2 Samuelchapter 13
39 verses · Samuel, Nathan and Gad, by tradition · 10th century BC · History
But when king David heard of all these things, he was very wroth.
Introduction
Samuel, Nathan and Gad, by tradition, History, 2 Samuel Overview.
This chapter opens the second half of David's reign, and the writer of 2 Samuel tells it for a people who remembered him as their greatest king. It follows directly on the prophet's sentence that the sword would never leave David's house. The crimes it records happen inside the royal family, among half brothers and a sister who lived in separate households at court. It is a narrative told with few comments from the narrator. Listen for who speaks and who stays silent, and for how long each silence lasts. The rest of the book grows out of what the king leaves undone here.
Context
- Who
- Israelites hearing the crimes of their own royal family named without cover
- What
- An account of a crime against a king's daughter inside David's household and the killing it provokes two years later.
- Where
- The princes' quarters in Jerusalem, a sheepshearing feast at Baal-hazor, and Geshur east of the Sea of Galilee.
- When
- About 990 to 988 BC, dated only by the two years at 13:23 and the three at 13:38.
- Why
- To show the sentence spoken against David's house at 12:10 beginning to fall on his own sons.
Historical context
The chapter belongs to David's household. Amnon was the firstborn and therefore the heir, Absalom was the third son and Tamar's full brother, and Jonadab was the king's nephew through his brother Shimeah.
Show the rest of the historical context, 5 more paragraphs
The king's grown sons kept separate households and the unmarried daughters lived apart under guard, which is why Amnon needs a scheme to get Tamar alone.
A first hearer read clothing as a legal statement. The long robe of many colours marked Tamar as a virgin daughter of the king, so tearing it and putting ashes on her head broadcast what had happened without a word being spoken.
A first hearer also knew what sending her away afterwards meant. A man who violated an unmarried woman was bound to provide for her for life, so putting her out of the door left her with no husband, no protector and no future. That is what the word desolate carries at 13:20.
The setting of the killing was the year's biggest party. The whole clip of wool came in at once, so shearing meant cash, feasting and heavy drinking, which made it a natural cover and a plausible invitation for the whole court.
Geshur, where Absalom flees, was a small Aramean kingdom east of the Sea of Galilee ruled by Talmai, his mother's father, as 3:3 records. He ran to family that Jerusalem could not touch, and no city of refuge applied, since the killing was planned.
Significance
The first hearers would hear the previous chapter answered point for point. A man takes a woman who is not his, and the sword does not leave the house.
Show the rest of the significance, 1 more paragraph
They would also hear a father who is furious and does nothing. David's failure to judge his own son is the gap Absalom steps into, and the rest of the book comes out of it.
This chapter in Jewish lifeWhat this chapter is in Jewish life and reading.
How it is read
Rashi reads this chapter as a record of a crime inside the king's house, and most of his notes are short glosses on its words. At the first verse he fixes the family tie, that Tamar was Absalom's sister by his mother (Rashi on II Samuel 13:1:1). At the third he gives Jonadab's character in four words, "Smart man. For wickedness" (Rashi on II Samuel 13:3:1, the Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J., CC-BY). At the second he takes the phrase about sickness plainly, "Until he became sick" (Rashi on II Samuel 13:2:1). At the fourth he glosses the word for Amnon's wasted look from the thin cattle of Pharaoh's dream (Rashi on II Samuel 13:4:1).
Two of his notes carry the weight of the chapter. On Tamar's plea he explains why she could say the king would not withhold her. Her mother was taken in war while still a gentile, so the law of the captive woman stood behind the claim (Rashi on II Samuel 13:13:1). On her protest after the rape he lets her own words set the measure of the second wrong. She says, "You raped me and then you added on more evil than that by sending me away" (Rashi on II Samuel 13:16:1). At the fifteenth verse he reports a saying of the rabbis on the cause of Amnon's hatred and sends the reader to Sanhedrin 21a for it (Rashi on II Samuel 13:15:1).
The rest of the kept notes are domestic and lexical. He explains the paste Tamar made, flour mixed first into boiling water and afterwards in oil (Rashi on II Samuel 13:8:1). He glosses the pan from the Aramaic of Onkelos (Rashi on II Samuel 13:9:1). At the twenty-third verse he records the custom behind Absalom's invitation, that a sheep-shearing was kept as a party (Rashi on II Samuel 13:23:1). That custom is how the king's sons came to be in one place two years after the crime.
Radak, Malbim and Metzudat David all comment across this chapter. The corpus carries their refs with the reason that Sefaria holds no English version of them, so they stand here cited and unquoted. They are Radak on II Samuel 13:6:1, 13:18:1, 13:19:1, 13:20:1 and 13:25:1, Malbim on II Samuel 13:7:1 and 13:21:1, and Metzudat David on II Samuel 13:10:1, 13:11:1, 13:12:1, 13:14:1, 13:22:1 and 13:24:1.
