1. made him houses] Cp. 2 Samuel 5:9.

a tent] a new tent, not the old tabernacle (1 Chronicles 16:39). Cp. the prefatory note to ch. 13.Verse 1. - The contents of this verse and the following verses up to the twenty-fifth have no parallel in the Book of Samuel, and excite suggestion respecting the different objects with which the compiler of Chronicles wrote, as compared with those of the author of the former work. They also direct fresh attention to the sources upon which they drew. The history of the preparations made for the reception of the ark, and for its safe and religious escort into the city, is now proceeded with. These preparations occupied the three months, or part of the three months, spoken of in 1 Chronicles 13:14. The houses may have been both his own (1 Chronicles 14:1) and the buildings referred to in 1 Chronicles 11:8 and 2 Samuel 5:9. The old tent, or tabernacle, is repeatedly alluded to, as in 1 Chronicles 16:39; 2 Chronicles 1:3. It will be remembered that the tabernacle established by Joshua at Shiloh remained there till the time of Eli, and the ark within it (1 Samuel 3:3). Afterwards we find it removed to Nob, for there David ate the shewbread (1 Samuel 21:6). From thence, very possibly after the savage slaughter of the priests by the order of Saul, it was removed, and we find it at Gibeon, according to the above references. Here at Gibeon was an altar and "high place," which, in the earlier time of Solomon, formed the chief religious centre. The wanderings of the ark already given from Shiloh, through Philistia to Beth-she-mesh, Kirjath-jearim, Perez-uzzah, now land it in this tent in Jerusalem. It is no more sheltered in the tabernacle. But the tabernacle, as well as the ark, was ultimately brought to the new-built temple of Solomon (1 Kings 8:4; 1 Chronicles 9:19; 2 Chronicles 1:4). Instead of נשּׂא כּי, that He (Jahve) had lifted up (נשּׂא, perf. Pi.), as in 2 Samuel 5:12, in the Chronicle we read למעלה נשּׂאת כּי, that his kingdom had been lifted up on high. The unusual form נשּׂאת may be, according to the context, the third pers. fem. perf. Niph., nisaa't having first been changed into נשּׂאת, and thus contracted into נשּׂאת; cf. Ew. 194, b. In 2 Samuel 19:43 the same form is the infin. abs. Niph. למעלה is here, as frequently in the Chronicles, used to intensify the expression: cf. 1 Chronicles 22:5; 1 Chronicles 23:17; 1 Chronicles 29:3, 1 Chronicles 29:25; 2 Chronicles 1:1; 2 Chronicles 17:12. With regard to the sons of David, see on 1 Chronicles 3:5-8.

In the account of the victories over the Philistines, the statement (2 Samuel 5:17) that David went down to the mountain-hold, which has no important connection with the main fact, and would have been for the readers of the Chronicle somewhat obscure, is exchanged in 1 Chronicles 14:8 for the more general expression לפניהם ויּצא, "he went forth against them." In 1 Chronicles 14:14, the divine answer to David's question, whether he should march against the Philistines, runs thus: מעליהם הסב אחריהם תּעלה לא, Thou shalt not go up after them; turn away from them, and come upon them over against the baca-bushes; - while in 2 Samuel 5:23, on the contrary, we read: אל־אחריהם הסב תעלה הסב אל־א לע, Thou shalt not go up (i.e., advance against the enemy to attack them in front); turn thee behind them (i.e., to their rear), and come upon them over against the baca-bushes. Bertheau endeavours to get rid of the discrepancy, by supposing that into both texts corruptions have crept through transcribers' errors. He conjectures that the text of Samuel was originally אחריהם תּעלה לא, while in the Chronicle a transposition of the words עליהם and אחריהם was occasioned by a copyist's error, which in turn resulted in the alteration of עליהם into מעליהם. This supposition, however, stands or falls with the presumption that by תּעלה לא (Sam.) an attack is forbidden; but for that presumption no tenable grounds exist: it would rather involve a contradiction between the first part of the divine answer and the second. The last clause, "Come upon them from over against the baca-bushes," shows that the attack was not forbidden; all that was forbidden was the making of the attack by advancing straight forward: instead of that, they were to try to fall upon them in the rear, by making a circuit. The chronicler consequently gives us an explanation of the ambiguous words of 2 Samuel, which might easily be misunderstood. As David's question was doubtless expressed as it is in 1 Chronicles 14:10, הפל על האעלה, the answer תּעלה לא might be understood to mean, "Go not up against them, attack them not, but go away behind them;" but with that the following וגו להם וּבאת, "Come upon them from the baca-bushes," did not seem to harmonize. The chronicler consequently explains the first clauses of the answer thus: "Go not up straight behind them," i.e., advance not against them so as to attack them openly, "but turn thyself away from them," i.e., strike off in such a direction as to turn their flank, and come upon them from the front of the baca-bushes. In this way the apparently contradictory texts are reconciled without the alteration of a word. In 1 Chronicles 14:17, which is wanting in Samuel, the author concludes the account of these victories by the remark that they tended greatly to exalt the name of David among the nations. For similar reflections, cf. 2 Chronicles 17:10; 2 Chronicles 20:29; 2 Chronicles 14:13; and for שׁם ויּצא, 2 Chronicles 26:15.

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