:
1 And it came to pass, when David and his men were come to Ziklag on the third day, that the Amalekites had invaded the south, and Ziklag, and smitten Ziklag, and burned it with fire; 2 And had taken the women captives, that were therein: they slew not any, either great or small, but carried them away, and went on their way. 3 So David and his men came to the city, and, behold, it was burned with fire; and their wives, and their sons, and their daughters, were taken captives. 4 Then David and the people that were with him lifted up their voice and wept, until they had no more power to weep. 5 And David's two wives were taken captives, Ahinoam the Jezreelitess, and Abigail the wife of Nabal the Carmelite. 6 And David was greatly distressed; for the people spake of stoning him, because the soul of all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his daughters: but David encouraged himself in the LORD his God. 7 And David said to Abiathar the priest, Ahimelech's son, I pray thee, bring me hither the ephod. And Abiathar brought thither the ephod to David. 8 And David inquired at the LORD, saying, Shall I pursue after this troop? shall I overtake them? And he answered him, Pursue: for thou shalt surely overtake them, and without fail recover all. 9 So David went, he and the six hundred men that were with him, and came to the brook Besor, where those that were left behind stayed. 10 But David pursued, he and four hundred men: for two hundred abode behind, which were so faint that they could not go over the brook Besor. 11 And they found an Egyptian in the field, and brought him to David, and gave him bread, and he did eat; and they made him drink water; 12 And they gave him a piece of a cake of figs, and two clusters of raisins: and when he had eaten, his spirit came again to him: for he had eaten no bread, nor drunk any water, three days and three nights. 13 And David said unto him, To whom belongest thou? and whence art thou? And he said, I am a young man of Egypt, servant to an Amalekite; and my master left me, because three days agone I fell sick. 14 We made an invasion upon the south of the Cherethites, and upon the coast which belongeth to Judah, and upon the south of Caleb; and we burned Ziklag with fire. 15 And David said to him, Canst thou bring me down to this company? And he said, Swear unto me by God, that thou wilt neither kill me, nor deliver me into the hands of my master, and I will bring thee down to this company. 16 And when he had brought him down, behold, they were spread abroad upon all the earth, eating and drinking, and dancing, because of all the great spoil that they had taken out of the land of the Philistines, and out of the land of Judah. 17 And David smote them from the twilight even unto the evening of the next day: and there escaped not a man of them, save four hundred young men, which rode upon camels, and fled. 18 And David recovered all that the Amalekites had carried away: and David rescued his two wives. 19 And there was nothing lacking to them, neither small nor great, neither sons nor daughters, neither spoil, nor any thing that they had taken to them: David recovered all. 20 And David took all the flocks and the herds, which they drave before those other cattle, and said, This is David's spoil. 21 And David came to the two hundred men, which were so faint that they could not follow David, whom they had made also to abide at the brook Besor: and they went forth to meet David, and to meet the people that were with him: and when David came near to the people, he saluted them. 22 Then answered all the wicked men and men of Belial, of those that went with David, and said, Because they went not with us, we will not give them ought of the spoil that we have recovered, save to every man his wife and his children, that they may lead them away, and depart. 23 Then said David, Ye shall not do so, my brethren, with that which the LORD hath given us, who hath preserved us, and delivered the company that came against us into our hand. 24 For who will hearken unto you in this matter? but as his part is that goeth down to the battle, so shall his part be that tarrieth by the stuff: they shall part alike. 25 And it was so from that day forward, that he made it a statute and an ordinance for Israel unto this day. 26 And when David came to Ziklag, he sent of the spoil unto the elders of Judah, even to his friends, saying, Behold a present for you of the spoil of the enemies of the LORD; 27 To them which were in Bethel, and to them which were in south Ramoth, and to them which were in Jattir, 28 And to them which were in Aroer, and to them which were in Siphmoth, and to them which were in Eshtemoa, 29 And to them which were in Rachal, and to them which were in the cities of the Jerahmeelites, and to them which were in the cities of the Kenites, 30 And to them which were in Hormah, and to them which were in Chor-ashan, and to them which were in Athach, 31 And to them which were in Hebron, and to all the places where David himself and his men were wont to haunt.
