Bible Commentaries
1 Chronicles 12

Verses 1-40

1 Chronicles 12:14 . Over a thousand. David at Ziklag had but six hundred men; the query is, whether these had already been captains over a thousand, or whether David after his coronation promoted them to that rank?

1 Chronicles 12:17 . If to betray me: for these were Saul’s brethren! God moved their hearts to fulfil his pleasure, for they saw that David would rise to the throne.

1 Chronicles 12:22 . Like the host of God, who is the Lord of hosts, whose army is greater than that of all princes. This figure of speech shows how men ran to David after the noble action of taking away Saul’s spear, and sparing his life.

1 Chronicles 12:32 . The children of Issachar that had understanding of the times, by the study of astronomy and gentile literature.

1 Chronicles 12:33 . Expert in war. In Saul’s time the young men of Israel, almost without exception, learned the arts of war.

REFLECTIONS.

We have here a farther account of David’s rise to the throne. It could not but be whispered about that he was to succeed his father-in-law in the kingdom, and that Saul had acknowledged it in his last interview with David. Thus the son of Jesse rose in the estimation of his country, while Saul became more and more insupportable by his melancholy and violent temper. Thus those Benjamites, all valiant men, by an act of faith came to Ziklag, and risked their fortune with the hero of Israel’s hope. David, apprized of their approach, went out to meet them, but with caution, for this tribe had aided Saul when pursuing him in the wilderness. Thus it is that Christ’s kingdom shall rise, while the kingdom of darkness is troubled and falls into decay. Happy are the men who, seeing the evil approach, shall risk their all to pay an early homage to the Lord. They shall be considered as the king’s best friends, and shall feast in his presence with exceeding joy.

After a lapse of six years and a half, in which David had reigned over Judah, we have next a most glorious view of the armies of all Israel coming to Hebron to make him king. The civil authorities, the twelve armies, besides the four thousand six hundred armed levites; and with Zadok, twenty two captains of Aaron’s house, attended the coronation, to add the utmost lustre to the august occasion. Of the civil authorities, not less than two hundred attended from the tribe of Issachar; and it is proper to notice this, for the kings elected merely by the cheers of the army have never been considered as having legal claims to the crown. Viewing therefore all the circumstances of this coronation, the cordial congratulations of the whole nation, and the grand military fête which followed, we do not recollect any ancient monarch who received his crown with so great a lustre. All this is but a faint figure of the coronation of our great captain, when every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. He, like David, shall receive the crown on the fairest grounds of equity. It was because he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, that the Father hath highly exalted him, and given him a name above every name.