1 Samuel 22:9 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
1 Samuel 22:9
Then answered Doeg the Edomite, which was set over the servants of Saul, and said, I saw the son of Jesse coming to Nob, to Ahimelech the son of Ahitub.
to station · verb, niphal active participle, masculine singular absolute
servants
עַבְדֵֽי'av.dei-
H5650
a servant · noun, common masculine plural construct
Saul
שָׁא֖וּלsha.'Ul
H7586
Shaul · proper noun, a man's name
said
וַיֹּאמַ֑רvai.yo.Mar
H559
to say (used with great latitude) · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine singular
saw
רָאִ֙יתִי֙ra.'I.ti
H7200
to see · verb, qal perfect, 1st person common singular
son
בֶּןben-
H1121
a son (as a builder of the family name) · noun, common masculine singular construct
Jesse
יִשַׁ֔יyi.Shai
H3448
Jishai · proper noun, a man's name
coming
בָּ֣אba'
H935
to go or come (in a wide variety of applications) · verb, qal active participle, masculine singular absolute
Nob
נֹ֔בֶהNoeh
H5011
Nob · proper noun, a place name + directional suffix
Ahimelech
אֲחִימֶ֖לֶךְ'a.chi.Me.lekh
H288
Achimelek · proper noun, a man's name
son
בֶּןben-
H1121
a son (as a builder of the family name) · noun, common masculine singular construct
Ahitub
אֲחִטֽוּב'a.chi.Tuv
H285
Achitub · proper noun, a man's name
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Psalms 52:1-9 Why boastest thou thyself in mischief, O mighty man? the goodness of God endureth continually.
1 Samuel 14:3 And Ahiah, the son of Ahitub, I-chabod’s brother, the son of Phinehas, the son of Eli, the LORD’s priest in Shiloh, wearing an ephod. And th…
1 Samuel 21:1-15 Then came David to Nob to Ahimelech the priest: and Ahimelech was afraid at the meeting of David, and said unto him, Why art thou alone, and…
Proverbs 19:5 A false witness shall not be unpunished, and he that speaketh lies shall not escape.
Proverbs 29:12 If a ruler hearken to lies, all his servants are wicked.
Ezekiel 22:9 In thee are men that carry tales to shed blood: and in thee they eat upon the mountains: in the midst of thee they commit lewdness.
Matthew 26:59-61 Now the chief priests, and elders, and all the council, sought false witness against Jesus, to put him to death;
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on 1 Samuel 22:6-19
We have seen the progress of David's troubles; now here we have the progress of Saul's wickedness. He seems to have laid aside the thoughts of all other business and to have devoted himself wholly to the pursuit of David. He heard at length, by the common fame of the country, that David was discovered (that is, that he appeared publicly and enlisted men into his service); and hereupon he called all his servants about him, and sat down under a tree, or grove, in the high place at Gibeah, with his spear in his hand for a sceptre, intimating the force by which he designed to rule, and the present temper of his spirit, or its distemper rather, which was to kill all that stood in his way. In this…
DOEG ACCUSES AHIMELECH. (Sa1 22:9-16)
Doeg . . . set over the servants--Septuagint, "the mules of Saul."
Adam Clarke on 1 Samuel 22:9
Doeg the Edomite, which was set over the servants of Saul - In Sa1 21:7 he is said to be the chiefest of the herdmen that belonged to Saul, and the Septuagint intimate that he was over the mules of Saul. Probably he was what we call the king's equery or groom.
John Gill on 1 Samuel 22:9
Then answered Doeg the Edomite,.... Josephus (d) calls him a Syrian, and so the Septuagint version; see 1 Samuel 21:7; being full of enmity to David, and willing to curry favour with Saul, and eager of further preferment, which Saul seemed to promise; and being more forward than the rest of his servants, prevented them and spoke first:
(which was set over the servants of Saul): over his herdsmen; see 1 Samuel 21:7,
and said, I saw the son of Jesse coming to Nob to Ahimelech the son of Ahitub; in imitation of Saul, he calls David by way of contempt the son of Jesse; and signifies that what he had to say of him was not by report, but he himself was an eyewitness of his coming to Nob, a city…
But Doech the Edomite, replying, etc. Doech, as we said above, means agitated or anxious; Edomite, bloodthirsty; Nobe, barking; Ahimelech, my brother's kingdom; Ahitub, my brother is good in interpretation. Therefore, he will respond to the persecuting Jews who are agitated for shedding innocent blood, being an associate of a gathering of the wicked; who, while others openly attack the faith, he usually plots inwardly to seek out and betray more diligently the meetings of the followers of Christ during the time of persecution, which he rightly suggests as the first among Saul's servants; because the more perverse and insensitive one is toward the good, the greater place they hold among the wicked. Without any doubt, the false brothers, who are within, burden the Church more than open enemies who attack it from outside. The time of the last conspiracy against Christ will respond, I say, like it is written about Judas: And night to night shows knowledge (Ps. 18). What is sober, just, and pious, he will wickedly betray, saying he has seen the faith of the Lord Jesus in the doctrine of those who, against the wickedness of the impious, bark like the sharpest and most watchful dog, and following the example of good brothers who have gone before, they also await the possession of the eternal kingdom. But they also supplicate the Father for the kingdom of Christ, and always refresh Him with spiritual bread in their members; and rescuing everyone they can from the hands of the devil, they will rather advise, command, and help them to strive for the peace of their rescuer.
