Richard Challoner

If the young men be clean: If this cleanness was required of them that were to eat that bread, which was a figure of the bread of life which we receive in the blessed sacrament; how clean ought Christians to be when they approach to our tremendous mysteries. And what reason hath the church of God to admit none to be her ministers to consecrate and daily receive this most pure sacrament, but such as devote themselves to a life of perpetual purity.

The vessels: i. e., the bodies, have been holy, that is, have been kept from impurity.-- Ibid.

Is defiled: Is liable to expose us to dangers of uncleanness.-- Ibid.

Be sanctified: That is, we shall take care, notwithstanding these dangerous circumstances, to keep our vessels holy, that is, to keep our bodies from every thing that may defile us.

The hold: The strong hold, or fortress of Maspha.

An ephod: Or the ephod. That is, the vestment of the high priest, with the urim and thummim, by which the Lord gave his oracle.

Heart struck him: Viz., with remorse, as fearing he had done amiss.

A thought to kill thee: That is, a suggestion, to which I did not consent.

Revenge me of thee: Or, as it is in the Hebrew, will revenge me. The meaning is, that he refers his whole cause to God, to judge and punish according to his justice: yet so as to keep himself in the mean time, from all personal hatred to Saul, or desire of gratifying his own passion, by seeking revenge. So far from it, that when Saul was afterwards slain, we find, that instead of rejoicing at his death, he mourned most bitterly for him.

If I leave: David certainly sinned in his designs against Nabal and his family, as he himself was afterwards sensible, when he blessed God for hindering him from executing the revenge he had proposed.

His name: Nabal, in Hebrew, signifies a fool.

Blessed be: David praiseth God, on this occasion, not out of joy for the death of Nabal (which would have argued a rancour of heart), but because he saw that God had so visibly taken his cause in hand, in punishing the injury done to him; whilst, by a merciful providence he kept him from revenging himself.

Pillaged Gessuri: These probably were enemies of the people of God: and some, if not all of them, were of the number of those whom God had ordered to be destroyed: which justifies David's proceedings in their regard. Though it is to be observed here, that we are not under an obligation of justifying every thing that he did: for the scripture, in relating what was done, does not say that it was well done. And even such as are true servants of God, are not to be imitated in all they do.

Understood that it was Samuel: It is the more common opinion of the holy fathers, and interpreters, that the soul of Samuel appeared indeed: and not, as some have imagined, an evil spirit in his shape. Not that the power of her magic could bring him thither, but that God was pleased for the punishment of Saul, that Samuel himself should denounce unto him the evils that were falling upon him. See Eccli. 46. 23.

With me: That is, in the state of the dead, and in another world, though not in the same place.