1 Samuel 25:13

13 David said, "Strap on your swords!" They all strapped on their swords, David and his men, and set out, four hundred of them. Two hundred stayed behind to guard the camp.

1 Samuel 25:13 Meaning and Commentary

1 Samuel 25:13

And David said unto his men
Provoked to the last degree to have such a rude churlish answer returned to such a civil and humble message as he had sent:

gird you on every man his sword;
and prepare to march and chastise Nabal for his insolence:

and they girded on every man his sword;
in obedience to David, and in vindication of his honour and their own:

and David also girded on his sword;
in order to march at the head of them, fired with indignation at the affront given him:

and there went up after David about four hundred men;
out of the six hundred he had with him, ( 1 Samuel 23:13 ) ;

and two hundred abode by the stuff;
the baggage in their camp; the Targum is, they

``were left to watch the vessels;''

the things necessary for their use, for the dressing of their food, their bedding

1 Samuel 25:13 In-Context

11 Do you think I'm going to take good bread and wine and meat freshly butchered for my sheepshearers and give it to men I've never laid eyes on? Who knows where they've come from?"

12 David's men got out of there and went back and told David what he had said.

13 David said, "Strap on your swords!" They all strapped on their swords, David and his men, and set out, four hundred of them. Two hundred stayed behind to guard the camp.

14 Meanwhile, one of the young shepherds told Abigail, Nabal's wife, what had happened: "David sent messengers from the backcountry to salute our master, but he tore into them with insults.

15 Yet these men treated us very well. They took nothing from us and didn't take advantage of us all the time we were in the fields.