Lange Commentary - 1 Samuel 16:14

Lange Commentary - 1 Samuel 16:14 - 16:23

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Lange Commentary - 1 Samuel 16:14 - 16:23

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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

II. The Darkening of Saul’s Mind by the Evil Spirit, and David’s First Appearance at the Court of Saul as Harpist

1Sa_16:14-23

¹⁴But [And] the Spirit of the Lord [Jehovah] departed from Saul, and an evil ¹⁵spirit from the Lord [Jehovah] troubled him. And Saul’s servants said unto him, ¹⁶Behold now, an evil spirit from God troubleth thee. Let our lord now command—thy servants which [om. which] are before thee, to [and let them, or they will] seek out a man who is a cunning player on a [the] harp; and it shall come to pass, when the evil spirit from God is upon thee, that he shall play with his hand, and ¹⁷thou shalt be well. And Saul said unto his servants, Provide me now a man that ¹⁸can play well, and bring him to me. Then answered one of the servants [And one of the young men answered] and said, Behold I have seen a son of Jesse the Bethlehemite, that is cunning in playing⁴ and a mighty valiant man and a man of war and prudent in matters and a comely person, and the Lord [Jehovah] is with ¹⁹him. Wherefore [And] Saul sent messengers unto Jesse, and said, Send [ins. to] ²⁰me David thy son, which is with the sheep. And Jesse took an ass laden with bread, and a bottle [skin] of wine, and a kid, and sent them by David his son ²¹unto Saul. And David came to Saul, and stood before him, and he loved him ²²greatly, and he became his armor-bearer. And Saul sent to Jesse, saying, Let ²³David, I pray thee, stand before me, for he hath found favor in my sight. And it came to pass, when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, that David took an [the] harp, and played with his hand, so [and] Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him.

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

1Sa_16:15. Observe the sharp contrast between the statement in 1Sa_16:13 : “the Spirit of the Lord came upon David,” and that which here immediately follows: The Spirit of the Lord departed from Saul.—The Spirit is meant which Saul received in consequence of his anointing, and by which he became another man, that is, a man full of great royal thoughts, courage of faith and inspiration. The cause of the departure of the divine Spirit from him, as given in the narrative, was his rejection by the Lord, and his persistent, impenitent pride and disobedience of heart towards the Lord.—Berl. Bib.: “No doubt Saul took his rejection to heart, and, instead of yielding humbly to God’s righteous judgment and bowing beneath God’s mighty hand, gave himself up to displeasure and discontent at God’s holy ways, and was therefore given over to the power of an evil spirit, which vexed him and sometimes even drove him to madness.”—And an evil spirit from the Lord troubled him; literally, fell upon him and frightened him ( áִòֵú ), Psa_18:5. The narrator means to describe Saul’s condition as one of anxiety and terror, which was produced in him by an evil spirit. This spirit (called in 1Sa_16:23 also the evil spirit), is, according to the narrative, not the condition itself of gloomy melancholy and torturing anguish, but an objective power, which produced it. It is a wicked spiritual power, which came upon him as the opposite of the good, holy spirit which he had once possessed, and goaded him to rage and madness (1Sa_18:10-11), finding its occasion in the conflict within his soul and in the passionateness of his nature, which, after the Spirit of the Lord left him, was unbridled. It came on Saul from the Lord; that is, the Lord gave him over to the power and might of this spirit as punishment for his disobedience and defiant self-will; for this reason this spirit is called in 1Sa_16:15-16 “an evil spirit of God,” and in 1Sa_16:23 simply “a spirit of God;” that is, one that came from God. [It seems clear that the evil spirit here cannot be resolved into simple melancholy without doing violence to the narrative (so the demons of the N. T.). Reasons for melancholy and madness may be found in Saul’s life and character (see the pathological and psychological aspects of his case treated by Kitto, Maurice, Krummacher, Ewald, and others), but over and above these the narrative speaks, as Erdmann says, of an objective spiritual wicked power, which had strange control over him. This possession by the spirit was in accordance with psychological conditions, yet distinct from them, and was controlled by the almighty God of Israel. We have here the proof of the belief in evil spirits by the Israelites many centuries before the exile, a belief very general, no doubt, though not as fully developed here as in “Job.”—Tr.]—The servants of Saul speak of this cause of his mental condition in order (1Sa_16:16) to counsel him to let them find a skilful harpist, that he may be healed by the strains of music of his suffering of soul. Saul having commanded this (1Sa_16:17), one of the young men of the court (1Sa_16:18) mentioned the son of Jesse, whom he himself knew. In order to induce Saul to call him to court, he describes him at length, as not merely a harpist, but also what would especially recommend him to Saul, a valiant man, a man of war, an eloquent man [or prudent—Tr.], a comely person, with whom the Lord is. All these characteristics appear clearly in David’s history; their combination in this description shows that the young man was well acquainted with him. His beauty of person has already been mentioned in 1Sa_16:12. He had showed his bravery and warlike spirit, if not in battle, yet in conflict with ravenous beasts for his herd (1Sa_17:34 sq.) His piety and communion with the Lord, the culminating point of the description, has already been referred to in 1Sa_16:12-13. His eloquence is a new feature and characterizes the future psalmist.

