2 Samuel 1:19

19 Oh, no, Israel! Your prince^[a] lies dead on your heights.^[b] Look how the mighty warriors have fallen!

2 Samuel 1:19 Meaning and Commentary

2 Samuel 1:19

The beauty of Israel is slain upon thy high places
The high mountains of Gilboa, where Saul their king, and Jonathan his son, a prince of the blood, and natural heir to the crown, and multitudes of young men, the flower of the nation, were wounded and slain. Here begins the lamentation, or the elegiac song:

how are the mighty fallen!
mighty men of war, strong and valiant, as Saul and his sons were, and the soldiers in his army.

2 Samuel 1:19 In-Context

17 Then David sang this funeral song for Saul and his son Jonathan.

18 David ordered everyone in Judah to learn the Song of the Bow. (In fact, it is written in the scroll from Jashar.)

19 Oh, no, Israel! Your prince lies dead on your heights. Look how the mighty warriors have fallen!

20 Don't talk about it in Gath; don't bring news of it to Ashkelon's streets, or else the Philistines' daughters will rejoice; the daughters of the uncircumcised will celebrate.

21 You hills of Gilboa! Let there be no dew or rain on you, and no fields yielding grain offerings. Because it was there that the mighty warrior's shield was defiled— the shield of Saul!— never again anointed with oil.

Footnotes

• [a]. Or gazelle or splendor or splendid one
• [b]. Correction