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1 Samuel 25:4

in 1 Samuel 25

While David was in the wilderness, he heard that Nabal was shearing sheep.

BSB

The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾

ASV

And David heard in the wilderness that Nabal was shearing his sheep.

KJV

And David heard in the wilderness that Nabal did shear his sheep.

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This verse in 1 Samuel 25

Commentary

3 notes on this verse

This site's exposition

While David was in the wilderness, he heard that Nabal was shearing sheep

on 1 Samuel 25:4-6

David sends ten young men up to Carmel with a customary greeting for shearing season. The greeting is also a quiet reminder, for David's men had protected Nabal's shepherds in the fields. So the peace wished on Nabal's house answers the peace David's men had already kept for it.

The record, by era

The Medieval Church1 voice

A commentator

Bede

Commentary on Samuel · Written before 735.

proposed

When therefore David heard in the desert that Nabal was shearing his sheep, etc. When the Lord, conversing in the world in man, heard that the learned in the law were preparing their hearers either to cleanse themselves from sins or to offer their own …

The Puritans and the Awakening1 voice

And David heard in the wilderness,.... In the wilderness of Paran, where he was, and a wilderness it was to him, being in want of food, as the following relation shows: that Nabal did shear his sheep; when there was generally good living, and so a proper person, and a proper time, for David to apply for the relief of his wants.

The words behind it

8 Hebrew words

Every Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.

  • וַיִּשְׁמַ֥עand he heard

    vaiyishma'H8085 →1159 times

  • דָּוִ֖דDavid

    davidH1732 →999 times

  • בַּמִּדְבָּ֑רin the wilderness

    bamidbarH4057 →270 times

  • כִּֽי־that

    ki-H3588 →4482 times

  • גֹזֵ֥ז[was] shearing

    gozezH1494 →15 times

  • נָבָ֖לNabal

    navalH5037 →22 times

  • אֶת־<obj.>

    ʾet-H853 →10935 times

  • צֹאנֽוֹ׃sheep his

    tzonoH6629 →274 times

A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.

Related verses

2 in all, six open

The walk

5 stops

Each card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.

  • Through

    2 Samuel 13:23

    Two years later, when Absalom’s sheepshearers were at Baal-hazor near Ephraim, he invited all the sons of the king.

    it leads to

    • Genesis 38:12–13

      After a long time Judah’s wife, the daughter of Shua, died. When Judah had finished mourning, he and his friend Hirah the Adullamite went up to his sheepshearers at Timnah.

    • 1 Kings 1:25

      For today he has gone down and sacrificed an abundance of oxen, fattened calves, and sheep, and has invited all the sons of the king, the commanders of the army, and Abiathar the priest.…

    • 1 Samuel 25:2

      Now there was a man in Maon whose business was in Carmel. He was a very wealthy man with a thousand goats and three thousand sheep, which he was shearing in Carmel.

    • 2 Kings 3:4

      Now Mesha king of Moab was a sheep breeder, and he would render to the king of Israel a hundred thousand lambs and the wool of a hundred thousand rams.

    • 1 Samuel 25:7

      Now I hear that it is time for shearing. When your shepherds were with us, we did not harass them, and nothing of theirs was missing the whole time they were in Carmel.

Where this verse is studied

About 1 Samuel

Anointing of David by Samuel, Félix-Joseph Barrias, 1842, Musée des Beaux-Arts de la ville de Paris. Public domain.
Anointing of David by Samuel, Félix-Joseph Barrias, 1842, Musée des Beaux-Arts de la ville de Paris. Public domain.
1 Samuel: the study guide →Read 1 Samuel 25 →

This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Bede, Commentary on Samuel; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament and John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763).

Read on in 1 Samuel 25 →