Previous
Next
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:1
They struck Ziklag, etc. Ziklag is interpreted as 'distillation of the drawn voice,' which those who strike and set on fire, who confuse the discernment of heard preaching with the battering ram of their arguments, and cast down the tranquility of ecclesiastical faith with the malignant fire of their error. Indeed, this fire is very similar to the one with which the proud king burned the books of the prophet Jeremiah; but contrary is the fire which the Lord sent to the earth and wished vehemently to kindle.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:2
And they had killed no one, etc. Heretics captivate but do not kill; who though they may rob the simplicity of faith from the less instructed, yet they cannot take away the fervor of charity, which is the life of virtues.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:3
When David and his men came to the city, etc. The Lord, arriving in His elect and Catholic teachers, and seeing the towers and roofs of the Church once shining, leveled to the ground by heretical discourse, first, as is proper, beseeches the Father with tears and prayers for its restoration, and then promptly begins the task of restoration as well. The doctors lament for the churches and souls entrusted to them, which they had brought forth and nurtured for God, corrupted from the simplicity of faith for a time, due to the delayed help of Christ; this is to say, with the advent of David delayed for a time, their wives and children were taken captive. For if His assisting grace were present, they certainly could not have been corrupted.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:5
Indeed, even the two wives of David were taken captive, etc. It has already been said above that David's wives signify both the active and contemplative lives of the holy Church, which rejoice to serve the true King in the present. However, the Church has often been enveloped by such a storm from heretics and pagans, as was made clear by the great Arian sedition, that not only the decorum of the contemplative life was lost – which, according to the name Jezrahel, the very Author of graces sowed in the hearts of the serene and humble spirits – but also the constancy of the active life, which those who recently escaped the hands of the ancient enemy are accustomed to exercise, seems to disappear under the force of the persecutor's wrath.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:7
And Abiathar applied the ephod to David, etc. Those things which His saints do by the inspiration of the Lord, He Himself is said to do according to the manner of the Scriptures, since He aids them to do it; just as it is also said of the Holy Spirit, who has power and operation together with the Father and the Son: For He intercedes for us with groanings that cannot be uttered, because He makes those whom He has filled to groan and to pray to the Lord for their salvation. Therefore David, having applied the priestly stole to himself, consults the Lord whether he ought to pursue the robbers; while the pastors of the Church, enlightened inwardly by the grace of their Creator, through the reading of the Holy Scripture, with which teachers must always be clothed in the ministry of the word, seek the counsel of the divine will as to how they should act towards erring ones. The Lord responds that the robbers must be pursued by David, and that the plunder should be recovered from them, just as in the same reading He has taught that heretics must be pursued by the teachers of the Church through debate, overcome by overpowering them, and the plunder should be recovered from them by calling back to the Church those souls previously seduced by their deceit.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:9
David himself therefore went, and six hundred men who were with him, etc. The Brook Besor, which is interpreted as announcement or flesh, or the carnal sense of heretics difficult to correct, or signifies the redundancy of secular eloquence, and equally rapid and violent in its flow, not easily overcome except by the most perfect doctors. Therefore our desirable king, truly strong in hand, went to fight by the word of truth against the stubbornness of those erring, he and his chosen ones proved by the integrity of their work and the certainty of their hope, which the number six, by which the Lord completed His works, and one hundred, which in the reckoning first asks for the right hand in confession, clearly denote. Finally, in the hundredth psalm, the distinction of the final judgment, where the hope of all rightly hoping burns, is openly described, where, with mercy and judgment sung, the faithful of the earth and those walking in the immaculate way are by mercy promoted to the seat of eternal blessedness and the ministry of their Redeemer; but all sinners of the earth by the just judgment in the morning of declared action, which had long been hidden, are mentioned to be killed and destroyed from the city of supreme peace. However, while his saints accompany the Lord on the path of truth, when it comes to the point of disputing and overcoming heretics, some often even great men, though not from the purity of believing, yet tired from the skill of speaking, desist. For not all who know how to believe rightly also know how to overcome by reasoning those who think contrary to the right faith. For often the torrent of announcement, or flesh, or their carnal sense, who are unable to grasp spiritual matters, or the urge to pronounce the carnal things they feel stands in the way; which those less skilled may not know how to overcome and, like Elijah or Elisha, break through and disperse by the power of their discretion. This was especially evident in the Nicene Council, where among so many and such great doctors gathered from the whole world, hardly anyone at first, except Athanasius, the deacon of the Church of Alexandria, could be found who knew how to contend with Arius, immediately detect his evasions and deceits, and defeat them. Where a certain pagan philosopher, much armed with Aristotelian arguments, challenging the Christians very frequently, could be overcome by none of the doctors even distinguished in dialectical art, until one bishop of remarkable sanctity arose, utterly ignorant of sophistical speech, but distinguished in the wisdom of divine faith, and with simple yet truthful prosecution throughout nullified his multifaceted cunning. Therefore, only those who are either strengthened by an outstanding grace of the Spirit in faith or pre-taught with greater skill in disputing can suffice to cross such a torrent by teaching. They are rightly remembered as four hundred who pursue robbers, for they eminently excel in prudence, fortitude, temperance, and justice, because they rejoice to fight for the Gospel; rightly two hundred who, though tired, hold back; for there are those who, while they do not know how to defend faith and action by disputing, do not fail to exercise it by living.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 604] Gregory the Dialogist on 1 Samuel 30:11-17
The poor and the feeble, the blind and the lame, are called and come because the weak and the despised in this world are often quicker to hear the voice of God, as in this world they have nothing to delight them.The Egyptian servant of the Amalekites is a good example of this. When the Amalekites were plundering and moving about, he was left behind on the road sick and fainting from hunger and thirst. When David found him, he provided him with food and drink, and as soon as he revived he became David’s guide, found the celebrating Amalekites, and with great bravery overthrew the people who had left him behind sick.
