1 Samuel 26:20

ERROR : An error happened: 7 Couldn't connect to server Failed to connect to ::1: No route to host

Contextual Overview

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

let not my: 1 Samuel 2:9, 1 Samuel 25:29

the king: 1 Samuel 24:14, Matthew 26:47, Matthew 26:55

a flea: Parosh, (in Arabic borghooth, Syriac, poorthano,) the well known little contemptible and troublesome insect, the flea, seems to be so called from its agility in leaping and skipping, from para, "free," and raash, "to leap, bound." David, by comparing himself to this insect, seems to import, that while it would cost Saul much pains to catch him, he would obtain but very little advantage from it.

a partridge: Korai certainly denotes the partridge, which is called in Arabic, kiraa. It seems to be so called from the cry or cur which it utters when calling its young.

Reciprocal: 1 Samuel 24:11 - thou huntest 2 Samuel 9:8 - a dead dog Psalms 49:5 - heels Psalms 124:6 - who hath not Jeremiah 16:16 - hunters Micah 7:2 - hunt

Cross-References

:

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Now therefore let not my blood fall to the earth before the face of the Lord,.... For should it be spilled, God, who is omniscient, will see it, and take notice of it; and being righteous, and to whom vengeance belongs, he will avenge it: some render it, "my blood shall not fall to the earth before the face of the Lord" r; I am continually under his eye and care, and he will protect and defend me; and in vain is it for thee to pursue after me; I shall never fall into thine hands, though I may be obliged to quit my country, and go into an idolatrous nation, against my will:

for the king of Israel is come out to seek a flea; which leaps from place to place and is not easily taken: or this may denote what a mean, poor, weak, insignificant person David was; and how much it was below Saul to come out with an army of chosen men in pursuit of him; so the Targum,

"the king of Israel is come out to seek one that is weak or feeble:''

as when one doth hunt a partridge in the mountains; as kings for their delight used to do, as Abarbinel observes; but this being a business of pleasure, and this a bird of worth, some other is thought to be here intended. Indeed the is represented as worth no more than an "obolus", or five farthings, though fifty drachmas or drachms were ordered to be paid for one s; the Septuagint renders the word an "owl": the word is "kore", and from the etymology of it one would think it was the raven or crow. Jarchi on Jeremiah 17:11 takes it to be the cuckoo, though here the partridge as others; Bochart t will have it to be the woodcock, snipe, or snite u. Some choose to read the words,

"as the kore or partridge on the mountains hunts;''

which, it is said, hunts and seeks after the nests of other birds, and sits on their eggs v: see Jeremiah 17:11; so Saul hunted after David, though he could not take him; several naturalists w observe, that the partridge is very difficult to be taken by the hunter.

r אל יפל דמו "non effundetur", Martyr. and to this sense are Syr. Ar. vers. s Laert. l. 2. in Vita Aristippi. t Hierozoic. par. 2. l. 1. c. 12. col. 81. u (A snite is like a snipe, yet a different species of lark-like bird. Oxford English Dictionary. Editor) v T. Bab. Cholin, fol. 140. 2. Jarchi & Abarbinel in loc. w Aristot. Hist. Animal. l. 9. c. 8. Plin. Nat. Hist. l. 10. c. 33. Aelian. Hist. Animal. l. 3. c. 16.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse 1 Samuel 26:20. As when one doth hunt a partridge — It is worthy of remark that the Arabs, observing that partridges, being put up several times, soon become so weary as not to be able to fly; they in this manner hunt them upon the mountains, till at last they can knock them down with their clubs.

It was in this manner that Saul hunted David, coming hastily upon him, and putting him up from time to time, in hopes that he should at length, by frequent repetitions of it, be able to destroy him. See Harmer.