I am taught through these words that whenever understanding guides my life like it did the life of the great David, that this carries me through to the end of the victory. And then I grieve especially for Doeg, the tyrant of my salvation, whenever I am in the house of the priest and when the attendant of the mules plots against me secretly because he no longer has the power to come to grips with me face to face, by informing the one who thirsts for my blood that I am staying with the priest.It's obvious what the mules represent, which this Edomite has charge over. He tends that sterile nature which has no room for God's blessing that sets fruitfulness in the creature in the beginning by saying "increase and multiply." Multiplication in evil, like the continuation of the species of mules, is not of God. As the animal is always begun anew, this sterile nature of the creature is produced by trickery and is achieved underhandedly by means of the nature itself. But the goal intended by the Word is obvious in what has been said. For if everything that the Lord made was very good, and the mule is not part of what was made in creation, it is obvious that "mule" has been used by the story to indicate evil. Its existence does not come from God, and it lacks the ability to propagate in order to make its characteristic nature endure. As the mule is unable to maintain its nature by itself, so evil lacks the ability to remain forever or preserve itself. Like with mules, another evil comes into being when it is created by another, when what is noble and splendid in our nature, and perhaps also haughty, sinks to the desire for a union which is ass-like and irrational. That foreigner Doeg, then, who became the messenger to Saul against David, the herdsman of the sterile herd of mules, is the wicked angel who draws the human soul to evil through the various passions of sin. Whenever he sees that the soul is in the house of the true priest, being unable to strike it with the kicks of the mules, he informs the ruler of wickedness, "the spirit which is at work in the sons of disobedience."
Dictionary and topics
Abiathar — Father of abundance, or my father excels, the son of Ahimelech the high priest. He was the tenth high priest, and the fourth in descent from Eli. When his father was slain with the priests of Nob, he…
Ahimelech — Brother of the king, the son of Ahitub and father of Abiathar (1 Sam. 22:20-23). He descended from Eli in the line of Ithamar. In 1 Chr. 18:16 he is called Abimelech, and is probably the same as…
Ahitub — Brother of goodness = good. (1.) The son of Phinehas. On the death of his grandfather Eli he succeeded to the office of high priest, and was himself succeeded by his son Ahijah (1 Sam. 14:3; 22:9,…
Doeg — Fearful, an Edomite, the chief overseer of Saul’s flocks (1 Sam. 21:7). At the command of Saul he slew the high priest Ahimelech (q.v.) at Nob, together with all the priests to the number of…
Mizpah — Or Miz’peh, watch-tower; the look-out. (1.) A place in Gilead, so named by Laban, who overtook Jacob at this spot (Gen. 31:49) on his return to Palestine from Padan-aram. Here Jacob and Laban set up…
Abiathar · in the City of Nob — in the City of Nob
Ahimelech · .Killed by the command of Saul — .Killed by the command of Saul
Ahitub · 1. High priest, father of Ahiah — 1. High priest, father of Ahiah
Betrayal · Of David, by Doeg — Of David, by Doeg
Slander · Exemplified: Doeg — Exemplified: Doeg
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Keil & Delitzsch on 1 Samuel 22:9-10
The Edomite Doeg could not refrain from yielding to this appeal, and telling Saul what he had seen when staying at Nob; namely, that Ahimelech had inquired of God for David, and given him food as well as Goliath's sword. For the fact itself, see Sa1 21:1-10, where there is no reference indeed to his inquiring of God; though it certainly took place, as Ahimelech (Sa1 22:15) does not disclaim it. Doeg is here designated נצּב, "the superintendent of Saul's servants," so that apparently he had been invested with the office of marshal of the court.
Tyndale Open Study Notes on 1 Samuel 22:7-8
men of Benjamin: Saul was suspicious of his own tribesmen, believing that David had bought their loyalty. Worse, Saul did not even trust his own son, convinced that he had joined the supposed conspiracy.
Rashi on 1 Samuel 22:6
That Dovid…had been discovered. That he realized to beware of him.
Beneath the tamarisk tree in Romoh. On one [hill], which was within Binyomin's border.3Not to be confused with the Romoh where Shmuel lived. Our Rabbis said4Maseches Taanis 5b. that this was Shmuel's Romoh, and these are two different places. It is expounded thus: 'Shaul was sitting in Givoh in the merit of the great tamarisk tree [i.e., Shmuel] who was in Romoh, and who was praying for him.'5Were it not for Shmuel’s prayers, Shaul would have had to relinquish the throne immediately after the incident with Amoleik. Shmuel prayed for Shaul’s reign to remain intact as long as he was alive.