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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - 2 Samuel 10:15 - 10:15
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The Aramaeans, however, gathered together again after the first defeat, to continue the war; and Hadarezer, the most powerful of the Aramaean kings, sent messengers to Mesopotamia, and summoned it to war. It is very evident, not only from the words “he sent and brought out Aram, which was beyond the river,” but also from the fact that Shobach, Hadarezer's general (Shophach according to the Chronicles), was at the head of the Mesopotamian troops, that the Mesopotamian troops who were summoned to help were under the supreme ruler of Hadarezer. This is placed beyond all possible doubt by 2Sa 10:19, where the kings who had fought with Hadarezer against the Israelites are called his “servants,” or vassals. חֵילָם וַיָּבֹאוּ (2Sa 10:16) might be translated “and their army came;” but when we compare with this the חֵלָאמָה וַיָּבֹא of 2Sa 10:17, we are compelled to render it as a proper name (as in the Septuagint, Chaldee, Syriac, and Arabic) - “and they (the men from beyond the Euphrates) came (marched) to Helam” - and to take חֵילָם as a contracted form of חֵלָאם. The situation of this place has not yet been discovered. Ewald supposes it to be connected with the Syrian town Alamatha upon the Euphrates (Ptol. Geogr. v. 15); but this is not to be thought of for a moment, if only because it cannot be supposed that the Aramaeans would fall back to the Euphrates, and wait for the Israelites to follow them thither before they gave them battle; and also on account of 2Sa 8:4 and 1Ch 18:3, from which it is evident that Helam is to be sought for somewhere in the neighbourhood of Hamath. For חֵלָאמָה וַיָּבֹא we find אֲלֵיהֶם וַיָּבֹא, “David came to them” (The Aramaeans), in the Chronicles: so that the author of the Chronicles has omitted the unknown place, unless indeed אֲלֵיהֶם has been written by mistake for חֵלָאם.