What the rabbis say
The corpus carries forty rabbinic locators for this chapter and the text of none, so each is cited and linked here rather than quoted. The Babylonian Talmud reads the chapter mainly in one place, Sanhedrin 21a, and the corpus carries it four times over. They are 21a:20 on Jonadab, 21a:21 on Amnon's complaint to him, 21a:22 on the hatred that followed, and 21a:24 on the robe Tamar tore. Avot DeRabbi Natan 9:4 and its Recension B at 16:9 stand beside the first of those, and Nedarim 40a:4 with Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Nedarim 4:9 and Ein Yaakov, Nedarim 4:11 beside the second.
The midrashic material reads this chapter next to Genesis more than next to anything else. On Tamar's appeal at the twelfth and thirteenth verses the corpus carries seven locators. They are Bereshit Rabbah 33:3 and 80:11, Midrash Sekhel Tov, Bereshit 34:2:5, and Bereshit Rabbati, Parashat Vayigash 35. Beside them stand Midrash Lekach Tov, Genesis 34:25:7, Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Sanhedrin 2:9, and Ein Yaakov, Sanhedrin 2:11. On Absalom's two years of silent hatred at the twenty-second verse it carries Bereshit Rabbah 84:9, Midrash Lekach Tov, Genesis 37:4:1, Midrash Sekhel Tov, Bereshit 37:4:3, and Midrash Tehillim 28:5. On the tearing of clothes at the nineteenth it carries Bamidbar Rabbah 9:33, Sifrei Bamidbar 11:1 and Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 707:11.
The remaining locators follow the story to its end. On the shearing feast at the twenty-third verse the corpus carries Bereshit Rabbah 74:5 and 85:6, Ein Yaakov, Sanhedrin 8:1, and Jerusalem Talmud Sotah 3:4:3. On the mules the king's sons fled upon it carries Jerusalem Talmud Kilayim 8:2:3 and Midrash Tannaim on Deuteronomy 22:10:3. On David's mourning it carries Moed Katan 21a:4, on Jonadab's report Kohelet Rabbah 7:3:1, and on Absalom's flight to Geshur Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer 32:10 and Seder Olam Rabbah 14:2. Two more read the written and spoken forms of a word at the thirty-third verse, Otzar Midrashim, Keri & K'tiv, Introduction 4 and its Midrash Ketiv V'lo Keri 2. What each of them teaches is a saying of the rabbis, and is reported as theirs wherever this site quotes one. The quotations wait on a fetch that carries the text.
Sources: Rashi, Rashi on II Samuel 13:1:1 to 13:23:1, the Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J., CC-BY; Radak, Radak on II Samuel 13:6:1, 13:18:1, 13:19:1, 13:20:1 and 13:25:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; Malbim, Malbim on II Samuel 13:7:1 and 13:21:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; Metzudat David, Metzudat David on II Samuel 13:10:1, 13:11:1, 13:12:1, 13:14:1, 13:22:1 and 13:24:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; The Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin 21a:20, 21a:21, 21a:22 and 21a:24, Nedarim 40a:4 and Moed Katan 21a:4, cited by locator from the Sefaria corpus for 2 Samuel 13; The Midrash, Bereshit Rabbah 33:3, 74:5, 80:11, 84:9 and 85:6, Bamidbar Rabbah 9:33, Midrash Tehillim 28:5 and Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer 32:10, cited by locator from the Sefaria corpus for 2 Samuel 13.
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
Amnon's sickness and Jonadab's cunning
2 Samuel 13:1-3
had a fair sister: The chapter names the two brothers on either side of Tamar in one breath: Absalom, her full brother, and Amnon, David's firstborn by Ahinoam and her half brother only. Amnon's love curdles at once into vexation, a want that cannot be filled without breaking the law of Israel. Jonadab, David's own nephew through his brother Shimeah, enters as a very subtil man, the same word Scripture uses elsewhere for shrewdness bent toward evil.
2 Samuel 13:1
“Whose name was Tamar - Tamar was the daughter of David and Maacah, daughter of the king of Geshur, and the uterine sister of Absalom. Amnon was David’s eldest son by Ahinoam. She was therefore sister to Amnon only by the father’s side, i.e., half-sister; but whole sister to Absalom.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
for she was a virgin: Jamieson, Fausset & Brown explain that unmarried daughters lived in close seclusion and were seen by men only with witnesses present. That custom is why Amnon saw no way to be alone with her. The scheme that follows is built to get around it.
2 Samuel 13:2
“Amnon was so vexed - for she was a virgin - It has been well remarked that “the passion of love is nowhere so wasting and vexatious, as where it is unlawful. A quick sense of guilt, especially where it is enormous, as in the present instance, strikes the soul with horror; and the impossibility of an innocent gratification loads that horror with desperation: a conflict too cruel and too dreadful for human bearing.” - Delaney.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Jonadab's father Shimeah was David's brother, so Jonadab is Amnon's cousin as well as his friend. Albert Barnes takes Shimeah as the Shammah of 1 Samuel 16:9. His shrewd counsel will bring ruin on the king's house.
