Chapter 19

1And Benaiah the son of Jehoiada [was] over the {g} Cherethites and the Pelethites; and the sons of David [were] chief about the king.
(g) Read 2Sa 8:18.

2And David said, I will shew kindness unto Hanun the son of Nahash, because his {a} father shewed kindness to me. And David sent messengers to comfort him concerning his father. So the servants of David came into the land of the children of Ammon to Hanun, to comfort him.
(a) Because Nahash received David and his company, when Saul persecuted him he would now show pleasure to his son for the same.

3But the princes of the children of Ammon said to Hanun, Thinkest thou that David doth honour thy father, that he hath sent comforters unto thee? are not his servants come unto thee for to search, and to overthrow, and to {b} spy out the land?
(b) Thus the malicious always interpret the purpose of the godly in the worst sense.

4Wherefore Hanun took David's servants, and {c} shaved them, and cut off their {d} garments in the midst hard by their buttocks, and sent them away.
(c) They shaved off half of their beards, 2Sa 10:4. (d) To put them to shame and villany, while the ambassadors should have been honoured: and because the Jews used to wear side garments and beards, they thus disfigured them, to make them odious to others.

6And when the children of Ammon saw that they had made themselves odious to David, Hanun and the children of Ammon sent a thousand talents of silver to hire them chariots and horsemen out of Mesopotamia, and out of Syriamaachah, and out of {e} Zobah.
(e) Which were five in all.

7So they hired thirty and two thousand chariots, and the king of Maachah and his people; who came and pitched before {f} Medeba. And the children of Ammon gathered themselves together from their cities, and came to battle.
(f) Which was a city of the tribe of Reuben beyond Jordan.

13Be of good courage, and let us behave ourselves valiantly for our {g} people, and for the cities of our God: and let the LORD do [that which is] good in his sight.
(g) He declares that where the cause is evil, the courage cannot be valiant, and that in good causes men should be courageous, and commit the success to God.

16And when the Syrians saw that they were put to the worse before Israel, they sent messengers, and drew forth the Syrians that [were] beyond the {h} river: and Shophach the captain of the host of Hadarezer [went] before them.
(h) That is, Euphrates.

18But the Syrians fled before Israel; and David slew of the Syrians {i} seven thousand [men which fought in] chariots, and forty thousand footmen, and killed Shophach the captain of the host.
(i) For this place, read 2Sa 10:18.

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