1 Samuel 17:10

10 The Philistine said, I defy the armies of Israel this day; give me a man, that we may fight together.

1 Samuel 17:10 Meaning and Commentary

1 Samuel 17:10

And the Philistine said, I defy the armies of Israel this day,
&c.] Or "reproach" ^F19 them; that is, should they not accept his challenge, and send down a man to fight with them, he should then upbraid them with cowardice; and now he disdained them, as if there was not a man among them that dared to encounter with him:

give me a man that we may fight together;
and so decide the controversy between us; such as were those duels fought between Paris and Menelaus in the Trojan war, and between the Lacedemonians and the Argives in the times of Orthryades, and between the Athenians and Romans by the Horatii and Curiatii, as Grotius observes.

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FOOTNOTES:

F19 (ytprx) "exprobravo". V. L. Pagninus, Montanus; "probro affeci", Tigurine version; "probro affecero", Junius & Tremellius.

1 Samuel 17:10 In-Context

8 He stood and cried to the armies of Israel, and said to them, Why are you come out to set your battle in array? am I not a Philistine, and you servants to Saul? choose you a man for you, and let him come down to me.

9 If he be able to fight with me, and kill me, then will we be your servants; but if I prevail against him, and kill him, then shall you be our servants, and serve us.

10 The Philistine said, I defy the armies of Israel this day; give me a man, that we may fight together.

11 When Saul and all Israel heard those words of the Philistine, they were dismayed, and greatly afraid.

12 Now David was the son of that Ephrathite of Beth-lehem-judah, whose name was Jesse; and he had eight sons: and the man was an old man in the days of Saul, stricken [in years] among men.