1Sa_16:19. The message to Jesse to send his son to court.

1Sa_16:20. Jesse is soon ready. He sends his son with presents appropriate to a herdsman and countryman. From this it appears that it was still customary to bring presents as a sign of obedience and subjection, see on 1Sa_10:4. The Heb. text, in spite of its difficulty, is to be retained; render: an ass laden with bread. äֲîåֹã , not, as Sept., çֹîֶã , “since bread was not reckoned by measures” (Keil). Clericus: “an ass laden with bread, with a skin of wine and with a kid, so that David might have nothing to carry.” Maur.: “an ass laden with bread,” &c. Compare the ἄñôùí ôñåῖò ὄíïõò (= ôñéῶí ὄíùí öïñôßïí ) [three asses of bread = a load of three asses] of the tragic poet Sosibius.

1Sa_16:21. So David came to Saul and stood before him; that is, served him. Becoming fond of him, Saul retained him and placed him among his armor-bearers, entrusted him, therefore, with a military service, informing Jesse (1Sa_16:22) that his son would remain with him.

1Sa_16:23. David’s playing had the effect of relieving, freeing Saul from his suffering, so that he became well again; when he heard the music, the evil spirit departed from him. The power of musical sounds over Saul was such that his gloomy mood vanished. Many illustrations from heathen writers of the wholesome effect of music on the mind are given by Cleric., Grot., and Bochart, in the Hieroz., p. I., 1, II., c. 44 (I., p. 511 sqq. ed. Rosenmüller). [Bochart also inquires whether David’s songs to Saul were sacred or secular (see Browning’s poem “Saul”), and how music had power over the evil spirit. See Kitto, “Saul and David,” p. 202 sq.—On the nature of the instrument which David used, the harp, kinnor, see on 1Sa_10:5, and the Bib.-Dictionaries and books on Archæology. Whether the kinnor was played with the hand or with a plectrum (either would suit the statement in 1Sa_16:23) is uncertain.—Tr.]