2 Samuel 13:3
“But Amnon had a friend,.... Though in the issue his friendship proved his ruin: whose name was Jonadab, the son of Shimeah, David's brother; so that they were own cousins, the same with Shammah, 1Sa 16:9, and Jonadab was a very subtle man; a very penetrating man into the dispositions of men, and could judge by their countenances what they were, and the affections of their minds, and had a talent in forming schemes; he was wise to do evil and was wickedly cunning.”
1 more voice on this verse
2 Samuel 13:3
“Shimeah - Called Shamma (marginal reference), was Jesse’s third son. Subtil - literally, wise. The word is generally used in a good sense, but here, and in Job 5:13, it means crafty.”
2 Samuel 13:4-6
lean from day to day?: Jonadab reads Amnon's sickness at a glance and supplies the whole plan: feign illness, ask for Tamar by name, get her alone in the inner chamber. A counselor's gift used for evil is worse than none, since it hands sin the cunning it lacked on its own. David comes in person to see his sick son, the first unwitting hinge of a plot he does not yet know exists.
2 Samuel 13:4
“And he said unto him, why art thou, being the king's son, lean from day today?....”
Albert Barnes links this feigning to 2 Samuel 14:2, where Joab has a woman feign mourning before the king. Pretense drives both plots. Barnes adds that Amnon was to claim he could eat only food he had watched being made.
2 Samuel 13:5
“Make thyself sick - “Feign thyself to be ill.” (Compare 2Sa 14:2.) That I may see it - He was to feign that he could not fancy anything that came from the kitchen, but that if he saw it cooked he should be able to eat it.”
Albert Barnes notes that the words for these cakes and the pan appear only in this passage, and their origin is doubtful. Some tied the cake's name to the Hebrew for heart. On that reading Amnon asked for heart-shaped cakes while posing as a man sick with love.
2 Samuel 13:6
“Make me cakes ... a pan - The words here used occur nowhere else, and the etymology is doubtful. Some particular kind of cake or pudding is meant 2Sa 13:8, called a לביבה lābı̂ybâh; according to some, it was, from its etymology, shaped like a heart. 2Sa 13:9 The dish into which she poured the לביבה lābı̂ybâh was doubtless borne to him by one of the servants into the chamber where he lay, and from which, the doors being open, he could see the outer room where Tamar prepared the meat.”
1 more voice on this verse
2 Samuel 13:6
“Thus he lieth in wait secretly, as a lion in his den, to catch the poor, and to draw them into his net, Ps. x. David was always fond of his children, and concerned if any thing ailed them; he no sooner hears that Amnon is sick than he comes himself to visit him.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
2 Samuel 13:7-11
sent home to Tamar: David sends his own daughter into Amnon's house at his son's request, never asking why a grown man needs his sister alone to bake for him. Amnon puts every other man out before he acts, leaving Tamar without a witness in the room, the circumstance later law treats as decisive at Deuteronomy 22:25. The king who wept over Bathsheba's dying child now sends Tamar in unknowing, and the sword promised at 12:10 finds its first opening inside his own house.
2 Samuel 13:7
“Then David sent home to Tamar,.... Who perhaps was not in the king's palace, but at her brother Absalom's house, 2Sa 13:20, saying, go now to thy brother Amnon's house; who also had a separate house and equipage, being the king's son, and his eldest son: and dress him meat; such as he may desire, and his stomach will bear.”
made cakes in his sight: Tamar does the work herself, from kneading the dough to baking, where a king's daughter could have sent a servant. The words in his sight repeat the terms of Jonadab's plan in verse 5. Each step she takes in good faith carries out his design.
he refused to eat: Amnon's refusal of the food shows that his hunger was a pretense. Matthew Henry observes that the sick are humoured and feel entitled to give orders, so no one questions the command to clear the room. Tamar, suspecting nothing, stays behind.
The move into the bedroom takes Tamar out of sight and hearing of the rest of the house. Matthew Henry reads this as the moment the mask comes off, with the food set aside once it has served its use. The pretext has done its work.
Come lie with me, my sister: Amnon took hold of Tamar and called her sister in the same breath as he demanded that she lie with him. John Gill marks that he names the very tie that forbade the act. Near kinship gave her no protection.
2 Samuel 13:11
“As if to show that near relationship is no safeguard, Amnon burned with illicit passion for his sister Tamar.”
Jerome · written before 420 · LETTER 22.12patristic
2 Samuel 13:12-14
no such thing ought to be done in Israel: Tamar's plea moves past emotion into law: she calls what he intends folly, warns it will leave him as one of the fools in Israel, then offers marriage to the king as her last hope of escape. Albert Barnes reads that offer as a bid to get free of the room rather than proof such marriages were lawful, since the law already forbade them. Amnon will not hear her. He simply overpowers her, and the narrator states the fact without ornament: forced her, and lay with her.
