1 Samuel 30:15-25

15 David said to him, Will you bring me down to this troop? He said, Swear to me by God, that you will neither kill me, nor deliver me up into the hands of my master, and I will bring you down to this troop.

16 When he had brought him down, behold, they were spread abroad over all the ground, eating and drinking, and dancing, because of all the great spoil that they had taken out of the land of the Pelishtim, and out of the land of Yehudah.

17 David struck them from the twilight even to the evening of the next day: and there not a man of them escaped, except four hundred young men, who rode on camels and fled.

18 David recovered all that the `Amaleki had taken; and David rescued his two wives.

19 There was nothing lacking to them, neither small nor great, neither sons nor daughters, neither spoil, nor anything that they had taken to them: David brought back all.

20 David took all the flocks and the herds, [which] they drove before those [other] cattle, and said, This is David's spoil.

21 David came to the two hundred men, who were so faint that they could not follow David, whom also they had made to abide at the brook Besor; and they went forth to meet David, and to meet the people who were with him: and when David came near to the people, he greeted them.

22 Then answered all the wicked men and base fellows, of those who went with David, and said, Because they didn't go with us, we will not give them anything of the spoil that we have recovered, except to every man his wife and his children, that he may lead them away, and depart.

23 Then said David, You shall not do so, my brothers, with that which the LORD has given to us, who has preserved us, and delivered the troop that came against us into our hand.

24 Who will listen to you in this matter? for as his share is who goes down to the battle, so shall his share be who tarries by the baggage: they shall share alike.

25 It was so from that day forward, that he made it a statute and an ordinance for Yisra'el to this day.

1 Samuel 30:15-25 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO FIRST SAMUEL 30

This chapter relates the condition Ziklag was in when David and his men came to it, the city burnt, and their families carried captive by the Amalekites, which occasioned not only a general lamentation, but mutiny and murmuring in David's men, 1Sa 30:1-6; the inquiry David made of the Lord what he should do, who is bid to pursue the enemy; and being directed by a lad where they were, fell upon them, and routed them, and brought back the captives with a great spoil, 1Sa 30:7-20; the distribution of the spoil, both to those that went with him, and to those who through faintness were left behind, 1Sa 30:21-25; and the presents of it he sent to several places in the tribe of Judah, who had been kind to him when he dwelt among them, 1Sa 30:26-31.