1 Chronicles14chapter 14

1 Chronicles 14:1-2

Chronicles places Hiram's cedar and this whole interlude after the ark's failed first attempt in chapter 13, where Samuel narrates the same material in 2 Sam 5:11-25 before the ark is ever brought up in 2 Sam 6. Keil reads the sequence as thematic rather than strictly chronological, since the Philistine wars of verses 8-16 answer verse 8's report that David was anointed king over all Israel, an event that sits earlier than Uzza's death. Barnes notes the parallel runs close to Samuel's wording throughout, with the differences confined to the children's list and the burned idols. Verse 2 states outright what the chapter then proves twice on the battlefield, that the Lord had confirmed David king, lifted up for the sake of his people.

1 Chronicles 14:3-7

The list of sons born in Jerusalem repeats the record already given at 1 Chr 3:5-8, Chronicles keeping the roster twice where Samuel gives it only once at 2 Sam 5:14-16. Clarke counts the spread across the witnesses, eleven names in the Hebrew of Samuel, thirteen here, and twenty-four in the Septuagint, a variance he leaves to the versions rather than resolving. The doubling fits the book's practice of laying every line of David's house on record for a remnant checking its own descent. Solomon's name stands third among the Jerusalem sons, already marked out before a word is said of his reign.

1 Chronicles 14:8-9

The Philistines move only once David is anointed king over all Israel, not merely over Judah, and they choose the valley of Rephaim southwest of Jerusalem, ground the giant traditions of 2 Sam 21:16-20 name again. Chronicles carries the notice essentially as Samuel gives it in 2 Sam 5:17-18, adding nothing of its own at these two verses. The timing matters for the chapter's placement: a Philistine army testing the new king belongs early in the reign, before the ark was ever carried toward Jerusalem.

1 Chronicles 14:10-12

David enquires of God before marching, and the Lord's own answer, Go up, for I will deliver them into thine hand, is the ground the name Baal-perazim gets in verse 11, the Lord who breaks forth. At verse 12 Chronicles departs from its source: 2 Sam 5:21 says David and his men took the abandoned idols away, while here they were burned with fire, the fuller obedience Deut 7:5 and 7:25 command against the gods of a conquered people. Barnes names the addition directly, and the readings differ only on whether Samuel's taking already implied destruction or whether Chronicles corrects an incomplete report. Either way the gods that could not save their own worshippers end as fuel.

1 Chronicles 14:13-16

The Philistines regroup in the same valley, and this second inquiry gets a different order: not a direct advance but a wide turn to come upon them from behind the mulberry trees. The instruction to wait for a sound of going in the treetops before advancing runs word for word with 2 Sam 5:23-25, already carried by the Samuel exposition, and Chronicles adds nothing to the wording here. Clarke records an older reading that took the sound as an army sent ahead of David, going before to render his way prosperous, a tradition he names rather than asserts. David's obedience is total, from Gibeon clear to Gazer, and this second victory earns no place-name of its own the way the first earned Baal-perazim.

1 Chronicles 14:17

Verse 17 has no counterpart in 2 Sam 5, which ends its parallel account at the battle report; Chronicles adds this closing sentence as its own summary before returning to the ark in chapter 15. Fame and fear stand together, the pairing the conquest narratives use of Israel's neighbors, and here it rests on David rather than on the nation entering the land. Henry reads the verse as the chapter's verdict on everything since verse 1, cedar, sons and two victories all serving to lift up a king the Lord himself had confirmed. The sentence closes the interlude and hands the narrative back to Uzza's unfinished business.