Teks -- 1 Samuel 25:1 (NET)

The Death of Samuel

25:1 Samuel died, and all Israel assembled and mourned him. They buried him at his home in Ramah. Then David left and went down to the desert of Paran.

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Kata/Frasa (per frasa)

Wesley: 1Sa 25:1 - Lamented him

Those have hard hearts, that can bury their faithful ministers with dry eyes, and are not sensible of the loss of them who have prayed for them, and taught them the way of the Lord.

JFB: 1Sa 25:1 - Samuel died

After a long life of piety and public usefulness, he left behind him a reputation which ranks him among the greatest of Scripture worthies.

JFB: 1Sa 25:1 - buried him in his house at Ramah

That is, his own mausoleum. The Hebrews took as great care to provide sepulchers anciently as people do in the East still, where every respectable family has its own house of the dead. Often this is in a little detached garden, containing a small stone building (where there is no rock), resembling a house, which is called the sepulcher of the family--it has neither door nor window.

JFB: 1Sa 25:1 - David arose, and went down to the wilderness of Paran

This removal had probably no connection with the prophet's death; but was probably occasioned by the necessity of seeking provision for his numerous followers.

JFB: 1Sa 25:1 - the wilderness of Paran

Stretching from Sinai to the borders of Palestine in the southern territories of Judea. Like other wildernesses, it presented large tracts of natural pasture, to which the people sent their cattle at the grazing season, but where they were liable to constant and heavy depredations by prowling Arabs. David and his men earned their subsistence by making reprisals on the cattle of these freebooting Ishmaelites; and, frequently for their useful services, they obtained voluntary tokens of acknowledgment from the peaceful inhabitants.

Clarke: 1Sa 25:1 - And Samuel died

And Samuel died - Samuel lived, as is supposed, about ninety-eight years; was in the government of Israel before Saul from sixteen to twenty years; and ceased to live, according to the Jews, about four months before the death of Saul; but according to Calmet and others, two years. But all this is very uncertain; how long he died before Saul, cannot be ascertained. For some account of his character, see the end of the chapter, 1Sa 25:44 (note)

Clarke: 1Sa 25:1 - Buried him in his house

Buried him in his house - Probably this means, not his dwelling-house, but the house or tomb he had made for his sepulture; and thus the Syriac and Arabic seem to have understood it

Clarke: 1Sa 25:1 - David - went down to the wilderness of Paran

David - went down to the wilderness of Paran - This was either on the confines of Judea, or in Arabia Petraea, between the mountains of Judah and Mount Sinai; it is evident from the history that it was not far from Carmel, on the south confines of Judah.

TSK: 1Sa 25:1 - Samuel // lamented // in his house // the wilderness

am 2944, bc 1060, An, Ex, Is 431

Samuel : 1Sa 28:3

lamented : Gen 50:11; Num 20:29; Deu 34:8; Act 8:2

in his house : 1Sa 7:17; 1Ki 2:34; 2Ch 33:20; Isa 14:18

the wilderness : Gen 14:6, Gen 21:21; Num 10:12, Num 12:16, Num 13:3, Num 13:26; Psa 120:5

Tafsiran/Catatan -- Catatan Kata/Frasa (per Ayat)

Haydock: 1Sa 25:1 - Samuel died // All Israel // House

Samuel died. The Rabbins say four months before Saul. (Seder, olam 13.) (Tirinus) ---

Others believe about two years; and suppose that he was 98 years old, twenty of which he had been judge: (Calmet) Salien says 38, and that he lived seventy-seven years. (Menochius) ---

On all these points the learned are divided, chap. vii. 15. They are more unanimous in praising (Haydock) the conduct of this most holy statesman. Grotius compares him with Aristides. (Calmet) ---

But he Holy Ghost gives Samuel a far more glorious character, Ecclesiasticus xlvi. 16., &c. (Haydock) ---

Both he and his mother are figures of the two testaments. Anna becomes fruitful ---

