1 Samuel 18:23

23 So they told this to David, and he answered, "It's a great honor to become the king's son-in-law, too great for someone poor and insignificant like me."

1 Samuel 18:23 Meaning and Commentary

1 Samuel 18:23

And Saul's servants spake these words in the ears of David,
&c.] Those before related, which Saul commanded them to speak, which they delivered exactly according to their orders, with an audible voice, clearly, plainly, and distinctly, so that David might hear and understand them:

and David said, seemeth it to you [a] light [thing] to be a king's son
in law;
a small a trifling matter, an easy thing to come into, every thing requisite to it:

seeing that I [am] a poor man;
and not able to give a dowry suitable to the daughter of a king; it being usual in those times for a man to give a dowry to, and not receive a portion with a wife; and which also was the custom of the Germans, as Tacitus ^F24 relates; and this was to be according to the rank and quality of the person married, and which in this case David was not equal to:

and lightly esteemed?
not by the people of Israel and Judah, who loved him, as he was loved even by the servants of Saul, at least in profession; but by Saul himself, who had slighted him in giving his elder daughter to another man, when he had promised her to him, which was discouraging to David, and resented by him.

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FOOTNOTES:

F24 De Moribus German. c. 18.

1 Samuel 18:23 In-Context

21 He said to himself, "I'll give Michal to David; I will use her to trap him, and he will be killed by the Philistines." So for the second time Saul said to David, "You will be my son-in-law."

22 He ordered his officials to speak privately with David and tell him, "The king is pleased with you and all his officials like you; now is a good time for you to marry his daughter."

23 So they told this to David, and he answered, "It's a great honor to become the king's son-in-law, too great for someone poor and insignificant like me."

24 The officials told Saul what David had said,

25 and Saul ordered them to tell David: "All the king wants from you as payment for the bride are the foreskins of a hundred dead Philistines, as revenge on his enemies." (This was how Saul planned to have David killed by the Philistines.)