And David came to his house at Jerusalem
His palace there, which was in that part of the city called the fort of Zion, and city of David:
and the king took the ten women [his] concubines, whom he had left to
keep the house;
when he fled from Jerusalem because of Absalom, ( 2 Samuel 15:16 ) ;
and put them in ward;
partly as a punishment for easily yielding to the lust of Absalom, and partly that they might not be seen, which would bring to remembrance his sin:
and fed them;
he did not put them to death, nor put them away, but kept them thus confined, and made a proper provision for them, not suffering them to marry any other, and be maintained by them:
but went not in unto them:
into their apartments to lie with them, having been defiled by his son, ( 2 Samuel 16:22 ) ;
so they were shut up unto the day of their death;
kept in the ward till they died:
living in widowhood;
neither used by the king as his concubines, as they had been before, nor suffered to many any other; or "in the widowhood of life" F15, which is so expressed, to distinguish it from widowhood made by death; this was such sort of widowhood as obtained while their husband was living; so the Targum,
``widows of their husband alive,''or remaining.