Amalekite means “a people that laps.” What does “a people that laps” signify but the hearts of the worldly? Going about after the things of earth, it is as if they are lapping them up when they take delight in temporal things alone. A lapping people takes plunder, so to speak, when out of its love for earthly things it heaps up profit from others’ losses. The Egyptian servant is left behind on the road sick, because all sinners, once they begin to grow weak from the situation of this world, soon come to be despised by worldly minds. David found him and provided him with food and drink, because the Lord, who is “brave in hand” (if we attribute to him the meaning of David’s name), does not despise what the world has cast aside. Often he directs to the grace of his love those who are not strong enough to follow the world, and who are, so to speak, left behind on the road, holding out to them the food and drink of his word. It is as if he chooses them as guides for himself on the road when he makes them his preachers. When they bring Christ to the hearts of sinners, it is as if they are leading David upon the enemy, and, like David, they strike the celebrating Amalekites with the sword, because by the Lord’s power they overthrow all the proud who had despised them in the world.

Source: FORTY GOSPEL HOMILIES 36
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:11
And they found an Egyptian man in the field, etc. The Catholic teachers hastening to engage in the battle with the heretics often find men abandoned by them, notable for the dark stain of their sins, unable to follow the teachers of error to devastate the Church due to the tenderness of their intellect; and they bring them to hear the Catholic faith, giving them the bread and water of the word; but they also add the sayings of preceding teachers, who, from the most beautiful tree of the present Church, as it were, from the fig tree, or severed at the brink of life and death, throughout the entire year of this current age which is now being lived, do not cease to preserve the mature memory of their teaching to refresh the souls of the faithful. And they well give a fragment of the dough, because they suggest not complete works to such people, but the sayings of the fathers deemed sufficient. They well give two clusters of grapes; because they show that they are to be united to Christ and the Church by the bonds of dual love.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:12
Who, when he had eaten, etc. When he had received the nourishment of the true faith, he also received the confidence of mind by which he would hope to obtain the grace of mercy.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:13
David therefore said to him: Whose are you, or from where? etc. It is a rule of the Church to inquire of those who defect to her from heretics through their teachers; who, before they fled, what they thought about faith, to where they tend in the future in mind. And when they have known them to contradict heresies with full intensity, and to favor the Catholic faith, then and only then should they apply the sacraments of the same faith to be reconciled with them, lest they seem to throw holy things to the dogs, and pearls to the swine. Of whose, he said, are you listeners, and of what, or to which sect are you proposing now to belong? It is necessary to reply, he who seeks to escape the snares of the heretics: I confess, I have been darkened by sins, having been devoted to listening to the heretics; but my master, who imbued me with errors, has left me: because where wars were waged against the Church, he found me less suitable in tongue or intellect for this contest; nor did he wish to take me any further into such a conflict with him. Truly, we breaking out from the south, that is, light, promising our perfect and Spirit-breathing doctrine, and brought not a few of the gentiles to our sect, and in no small part obstructed the faith of the Church.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:15
And David said to him: Can you lead me to this band? etc. David is advised to find and conquer the robbers, who is left sick by the Amalekites; because there are those who, having lived among heretics, by the laziness of their mind, do not have the strength to harm the good, and the same ones, suddenly favored and touched by divine grace, acquire sufficient strength from God to resist the perverse; indeed, it is much more convenient and certain through those who know the secrets of the heretics, being converted to the Catholic, their errant sayings are confounded. But what he asks to be sworn to him, that he will not be killed, and that he will not be handed over to his master, so that he will reveal to them the hostile band of persecutors; this surely he asks from his spiritual teachers, that only on this condition will he disclose to them the secrets of the heretics, if they show him without any doubt the faith by which he may escape perpetual death; nor allow him to be subjected again to vain doctrines.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:16
When he had led him, behold, they reclined, etc. Heretics recline on the face of the earth, eating and drinking; whether they read the obscure or the clear Scriptures (for this is the difference between eating and drinking), they always seek not the heavenly things through these, but the earthly, nor can they say with the Apostle: "But our conversation is in heaven" (Philippians 3). And as if they celebrate a feast day for the spoils they had plundered from the land of the Philistines and Judah, regarding their inventions, by which they had taught some pagans to err worse under the pretext of Christ's name, or turned the faithful away from the path of truth, as the best light of knowledge, they joyfully say: "This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it" (Psalm 118).