HISTORICAL AND THEOLOGICAL

1. To be rejected by the Lord for continued disobedience and hardness of heart against the chastening and guidance of His Spirit, is identical with the departure from the heart of the Spirit of God, which can dwell and be efficient only where heart and will are turned to the light from above. But when the Spirit of God departs from the man, he is not simply left to himself, but, as Saul’s example shows, his heart becomes the abode of the evil spirit. Theodoret: “Where the divine spirit departs, the wicked spirit comes in his place. This should teach us to pray with David: Take not thy Holy Spirit from me.” Man is governed either by the Spirit from above or by the spirit from beneath; there is no third course. For he is as little isolated in the invisible as in the visible world; he must be part of the organism of the one or the other of the invisible worlds; he belongs either to the kingdom of light or to the kingdom of darkness; he is guided either by the Spirit of the Lord or by the evil spirit, according as he decides for a permanent attitude of heart and direction of will to this side or that. But Saul’s example teaches still more, namely, the divine causality in the position of the rejected man under the power of the evil spirit: He gives the apostate, reprobate man into the power of the evil spirit, permits the latter to control him; when man by continued conscious opposition to Him renders His Spirit inefficacious He righteously punishes him by giving him over to the evil spirit, who must serve God, and can do nothing except the Lord, who is almighty over all spirits, give him a field within the moral order of the world, in which, for the execution of His punitive justice, even the power of the evil one must be subservient to Him. Therefore the wicked spirit is here called a spirit “from the Lord.”—The consequence of the possession of the inner life by the evil spirit is not merely its sunderance and derangement (there being of necessity conflict partly between the divine nature of the soul and its indwelling ungodly inclinations and passions, and partly among these last themselves), but at the same time the filling of the heart with wicked thoughts, dark melancholy, and the spirit of hatred, the perversion and dedication of the natural noble gifts of the spirit and heart (so richly possessed by Saul) to the service of the kingdom of evil. But in all this there is presupposed as back-ground not a merely physical suffering, but a corresponding ethical determination of the inner life against God. “There is much suffering and melancholy which has its origin in purely bodily sickness; as soon as the sickness ceases, the melancholy also ceases. But there is also to-day much heaviness of mind, which has its ground in the kingdom of darkness” (Schlier.).

2. The counter-picture to Saul, who is controlled by the evil spirit, is David, under the guidance and discipline of the Spirit of God from his anointment on. His divinely-bestowed natural gift of poetry and music is not merely sanctified and consecrated by the Spirit of the Lord, but also powerfully developed and intensified, and by the Lord’s ordination taken into the service of His merciful love; for this love is seen in that He makes David’s art alleviate Saul’s sufferings, and in the depth of Saul’s soul makes the chords of the godlike man resound in the demon-possessed nature and drown its tones. The power to set forth the Beautiful as the Harmonious in music is a natural gift of God’s grace, which, employed in the service of sin and of the kingdom of darkness, robs music of its divine nobility and misuses it for the furtherance of the kingdom of evil in the human heart and in the world; but, on the other hand, (as in David’s case), developed according to its God-implanted laws, and under the guiding discipline of God’s Spirit, checks and expels the power of evil, rouses again the nobler feelings of human nature (created by and for God), and restores at least for a time the disturbed harmony of the life of the soul. David’s harp playing before Saul is the prelude to the harpings and songs which flowed from the heart of the future royal singer.

3. With the beginning of his service at the court of Saul, David, under the wonderful guidance of God’s hand, whence he had through Samuel received the royal anointing, enters on the path of inner and outer development till he ascends the throne. It was the way of external cultivation and preparation for the representative side of the kingdom by the experiences and knowledges which he gained at the royal court concerning all that pertained to the fulfilment of the royal calling, but also, what is far more important, a way of deep suffering, which must needs have served to try and tempt, but also to purify, prove and confirm him, and establish his inner life in communion with his God; from this school of suffering, whose experiences afterwards resound throughout his Psalms, he comes forth as a man who has been educated from shepherd-boy to king.

[Helps in the study of David’s life: Chandler’s Life of David (abounds in illustrations from classic antiquity, and is polemical against Bayle); Ewald’s History of Israel; Stanley’s Jewish Church (brilliant in description); Schlier’s Saul and Krummacher’s David (devotional); Stähelin’s David (strictly scientific); F. D. Maurice, Prophets and Kings of O. T. (fresh and clear); Kitto’s Saul and David (in Daily Bib. Illust.); W. M. Taylor’s David, 1875 (excellent); Graetz, Geschichte der Juden; Apocrypha relating to David in Fabricius, Codex Pseud. Vet. Test., Tom. I.; Legends concerning him in Koran, Suras ii., xxxviii.; Weil’s Biblical Legends of the Mussulmans; Baring-Gould’s Legends of O. T. Characters. See also Josephus, Antiquities VI. 8–VII. 15; Wilberforce’s Heroes of Hebrew History; and Articles in the Dictionaries of Herzog, Smith, Fairbairn, and Ersch and Grube. Voltaire and Bayle deal with David’s life in an unworthy spirit.—Tr.]

HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL

1Sa_16:14. Calvin: As God grants His gifts richly to those who serve Him in the obedience of faith, so He withdraws them again from those who are slothful in employing them, that we may not believe God is under obligation to us. God does indeed distribute His gifts richly and abundantly, but He also demands from us the right use of them, that they may subserve His aims. Whoever, then, does not give back to God what He has received from Him, will certainly soon lose it.—Cramer: He who will not let himself be ruled by the Spirit of God, drives it out; and where that is driven out, there is no third state possible, but the evil spirit goes in again, Luk_11:23 sq.

1Sa_16:15-16. Schmid: We should have compassion even upon those who by their sins have drawn on themselves God’s chastisement, and should give them counsel as to how their case may be bettered.—[ 1Sa_16:18. David was a brave soldier and a famous musician. There is a very unwise notion abroad in America that to perform well on musical instruments is something effeminate. But the Hebrews thought not so, nor did the Greeks, nor do the Germans.—Tr.]

1Sa_16:19. Osiander: God gradually, more and more, draws His people forward and exalts them; yea, He leads them by degrees from one ground to another even unto eternal life.

1Sa_16:23. Cramer: Only God’s word and believing prayer can drive out Satan with his assaults, Eph_6:17-18.—Schlier: There is a wonderful power in song and the harp over the human heart; how much sorrow and anguish retreat before it—how much of the power of darkness is broken; where song and the harp dwell in the fear of God, there the power of evil spirits gives way, there the good spirits come, hell is silent, heaven comes down.—F. W. Krummacher: We ask, “Did the harmonies banish the demon?” No! But the higher mood into which the king was brought by them sufficed at least to give the affliction less room for working on his mind, while against a full, clearly conscious life of faith on Saul’s part, the power of the evil spirit would have been utterly wrecked.—Schlier: Thoroughly better would it have been for him if he had been converted—if he had earnestly repented. But of repentance Saul would know nothing; he let himself be cheered, but he would not turn about. If our sins give to the kingdom of darkness power over us, then we must repent. He who chooses to persevere in sin and cannot acknowledge his guilt, should not wonder forsooth if he finds no peace. Evil conscience, evil guest. No peace, nor any rest! But the word stands fast forever that the Lord makes the upright to prosper.—Wuert. Summary: The mourning of this world and the heaviness proceeding from an evil conscience can be relieved by no harping nor any diversion, if forgiveness of sins is not earnestly sought and gained, and the heart is not truly bettered.

1Sa_16:13-23. J. Disselhoff: The anointing of the chosen one: 1) Whom the Lord chooses for His servant, He causes before His work to be anointed with power from on high; 2) The anointing does not at once give the throne, but it first leads into lowliness; 3) The anointing does not annihilate natural gifts and powers, but sanctifies them and fits them for the service of the Lord.

1Sa_16:14-23. F. W. Krummacher: The harper: 1) How David came to Saul; 2) What he experienced at the king’s court.

1Sa_16:14. Man is under the dominion either of the holy or of the evil spirit: 1) Statement of this truth. 2) Indication of the opposite consequences in the two cases. 3) Application of the solemn warnings therein contained.

[1Sa_16:21. “And he loved him greatly.” 1) Saul, with all his faults, a loving man. Comp. 1Sa_24:16. 2) David an eminently lovable youth. Some of the qualities which made him such are indicated in 1Sa_16:18 : handsome, accomplished, brave and soldierly, prudent, pious. (Highly creditable to a youth to gain the love of old men.) 3) The Lord loved David, and caused his fellowmen to love him. 1Sa_16:13; 1Sa_16:18. Comp. Genesis 39.