2 Samuel 13:12
“In bidding him, however, "speak to the king, for he will not withhold me from thee," it is probable that she urged this as her last resource, saying anything she thought would please him, in order to escape for the present out of his hands.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Albert Barnes renders shame as reproach and compares Genesis 34:14, the same disgrace Dinah's brothers named. The marriage offer divides readers. Adam Clarke took it that Tamar expected the king to consent, while Jamieson, Fausset & Brown hold she said whatever might free her from his hands.
2 Samuel 13:13
“My shame - Better, “my reproach.” Compare Gen 30:23; Gen 34:14; 1Sa 11:2. Speak unto the king ... - It cannot be inferred with certainty from this that marriages were usual among half brothers and sisters in the time of David. The Levitical law forbade them (marginal reference), and Tamar may have merely wished to temporize.”
The words being stronger place the whole guilt on Amnon. Matthew Henry doubts a man reaches such a crime all at once and suspects Amnon had long lived loosely while his father failed to know or punish it. John Gill connects the scene with the law of Deuteronomy 22:25 on a woman overpowered with no one near to help.
2 Samuel 13:14
“Howbeit, he would not hearken unto her voice,.... His lust was so inflamed and enraged, that he could not attend to any arguments, though ever so forcible, that were offered to him: but being stronger than she, forced her, and lay with her; whether she cried out or not, as the law directs in such cases, Deu 22:25; is not said; she might, and nobody hear her and come to her assistance; or she might not choose to expose her brother to his servants.”
Hatred greater than the love: Tamar left desolate
2 Samuel 13:15-17
hated her exceedingly: The hatred that follows is stranger than the crime, greater than the love had been, and now it is Amnon who wants distance. Tamar answers that sending her away is a wrong worse than what he did to her, since it denies her even the standing of a wife taken by force and casts her out with nothing. Amnon calls a servant rather than face her again, and the order to bolt the door behind her is his last word in the scene.
2 Samuel 13:15
“Hated her exceedingly - Amnon’s conduct to his sister was not only brutal but inexplicable. It would be easy to form conjectures concerning the cause, but we can arrive at no certainty.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
2 Samuel 13:15
“In Amnon's case the sudden revulsion is easily accounted for; the atrocity of his conduct, with all the feelings of shame, remorse, and dread of exposure and punishment, now burst upon his mind, rendering the presence of Tamar intolerably painful to him.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Tamar tells Amnon that sending her away is a worse wrong than the one already done to her. Driven out, she would carry the disgrace alone. Yet he refused to listen to her.
2 Samuel 13:16
“The sense of the passage probably is, “And she spake with him on account of this great wrong in sending me away, greater than the other wrong which thou hast done me (said she), but he hearkened not unto her.” The Hebrew text is probably corrupt, and the writer blends Tamar’s words with his own narrative.”
Amnon calls his attendant and orders him to throw this woman out, refusing even to say her name. John Gill hears contempt in the words. The door is bolted behind her as though she were the one at fault.
2 Samuel 13:17
“Then he called his servants that ministered unto him,.... His domestic servants that waited on him: and said, put now this woman out from me; she not willing to depart at once, he ordered her to be put out immediately by force; using her and speaking of her in a very rude and scandalous manner, calling her this, leaving it to be supplied, as they would understand it, this base woman, this strumpet, &c. and bolt the door after her; that she might not return; this was more disgraceful still.”
2 Samuel 13:18-19
for with such robes were: Tamar's garment of divers colours marks her as a king's daughter still a virgin, and the phrase occurs in only one other place in Scripture, the coat Jacob made for Joseph at Genesis 37:3. She tears it herself, the garment meant to mark her standing now torn to mark her ruin, and puts ashes on her head, the plain sign of mourning used throughout Israel's story. The narrator lingers on the robe long enough that its tearing reads as testimony spoken in cloth, where her own household refuses to speak.
2 Samuel 13:18
“And she had a garment of divers colours upon her,.... Of embroidered work, which made her the more observable, and her shame the more manifest. Whether this was interwoven with threads of various colours, or embroidered with figures of flowers, animals, &c. and wrought with the needle, or was painted with different colours, or made up of pieces of various colours, is not certain.”
1 more voice on this verse
2 Samuel 13:18
“A garment of divers colors - See Gen 37:3. Some prefer here (and there) “a tunic with sleeves,” a tunic reaching to the extremities, i. e. the hands and feet, and worn over the common tunic, in room of a robe.”
put ashes on her head: Tamar put ashes on her head, tore the robe that marked a virgin daughter of the king, and went away crying bitterly. John Gill compares the hand on the head to Jeremiah 2:37 as a sign of shame. Her grief was public.