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:17
And David smote them, etc. Christ smites heretics in two ways: either by chastising them to receive the faith or by anathematizing them to endure eternal punishment. Both of these forms of smiting extend from evening to evening, because they reach from the recognition of the error darkening the hearts, to either the bitterness of the same error's repentance for a time or eternal punishment. Indeed, the four hundred men, who with camels escaped the sword of David and as many of his soldiers by fleeing, are surely those who, despising the voice of Catholic teachers, neither agree to be corrected by them nor fear to be condemned; but, relying on the height of their virtues, or rather, on their swelling pride and boastfulness, just as on a camel’s hump, they boast that they equally hold the name and number of evangelical perfection, and hope to obtain the joys of the heavenly life.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:19
Therefore David rescued everything, etc. By conquering or correcting or avenging, or exposing the wicked doctrine of the heresies' founders, the Lord rescues the souls they had deceived and brings them back to the unity of Catholic peace.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 387] Horsiesios on 1 Samuel 30:21-24
Let there be no special food for anyone working in the kneading room. Let the food be the same for everyone, for those who bake and those who are appointed to any task, in accordance with what was established from the beginning by the father of the koinōnia, Apa, to whom God entrusted this great calling. If other fathers who have succeeded him have made canons granting special food to the bakers, they did so after Moses’ manner, as we have learned in the Gospel that says, “Because of your hardness of heart, Moses has allowed you to repudiate your wives, but in the beginning it was not like this.” If, for some light fatigue, a man separates himself from his brother and differs from him in his food more than do those who are to leave for the harvest or for any other task at which they will have to endure the heat, let us not allow the brothers who have been appointed for any other task in the community to eat with these, since they have not set out to endure the heat and to work strenuously.On the contrary, the unity of the koinōnia consists in a like measure for all, according to the saints’ way of doing; thus David approached those who had not gone to war and spoke to them peacefully, giving them a share of the spoils equal to that received by those who had gone to war with him. He did not listen to those who were wicked and said, “We will not share with them.” The Lord taught us likewise in the Gospel by the parable, when those who had “borne the weight of the day and the heat murmured, saying, ‘Why have you treated us like those who have worked only an hour?’ ” They, too, heard the reproach, “Is your eye evil because I am good?”

Source: REGULATIONS 2.48
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:21
David came to the two hundred men, etc. After the victory over the plunderers, David equally enriched those who were weary and stayed behind, with those who fought, with a share of the spoils. Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom (Jerem. IX). We cannot all do everything. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles? Do all possess gifts of healing? Yet all laboring at different times in the same vineyard of the Lord, will receive the same denarius of life in contemplating the image of the supreme king.

Source: Commentary on Samuel
[AD 735] Bede on 1 Samuel 30:26
And he sent gifts from the spoil to the elders of Judah, etc. The Lord loves and urges all the members of His Church, in various persons, conditions, and ages, to always rejoice in His victory, in the perpetual increase of His kingdom, and whenever they see souls previously corrupted by the devil's sedition restored to the Church, to glorify and bless the Father who is in heaven. He especially delights to see those doing this who have preserved their love in a pure heart and have held on to the sayings or examples of the saints in the diligent memory of a chaste conscience. For this is the true David exulting and either hosting or defending his men. Likewise, any catholic teacher, when investigating, exposing, and conquering the thorns of heretics, must not delay revealing these things to other brothers, whether by conversing or even writing, for the sake of the knowledge of avoiding and overcoming such things. And note, not only in believing in God but also in loving neighbors, the heretics greatly differ from the catholic and gentiles greatly from Christian perfection. The Amalekites leave behind their tired and dying companion of their journey and expose him as if to be torn apart by wild beasts and birds. But David prepares his tired companions in a safe place for battle and enriches them with abundant peace and blessing upon his return. The title of the fifty-second psalm also recalls this lesson, which reads, "To the end for Amalech, the understanding of David," signifying Christ, who is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes (Rom. X), for the understanding of the figurative David in bearing with, persecuting, and fighting the Amalekites, what the city of the true David is to suffer from the faithless and what he himself is to repay to them. But the text of the psalm, very easy to understand, throughout rejoices in the mysteries of this lesson; because it begins with the endeavors of the wicked faithless saying, "The fool says in his heart, 'There is no God' (Psalm LII)," either claiming there is no God who cares for human affairs or considering within a foolish heart that any person in the holy Trinity is not truly God; and it ends in the triumph of the true David, "When the Lord restores the fortunes of His people, Jacob will exult and Israel will rejoice (Psalm XIII)."

Source: Commentary on Samuel