1Sa_16:17-22. Example of the young harper David: 1) Improvement of youthful leisure a preparation for the work of life. 2) Something in itself unimportant often the providential occasion of great results. But note: a) It can only be the occasion; the causes must together be as great as the effect. b) There must be disciplined character, or occasions will be in vain. 3) A youth leaving home for scenes of temptation is safe if “the Lord is with him.” (Comp. W. M. Taylor, David, Sermon III.)

Robert Browning’s finest poem is on “Saul,” depicting his madness, and the effect of David’s harp and song.—Tr.]

Footnotes:

[1Sa_16:15. The Heb. text here uniformly designates the source of righteous influence as “the Spirit of Jehovah,” and the source of evil influence as “evil spirit,” “evil spirit of God,” or “evil spirit from Jehovah,” the significance of the last preposition being obvious; except in 1Sa_16:23, where it is “spirit of God,” and Sept., Chald., Syr., Arab, and Eng. A. V. there insert “evil;” in 1Sa_19:9 it is “evil spirit of Jehovah,” and there Sept. writes “God,” instead of Jehovah, Chald. and Eng. A. V. insert “from” before “Jehovah,” and Arab omits the divine name. Elsewhere throughout the Old Testament the Divine Spirit is called either “Spirit of God” or “Spirit of Jehovah.”—Tr.]

[1Sa_16:16. This clause is difficult in the Heb., and varies in the ancient VSS. Chald. follows the Heb.; Sept. takes òֲáָãֶéêָ as subject, omits àֲãðֵֹðå and renders: “let thy servants now say before thee and seek,” where “say” for “speak” is not tolerable (we should expect ãáø instead of àîø ); Vulg.: “let our lord command, and thy servants who are before thee will seek,” where ìְôָðֶéêָ is made to qualify “servants” (so in Eng. A. V.), contrary to usage, which demands that it stand after a verbal conception; Syr. omits the speech of the servants in 1Sa_16:15, and goes on in 1Sa_16:16 : “thy servants are before thee, let them seek.” As the Heb. now stands, the words òá× ìô× must form a separate clause; but the construction is thus harsh. If we could omit ìִô× (which, however, is sustained by all the VSS.), an easy reading would be given: “let our lord now command, and thy servants will seek.”—The use of the second pers. suffix when the verb is in the third pers., though not the usual construction, occurs elsewhere, as 2Sa_14:11.—Tr.]

[1Sa_16:16. The partcp. as complement of the verb “to know.” See Ew., Gr. § 285, e, and Ges. § 142, 4.—Tr.]

[1Sa_16:17-18. Infin. as complement, Ges. § 142.—Tr.]

[1Sa_16:18. Or, “in speech,” as in margin of Eng. A. V.; but “affairs” seems to suit the connection better Chald. “counsel,” Vulg., Syr. and Erdmann “word.” In Isa_3:3 ìçùׁ is “enchantment,” though the phrase is rendered by Jewish commentators “clever in discourse” (Philippson). Comp. 1Sa_18:14.—Tr.]

[1Sa_16:20. Sept. “omer” or “homer” ( ãïìüñ ), on which Wellh. rightly says that bread was not reckoned by measure; he proposes to read a numeral here instead of çֲîåֹø , since bread was usually counted by loaves. But we may follow the ancient VSS., which render “ass-load of bread.”—Tr.]

[1Sa_16:20. Fully: “a kid of the goats.”—Tr.]

[1Sa_16:23. See note 1 on 1Sa_16:15.—Tr.]

[On the relation of the spiritual influence on Saul to the regenerating power of the Holy Spirit as taught in the N. T., see Hodge’s Theol., II., 660 sq. (especially 666).—Tr.]

[On the possibility of demoniac possession at the present day, and on the general subject of the power of evil spirits in the ancient and modern world, see Mr. R. S. Poole’s Art. “Magic” in Smith’s Bib. Dict.—Tr.]