2 Samuel 13:19
“And Tamar put ashes on her head,.... In token of sorrow and distress; see Jos 7:6, and rent her garment of divers colours that was on her; signifying that her virginity was rent from her in a forcible manner, or that she was ravished: and laid her hand on her head; through grief and shame; see Jer 2:37, and went on crying; from Amnon's house to her brother Absalom's, as one abused and injured.”
hold now thy peace, my sister: Absalom already knows or guesses what happened, and his counsel is silence rather than justice: hold thy peace, he is thy brother, regard not this thing. The advice keeps the household's surface calm while doing nothing for Tamar, who is left desolate in her brother's house rather than restored or avenged. Two years of that silence will pass before Absalom acts, and this verse is where his plan begins, not where it ends.
2 Samuel 13:20
“So Tamar remained desolate in her brother Absalom's house--He was her natural protector, and the children of polygamists lived by themselves, as if they constituted different families.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
he was very wroth: David's anger is real, and it is also all he offers. The Hebrew text names no punishment and no rebuke, though the Greek translation used by the early church adds a reason: he did not vex Amnon's spirit, because he loved him as his firstborn. The positions differ on whether that clause belongs to the original text or simply explains what the Hebrew leaves silent, but either reading leaves a king angry without being just, and Absalom's own justice at the sheepshearing feast fills the gap his father left.
2 Samuel 13:21
“But when King David heard of all these things,.... Of Amnon's ravishing Tamar, and turning her out of doors in that inhuman manner he did, and of her distress upon it: he was very wroth; with Amnon; but we read not of any reproof he gave him, nor of any punishment inflicted on him by him.”
2 more voices on this verse
2 Samuel 13:21
“Withhold - This she spoke, because she thought her royal father would dispense with it, upon this extraordinary occasion, to save his first-born son's life: 15. Hated her - By the just judgment of God both upon Amnon and David, that so the sin might be made publick, and way for the succeeding tragedies.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
2 Samuel 13:21
“But was it enough for him to be angry? He ought to have punished his son for it, and have put him to open shame; both as a father and as a king he had power to do it. But the LXX. here adds these words: But he saddened not the spirit of his son Amnon, because he loved him, because he was his first-born.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
neither good nor bad: Absalom says nothing to Amnon at all, neither rebuke nor forgiveness, and the silence proves worse than either would have been. The law of Leviticus 19:17 ties open rebuke to loving one's neighbor and hidden hatred to withholding it, and this verse names the hatred outright: Absalom hated Amnon. What David failed to punish, Absalom now determines to avenge himself, and the two years of quiet that follow are preparation, not peace.
2 Samuel 13:22
“Spake - That is, he said nothing at all to him, about that business. He neither debated it with him, nor threatened him for it; but seemed willing to pass it by with brotherly kindness.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
2 Samuel 13:22
“If Absalom had reasoned the matter with Amnon, he might have convinced him of his sin and brought him to repentance; but, saying nothing, Amnon's heart was hardened, and his own more and more embittered against him; therefore rebuking our neighbour is opposed to hating him in our hearts, Lev. xix.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Two years, a sheepshearing, and murder at the table
2 Samuel 13:23-27
after two full years: Two full years is the narrator's own measure of Absalom's patience, long enough that both Amnon and David let their guard down completely. Absalom invites the king first, knowing he will decline a costly outing for his whole court, then asks specifically for Amnon once the king has already refused to come himself, so the one request that matters looks like an afterthought. David presses him no further and lets his firstborn go, never suspecting a plot two years in the making.
2 Samuel 13:23
“Absalom had sheep-shearers in Baal-hazor, which is beside Ephraim--A sheep-shearing feast is a grand occasion in the East. Absalom proposed to give such an entertainment at his estate in Baal-hazor, about eight miles northeast of Jerusalem near a town called Ephraim (Jos 11:10).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
1 more voice on this verse
2 Samuel 13:23
“Two years - This circumstance of time is noted, as an aggravation of Absalom's malice, which was so implacable: and as an act of policy, that both Amnon and David might more securely comply with his desires.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Absalom goes to the king with word that he has hired shearers at Baal-hazor. Shearing brought a feast with wine and many guests, as with Nabal in 1 Samuel 25. Inviting the king and his servants looked ordinary.
2 Samuel 13:24
“And Absalom came to the king,.... At Jerusalem, to invite him in person: and said, behold now, thy servant hath sheepshearers; persons employed in shearing his sheep: and this being a time of entertainment and joy: let the king, I beseech thee, and his servants, go with thy servant; he invited the king and the whole royal family to go with him to Baalhazor, and partake of the sheepshearing feast; for by "his servants" are not meant the king's domestic servants, his guard and retinue, but his sons, as appears by what follows.”