Samuel is substituted in the place of Heli. The sterility of Anna represents the incapacity of the Synagogue, to produce living and virtuous children. She bears Samuel, the figure of Jesus Christ, who reunites in his person the royal and the sacerdotal dignity. But under another point of view, Samuel, how perfect soever, must give place to the more perfect David, the glorious type of Jesus Christ, and thus the Synagogue, notwithstanding all her prerogatives, must yield to the Church. See St. Augustine, de C.[City of God?] xvii. 1, 4. Many of the ancients have looked upon Samuel as the high priest: but the generality have acknowledged that he was only a Levite, (Calmet) or an extraordinary priest, like Moses. (Haydock) ---

All Israel, or many from every tribe, assembled to attend his funeral; (Tirinus) and all mourned for him, as they had done for Moses and Aaron. (Salien) ---

House, or among his kindred, (Tirinus) in a place which he had chosen for his tomb. This is called the house of the wicked for ever; but the just raise their hopes much higher, and await a more splendid palace above, and a glorious resurrection. (Haydock) ---

The would not bury Samuel in his dwelling-house, as it could not then be entered without incurring an uncleanness. (Calmet) ---

His bones were translated with great respect to Constantinople, and a noble mausoleum was built for them by the emperor Justinian. (Procopius v.; St. Jerome, contra Vigil.) (Tirinus)

Gill: 1Sa 25:1 - And Samuel died // and all the Israelites were gathered together, and lamented him // and buried him in his house at Ramah // and David arose and went down to the wilderness of Paran

And Samuel died,.... In the interval, when Saul and David were parted, and before they saw each other again; according to the Jewish chronology ^g, Samuel died four months before Saul; but other Jewish writers say ^h he died seven months before; Abarbinel thinks it was a year or two before; which is most likely and indeed certain, since David was in the country of the Philistines after this a full year and four months, if the true sense of the phrase is expressed in 1Sa 27:7; and Saul was not then dead; and so another Jewish chronologer ⁱ says, that Saul died two years after Samuel, to which agrees Clemens of Alexandria ^k; and according to the Jews ^l, he died the twentieth of Ijar, for which a fast was kept on that day:

and all the Israelites were gathered together, and lamented him; his death being a public loss, not only to the college of the prophets, over which he presided, but to the whole nation; and they had reason to lament his death, when they called to mind, the many good offices he had done them from his youth upwards; and when the government was in his hands, which was administered in the most prudent and faithful manner; and after that they had his wise counsel and advice, his good wishes and prayers for them; and the rather they had reason to lament him, since Saul their king proved so bad as he did, and at this time a difference was subsisting between David and him:

and buried him in his house at Ramah; where he lived and died; not that he was buried in his house, properly so called, or within the walls of that building wherein he dwelt; though the Greeks ^m and Romans ⁿ used to bury in their own dwelling houses; hence sprung the idolatrous worship of the Lares, or household gods; but not the Hebrews, which their laws about uncleanness by graves would not admit of, see Num 19:15; but the meaning is, that they buried him in the place where his house was, as Ben Gersom interprets it, at Ramah, in some field or garden belonging to it. The author of the Cippi Hebraici says ^o, that here his father Elkanah, and his mother Hannah, and her two sons, were buried in a vault shut up, with, monuments over it; and here, some say ^p, Samuel's bones remained, until removed by Arcadius the emperor into Thrace; Benjamin of Tudela reports ^q, that when the Christians took Ramlah, which is Ramah, from the Mahometans, they found the grave of Samuel at Ramah by a synagogue of the Jews, and they took him out of the grave, and carried him to Shiloh, and there built a large temple, which is called the Samuel of Shiloh to this day:

and David arose and went down to the wilderness of Paran; on hearing of the death of Samuel, there to indulge his mourning for him; or rather that he might be in greater safety from Saul, being further off, this wilderness lying on the south of the tribe of Judah, and inhabited by Arabs, and these called Kedarenes; and now it was that he dwelt in the tents of Kedar, Psa 120:5.