Biblion Bible Commentary
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Those Who Came to David at Ziklag
1 Chronicles 12:1-22
1 Now these are those who came to David to Ziklag while he was a fugitive from Saul the son of Kish. They were among the mighty men, his helpers in war. · WEB
The men who joined a fugitive came from the wrong tribe and the wrong side, and David tested them rather than assuming them.
The narrative now goes backward. David is king in chapter 11; here he is a fugitive from Saul the son of Kish 1 Chronicles 12:1, hiding in the wilderness. The writer is arranging by subject and not by date, and the subject is how a kingdom was gathered.
The first men listed are the least expected. They are Benjaminites, of Saul's relatives 1 Chronicles 12:2 — the hunted man's supporters come out of the hunter's own clan. Their skill is described with care: bows and slings, and the use of either hand.
The Gadites who follow are described with the only extended figure in the chapter. Their faces were like the faces of lions, and they were as swift as the gazelles on the mountains 1 Chronicles 12:8. They crossed the Jordan in the first month, when it had overflowed all its banks 1 Chronicles 12:15, which is the season the river cannot be forded.
Then the scene that gives the chapter its weight. A party from Benjamin and Judah approaches the stronghold, and David goes out and puts the question to their faces: if you have come to help, my heart will be united with you; if to betray me, may the God of our fathers see this and rebuke it 1 Chronicles 12:17.
He does not assume loyalty. A man with a price on his head, badly in need of soldiers, opens by naming the possibility that they are informers — and he does not propose to test them himself. He refers the matter to God and waits.
The answer comes as a word rather than an oath. The Spirit comes on Amasai, and what he says turns the offer around: we are yours, David, and on your side, you son of Jesse, and then the reason, for your God helps you 1 Chronicles 12:18. They are not joining a leader with prospects. They are joining a man they take to be backed.
The last group is the most awkward, and the writer does not smooth it. Some of Manasseh joined David when he came with the Philistines against Saul to battle 1 Chronicles 12:19 — that is, while he was marching in the enemy's army against his own king. The episode is reported flatly, with the detail that the Philistine commanders distrusted him and sent him home.
And the recruitment is summed up in a phrase that turns a war band into something else. Day by day men kept coming until there was a great army, like God's army 1 Chronicles 12:22.
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