1 more voice on this verse
2 Samuel 13:24
“If the sun going down once upon the wrath gives such place to the devil (as is intimated, Eph. iv. 26, 27 ), what would the sunsets of two full years do?”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Matthew Henry commends the refusal as good sense, since a young householder should not spend the wool upon the shearing. The king's concern for his son's purse is sincere. His blessing sends Absalom home with royal favor for the day he has planned.
let my brother Amnon go: Absalom asks the king to let Amnon go with them if David himself will stay home. As the firstborn son, Amnon could stand in the king's place at the feast. The king asks why he should go.
2 Samuel 13:26
“Let Amnon - For the king designed (as the following words shew) to keep him at home with him, as being his eldest son, and heir of his kingdom: otherwise Absalom would never have made particular mention of him; which now he was forced to do.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Absalom urged David until he allowed Amnon and the other princes to go. John Wesley wonders that such pressing raised no suspicion in a wise king. David gave the consent himself.
2 Samuel 13:27
“Pressed him - It is strange that his urgent desire of Amnon's company raised no suspicion in so wise a king; but God suffered him to be blinded that he might execute his judgments upon David, and bring upon Amnon the just punishment of his lewdness.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
2 Samuel 13:28-29
heart is merry with wine: Absalom gives the order in a setting that echoes Amnon's own trap, waiting for the same kind of unguarded moment, wine in place of appetite. This is the sword promised at 12:10 opening its first wound, a son of David killed by a son of David, and the older writers count Amnon among the fourfold loss David pronounced on himself unknowing at 12:6, alongside the child already dead and Absalom and Adonijah still to come. David did nothing to stop what he already knew of, and the other sons flee on their mules not yet knowing whether the killing will end with Amnon.
2 Samuel 13:28
“Observe the aggravations of this sin:-- [1.] He would have Amnon slain when his heart was merry with wine, and he was consequently least apprehensive of danger, least able to resist it, and also least fit to go out of the world; as if his malice aimed to destroy both soul and body, not giving him time to say, Lord, have mercy upon me.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
1 more voice on this verse
2 Samuel 13:28
“Merry - When he least suspects, and will be most unable to prevent the evil. I - I who am the king's son, and, when Amnon is gone, his heir: who therefore shall easily obtain pardon for you, and will liberally reward you.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Albert Barnes observes that the mule was the royal mount in this period, and David's own mule carries Solomon at 1 Kings 1:33. Absalom's own mule will carry him under the oak at 2 Samuel 18:9. John Gill says each son feared he was marked for death.
2 Samuel 13:29
“And the servants of Absalom did unto Amnon as Absalom had commanded,.... They smote him, and killed him, when he gave the word: then all the king's sons arose; from the feast, imagining they were all designed to be slain: and every man gat him up upon his mule, and fled; creatures much used in Judea instead of horses, which, though they might not be bred, might be used (o). (o) Vid. Misn. Celaim, c. 8. sect. 1.”
2 more voices on this verse
2 Samuel 13:29
“Upon his mule - So in 1Ki 1:33, 1Ki 1:38 the mule is the royal animal on which David himself rides. In 2Sa 18:9 Absalom rides upon a mule.”
2 Samuel 13:29
“Commanded - Now the threatened sword is drawn in David's house, which will not depart from it. His eldest son falls by it, thro' his own wickedness, and his father by his connivance is accessory to it.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
A rumor, a lament, and Absalom gone to Geshur
not one of them left: The report that reaches David before the facts do is worse than the truth, all the king's sons rather than one, and grief comes to the palace on a rumor before the real news arrives. Adam Clarke notes that a report always grows larger than the event it carries, and this verse is the first place in the chapter where that pattern costs David dearly. He will tear his garments for sons who are alive before he learns which one is dead.
2 Samuel 13:30
“Absalom hath slain all the king’s sons - Fame never lessens but always magnifies a fact. Report, contrary to the nature of all other things, gains strength by going. Virgil has given, in his best manner, a fine personification of Fame or Evil Report. - Aen. iv., 173. Extemplo Libyae magnas it Fama per urbes; Fama, malum qua non aliud velocius ullum, Mobilitate viget, viresque adquirit eundo, etc. “Now Fame, tremendous fiend! without delay, Through Libyan cities took her rapid way; Fame, the swift plague, that every moment grows, And gains new strength and vigor as she goes,” etc.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
2 Samuel 13:31-33
arose, and tare his garments: David's grief is total and, for the moment, wrongly aimed, mourning a household wiped out that is not actually gone. Jonadab, the same cunning cousin who designed Amnon's trap at verse 5, is also the only man in the room who already knows the truth, and he corrects the king's grief with the same shrewdness he once gave Amnon's lust. His calm certainty, Amnon only is dead, tells the reader that Jonadab had read Absalom's plan from the day Tamar was forced, and said nothing to stop it either.
