who escaped this bloody death was a son of Ahimelech, named Abiathar, who “fled after David,” i.e., to David the fugitive, and informed him of the barbarous vengeance which Saul had taken upon the priests of the Lord. Then David recognised and confessed his guilt. “I knew that day that the Edomite Doeg was there, that he (i.e., that as the Edomite Doeg was there, he) would tell Saul: I am the cause of all the souls of thy father’s house,” i.e., of their death. סבב is used here in the sense of being the cause of a thing, which is one of the meanings of the verb in the Arabic and Talmudic (vid., Ges. Lex. s. v.). “Stay with me, fear not; for he who seeks my life seeks thy life: for thou art safe with me.” The abstract mishmereth, protection, keeping (Exo 12:6; Exo 16:33-34), is used for the concrete, in the sense of protected, well kept. The thought is the following: As no other is seeking thy life than Saul, who also wants to kill me, thou mayest stay with me without fear, as I am sure of divine protection. David spoke thus in the firm belief that the Lord would deliver him from his foe, and give him the kingdom. The action of Saul, which had just been reported to him, could only strengthen him in this belief, as it was a sign of the growing hardness of Saul, which must accelerate his destruction.