2 Samuel 23:5
Read 2 Samuel 23:5 Using Other Translations
What does 2 Samuel 23:5 mean?
Although my house [be] not so with God
So bright, and flourishing, and prosperous as the government of
the just ruler before described; or is not "right" F13 with
God, meaning his family, in which great sins were committed, and
great disorders and confusions brought into it, as the cases of
Amnon, Absalom, and Adonijah showed; or "not firm" or "stable"
F14, through the rebellion of one, the
insurrection of another, and the usurpation of a third; yet he
believed it would be firm and stable in the Messiah that should
spring from him, promised in the everlasting covenant; though the
Jewish writers understand this of the firmness and stability of
his kingdom and government: "but my house is not so" like the
morning light, which increases by little and little, and like the
morning, which sometimes is not cloudy, and sometimes is;
sometimes the sun shines clearly, and sometimes not; or like the
tender grass, which is sometimes flourishing, and after withers;
but so is not my kingdom, it is a perpetual one, given and
secured by an everlasting covenant; and such certainly is or will
be the kingdom of the Messiah:
yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered
in all
[things], and sure;
or, "for F15 he hath made" the covenant by which
the kingdom was settled on David and his seed was a covenant that
would continue for ever, and would be kept, "observed", and
"preserved"
F16 in all the articles of it, and so be sure to his seed, particularly to the Messiah that should spring from him, in whom it was fulfilled, ( Luke 1:32 Luke 1:33 ) ; and the covenant of grace made with David's antitype, with Christ the head of the church, and the representative of it, and so with all his people in him, is an everlasting one: it was made with Christ from everlasting, as appears from the everlasting love of God, the source and spring of it; the earliness of the divine counsels on which it is formed, and blessings and promises of it, with which it is filled, which were before the world was; and from Christ being set up as the Mediator of it from everlasting: and it will continue to everlasting; it is a covenant that cannot be broken, will never be removed, nor give way to or be succeeded by another: it is "ordered in all things": to promote and advance the glory of all the three Persons in the Godhead, Father, Son, and Spirit; to secure the persons of the saints, and to provide everything needful for them for time and eternity: and it is "sure"; it stands upon a sure basis, the unchangeable will and favour of God, and is in the hands of Christ, the same today, yesterday, and for ever; its mercies are the sure mercies of David, and its promises are yea and amen in Christ, and are sure to all the seed. Though things may not be with them God-ward, as they desire, and could be wished for; though they may be attended with many sins and infirmities, the temptations of Satan, divine desertions, and various afflictions, and be guilty of many backslidings, yet covenant interest always continues; and so, though in the kingdom and interest of Christ in the world, there are, and may be, many things disagreeable; it may be attended with persecutions, heresies, scandals, &c. yet it shall continue and increase, and spread, and be an everlasting kingdom:
for [this
is] all my salvation:
all depends upon this covenant; the safety of David's family, and
the security of the kingdom in it, and to his seed, till the
Messiah came, depended on the covenant made with him respecting
that; and the spiritual and eternal salvation of the Lord's
people depends upon the covenant of grace; which was contrived,
formed, and settled in it, in which the Saviour is provided, and
the persons to share in his salvation are taken into it and
secured, with all blessings both of grace and glory:
and all [my]
desire;
to see it fulfilled; as it is the desire of good men to be led
more and more into it, to see their interest in it, to have the
blessings and promises of it applied unto them, and to be saved
by it, and not by the covenant of works; and there is all that in
it that a believer can desire to make him comfortable here, or
happy hereafter; and it is what gives him delight and pleasure in
all his troubles: it may be supplied he is, as well as "this is",
and be applied to Christ, the ruler over men, described, (
2 Samuel
23:3 2 Samuel
23:4 ) ; with whom the covenant of grace is made, in whom is
the salvation of men; he is the author and the only author of it;
in whom it is complete and perfect; "all" salvation is in him,
and which they can claim as theirs; to whom is "all [their]
desire"; and in whom is "all [their] delight", as it may be
rendered; on account of the glory of his person, the fulness of
his grace, and his suitableness as a Saviour; whom they desire to
know more of, and have more communion with:
although he
made [it] not to grow;
though there may not be at present any growth of outward
prosperity, or of inward grace, or even of the produce of the
earth, ( Habakkuk
3:17 Habakkuk
3:18 ) ; though the horn of David is not yet made to bud, or
his family in growing and flourishing circumstances, or the
Messiah, the man, the branch, does not yet shoot forth, though he
certainly would; or, "for shall he not bud forth" he shall, (
Jeremiah
23:5 ) ( Zechariah
3:8 ) ( 6:12 )
.
F13 (Nk
al) "non recta", Cocceius.
F14 "Non est re firma", Vitringa in
Jesaiam, c. xi. 1.
F15 (yk) "quia", Pagninus, Montanus, Piscator.
F16 (hrmv) "scrvatum", Tigurine version, Vatablus;
"conservatum", Junius & Tremellius.