Jonadab assures the king that only Amnon is dead, and he says Absalom had planned it from the day Amnon violated his sister Tamar. Adam Clarke notes how coolly Jonadab speaks of a killing his own advice set in motion. He knew the plan.
2 Samuel 13:32
“It is well if Jonadab was not as guilty of Amnon's death as he was of his sin; such friends do those prove who are hearkened to as counsellors to do wickedly: he that would not be so kind as to prevent Amnon's sin would not be so kind as to prevent his ruin, when, it should seem, he might have done both.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Jonadab tells the king to put no weight on a report of every son dead. Only Amnon is dead, he says a second time. John Gill hears in this confidence a prior knowledge of Absalom's plan.
2 Samuel 13:33
“Now therefore let not my lord the king take the thing to his heart,.... Neither suppose it, nor be troubled for it: to think that all the king's sons are dead: which was not to be thought, nor could any good reason be given for such a supposition for Amnon only is dead; he repeats it again with great assurance, which seems to confirm the suspicion of him before suggested; though some think he said this not from certain knowledge, but by conjecture.”
2 Samuel 13:34-36
kept the watch lifted up his eyes: A watchman posted to look down the road, the same kind of office that will one day spot Absalom's own end at chapter 18, sees the king's sons coming while Jonadab is still speaking. The false report of verse 30 dissolves the moment the company comes into view, and grief turns from all the sons to the one who will not walk through the gate again. David and his servants weep sore, not from the worst they feared, but from a lesser and still real loss.
2 Samuel 13:34
“Absalom fled - This is the sequel to 2Sa 13:29. The king’s sons rose from table and fled, and Absalom taking advantage of the confusion, also escaped and fled. This information is inserted here to account for the king’s sons returning unmolested.”
Jonadab points the king to his sons as they arrive and claims his word has proved true. John Gill hears him praising his own foresight. Matthew Henry finds mercy in the false report of all the sons dead, which made the death of Amnon easier to bear.
2 Samuel 13:35
“The watchman, as his duty was, had sent immediate notice to the king that he saw a crowd approaching (see 2Ki 9:17-20). Jonadab, who was with the king, was prompt to give the explanation.”
David's sons arrived wailing loudly, and the king and his servants wept bitterly. Salvian the Presbyter calls this grief the first stroke of the LORD's punishment on David's house. More trouble would follow.
2 Samuel 13:37-39
went to Talmai, the son of Ammihud: Absalom flees to his mother's father Talmai, king of Geshur, a foreign court beyond David's reach and beyond any city of refuge, since this killing was planned rather than accidental. Three years pass there while David mourns Amnon daily, and by the chapter's last verse the mourning has turned into something else: a father's longing for the son who murdered his brother. That longing, left unresolved here, is the seam the next two chapters open, when Joab and a wise woman will have to talk David into calling Absalom home.
2 Samuel 13:37
“Absalom fled - As he had committed wilful murder, he could not avail himself of a city of refuge, and was therefore obliged to leave the land of Israel, and take refuge with Talmai, king of Geshur, his grandfather by his mother’s side. See 2Sa 3:3.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
2 Samuel 13:37
“Absalom fled, and went to Talmai--The law as to premeditated murder (Nu 35:21) gave him no hope of remaining with impunity in his own country. The cities of refuge could afford him no sanctuary, and he was compelled to leave the kingdom, taking refuge at the court of Geshur, with his maternal grandfather, who would, doubtless, approve of his conduct.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Absalom had already waited two years, at verse 23. Three years in Geshur and two more in Jerusalem pass before he sees the king's face, according to 14:28. Salvian the Presbyter reads this long run of misfortune as one continuous punishment on David's house.
King David longed to go to Absalom once he had been consoled over Amnon's death. The Hebrew verb is feminine, and John Gill notes the Targum supplies the soul of David as its subject. Matthew Henry calls the longing David's weakness.
2 Samuel 13:39
“And the soul of King David longed to go forth unto Absalom,.... In like manner it is supplied and paraphrased in the Targum, because the word rendered "longed" is feminine; though it may be used to denote the effeminateness of David's disposition and carriage on this occasion.”
2 more voices on this verse
2 Samuel 13:39
“Longed to go forth - Rather, “longed after Absalom,” literally, was consumed in going forth, with a sense of disappointed hope.”
2 Samuel 13:39
“At first he could not find in his heart to do justice on him; now he can almost find in his heart to take him into his favour again. This was David's infirmity.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
How this psalm is built
The form: A household narrative in two crimes, the second answering the first across a two year silence, as Samuel classes it.
