[¹] Or, make a mock of me.
4. unto his armourbearer] Compare Judges ix. 54 (the death of Abimelech). One function of an armourbearer was to give the “coup de grâce” to fallen enemies (1 Samuel xiv. 13), but sometimes the same office had to be executed for friends. Possibly the man refused from fear of blood-revenge, which would be the more certainly exacted in the case of the Lord’s Anointed, compare 1 Samuel ii. 22, xxvi. 9 (so Curtis).
and abuse me] i.e. wreak their cruel will upon me; compare Judges i. 6.
⁶So Saul died, and his three sons; and all his house died together.
6. all his house] In Samuel “his armourbearer and all his men.” The reference may be to Saul’s servants: his family was not exterminated in this battle.
⁷And when all the men of Israel that were in the valley saw that they fled, and that Saul and his sons were dead, they forsook their cities, and fled; and the Philistines came and dwelt in them.
⁸And it came to pass on the morrow, when the Philistines came to strip the slain, that they found Saul and his sons fallen in mount Gilboa.
7. that were in the valley] The “valley of Jezreel” (Hosea i. 5), called in later times the “plain of Esdrelon” (Esdraelon), is meant.
forsook their cities] Among these was no doubt Beth-shan (Beisan) “the key of Western Palestine” (see G. A. Smith, Historical Geography of the Holy Land pp. 358 f.), where Saul’s body was exposed (1 Samuel xxxi. 12).
and dwelt in them] Perhaps for a short while only, compare 2 Samuel ii. 9, “[Abner] made him (Ish-bosheth) king over ... Jezreel.” Ish-bosheth, however, may have “ruled” only in acknowledgment of a Philistine suzerainty.