The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Samuel — Section 29

thus conduces to tho security of human life. Severity to one is mercy to many, On the other h11nd, it may be se.id that: 1. The claims of justice are adequately satisfied by a lifelong penal servitude, 2. Scripture, rightly interpreted, does not justify the infliction of dellth. The Noe.chic precept (if it be such) was adapted only to a.n early stage of eooiety, its litere.l fulfilment is no longer required, e.nd the principle on which it rests (the dignity of me.n) Is preserved nnd more fully maintained by the revelations and Influences of Christianity. Tho whole spirit of the New Testament is in favour of seeking the reformation rather than effecting the destruction of the offender. "Mercy glorieth age.inst judgment." Even the fratricide Ca.in was spared (Gen. iv. 5), a.s if to show the possibility e.nd propriety of sparing the life of the criminal. 3. The welfare of society is more fully promoted by sparing his life than by taking it away. Hardened crimine.ls and persons under the influence of strong passion are not deterred by the rear of death; other persons are more powerfully affected by other motives. The possibility of the innocent sufferin~ a penalty which is irreversible ea.uses hesitation in its inflic- tion where there is the least doubt, and so the guilty often escape, punishment becomes uncertain, and men are tempted to commit crime in the hope of impunity. As a matter of fact, crime does not increase in those countries where ea.pita! punishment is abolished. "After the Divine permission to inflict capital punishment which had been given for a considerable period of time, had displayed itself as the most extreme madness in the execution of Christ, the question of its abolition has become only a question of time. The question is whether Christ may not have done enough for this" (Ewa.Id, • Antiquities,' p. 174).-D. Vers. 17, 18.-(ZIKLAG.) The song of the bow. I. THE OCCASION of this lament, threnody, elegy, or funeral dirge, was the arrival of fatal tidings from Gilboa. "There were only two in that great slaughter concerning whose fate David was eager to know the truth-his enemy and his friend. ' How knowest thou that Saul and Jonathan his son be dead ? ' (ver. 5). When the news was fully established, he immediately went through a.11 the signs of Eastern grief. He and his six hundred heroes sat with their clothes rent, uttering the loud Oriental wail, observing the rigid Eastern fast until the sunset of the fatal day released them. Then David roused himself to action. The first vent to his grief was in the stem exaction of the life. of the unhappy mes- senger, according to the hard temper of those fierce times. The second vent was in the touching dirge, which, according to the tender spirit of the sweet psalmist of Israel, he poured forth over the two departed chiefs"(' The Songs of Israel,' Gootl. Words, 1863). It was probably accompanied by his harp, that had long been silent, but was now taken up afresh and struck to a song of sorrow which for tenderness and intensity has never been surpe.ssed. "The genius and origin of the elegy among the Hebrews may be clearly traced to their manner of celebrating their funeral rites" (Lowth). "If you attend to David's harp, you shall hear as many hearse-like airs as carols" (Bacon). II. THE TITLE of" '!'he Bow" (Kesheth), which it appears to have received, may have been derived from the mention of the bow in ver. 22, as the favourite weapon of Jone.than (1 Sam. xviii. 4 ; xx. 20), as it was of his tribesmen (1 Chron. xii. 2) ; or "because it waR a martial ode" (Keil). It is improbable that David introduced "the use of the bow" (Authorized Version) into the tribe of Judah, either as a tribute to the memory of his friend, or as a means of repairing the recent disaster; for that had been long familiar. But he "bade them teach the cbildreu of Judah" the song of "the bow" (possibly that his youthful warriors might sing it in their military practice with the bow)-a title given to it in the Book of Jashar (Josh. x. 13), or collection of national songs, in which it was preserved. "When the writer of 2 Samuel transferred the dirge to his own pages, he transferred it, as we might do any of the psalms, with its title, which was as follows: 'For the children of Israel to learn by heart. Kasheth from the Book of Jasher'" (' Speaker's Commentary'). III. lTs FORM is that of a lyrical composition, the oldest as well as the mast common species of Hebrew poetry; and (like the rest) it is distinguished by parallelism or rhythm, "the measured rise and fall of feeling and utterance, in which the poet's effort to become fully master of his P'l5tic inspiration fiuds harmonious expression, and the external rhythm of sound is properly i;ubordinated to thti rbythmic pulsation of thought" -(British Quar~ly Billil!W, Januury, 1877). U contains a refrain or  THE SECOND BOOK 01•' SAMUEL. [oH. I, 1-27,