The patterns in this chapter
| Device | What it does | Where to see it |
|---|---|---|
| The two traps | Both crimes are worked the same way. Amnon feigns sickness and asks for food, and gets Tamar alone in an inner room at 13:6 and 13:9. Absalom waits for a feast and for wine, and gives the order when Amnon's heart is merry at 13:28. This site's published exposition note on those verses reads the second trap as an echo of the first, with wine in the place of appetite.John Wesley and Jamieson, Fausset and Brown, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament, 1765, and Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871, on 2 Samuel 13:28, as this site's published exposition note on that verse reports them. | 2 Samuel 13:6, 2 Samuel 13:9, 2 Samuel 13:28 |
| Love turned to hatred in one verse | The chapter opens by saying Amnon loved Tamar at 13:1, and states at 13:15 that he hated her with a hatred greater than the love he had felt. The same word is used for both, and the turn is stated in a single verse. The commentators read the reversal as the mark of what the desire had been all along.Jamieson, Fausset and Brown and Adam Clarke, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, 1871, and Commentary on the Bible, 1832, on 2 Samuel 13:15, as this site's published exposition note on that verse reports them. | 2 Samuel 13:1, 2 Samuel 13:15 |
| Tamar argues from the law | Tamar's plea at 13:12 and 13:13 is legal argument rather than appeal. Albert Barnes records that her words are a verbal quotation from Genesis 34:7, and reads the natural inference that she knew the passage and wished to profit by the warning it contained. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read her offer to speak to the king as a last resort to get out of the room.Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments, 1832 to 1869, on 2 Samuel 13:12, quoted in the store's pull_quotes pool at 34 words. | 2 Samuel 13:12, 2 Samuel 13:13 |
| The longing at the beginning and the longing at the end | The chapter opens on Amnon sick with a desire he cannot lawfully satisfy at 13:1 and 13:2, and closes on David longing to go to Absalom at 13:39, a son he cannot lawfully recall. The frame is read off the Berean text of those verses in the store, and no commentator in the store's quotation pool is cited for it. | 2 Samuel 13:1, 2 Samuel 13:2, 2 Samuel 13:39 |
The textual point at 13:21
13 more paragraphs on the patterns
The Hebrew at 13:21 records David's anger and stops. The Greek translation used by the early church adds a reason, that he did not vex Amnon's spirit because he loved him as his firstborn. This site's published exposition note on that verse states that the positions differ over whether the clause belongs to the original text or simply explains what the Hebrew leaves silent.
The question sits inside the larger textual situation of this book. This site's published manuscripts section records that 4QSamuel-a repeatedly agrees with the Greek against the Masoretic Text, which showed that many Septuagint readings in Samuel translate a genuine Hebrew text. The section also records that the Greek from 2 Samuel 11:2 onward has been revised toward a proto-Masoretic Hebrew, the kaige recension. A citation of the Greek here has to say which Greek is meant.
Either reading leaves the chapter's point standing. A king was angry and no judgment followed.
What the law behind the chapter says
Three laws stand behind the scene and the text reaches for all three. Genesis 34:7 supplies Tamar's own words, as Albert Barnes shows. Deuteronomy 22:25 treats the absence of a witness as decisive, and this site's published exposition note on 13:7 to 13:9 reads Amnon's clearing of the room against it. Leviticus 19:17 stands behind Absalom's silence at 13:22.
The chapter is therefore a study in law that nobody applies. Every party in it knows what the law says, and the king who could enforce it does not.
The New Testament's use
The New Testament does not quote this chapter and does not name any person in it. Its bearing on the New Testament is indirect, through the line of David, since Amnon was the firstborn and his death moves the succession.
The historical value
The sheepshearing at Baal-hazor near Ephraim is a real annual event with a real social form. Shearing was the year's payday for a flock owner and it was kept as a feast, which is why a royal son could invite the whole court without raising suspicion. The same custom stands behind Nabal's feast at 1 Samuel 25:4 to 25:11.
Geshur was a small Aramean kingdom east of the Sea of Galilee, and Talmai son of Ammihud was Absalom's own grandfather through his mother Maacah, as 3:3 records. Absalom therefore flees to a foreign court where he has a family claim and beyond any city of refuge, since this killing was planned.
The feature pages this chapter needs
The estate carries no page on Absalom and none on Tamar. This lane adds both to docs/lanes/FEATURE-PAGES-OWED.md and builds neither. A reader who wants the whole arc reads chapters 13 to 19 in order until those pages stand.
Keep studying
Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The form and classifications
This site's published exposition of 2 Samuel 13, The published note on 13:28 to 13:29, which reads the killing as that sentence taking effect; This site's published guide to 2 Samuel, src/components/book/guides/2-samuel/Book2SamuelGuide.tsx, act II, the beat at chapter 13, which names rape, a brother's silence and calculated revenge two years later and This site's published timeline of 2 Samuel, src/components/book/dossier-content/2-samuel.ts, the timeline entry "The sword in the house", anchored at 2 Samuel 15:6.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes; Fructuosus of Braga, GENERAL RULE FOR MONASTERIES 17; Jamieson Fausset and Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, LETTER 22.12; John Gill; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament; Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Salvian the Presbyter, THE GOVERNANCE OF GOD 2.5.