Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary

Adam Clarke Commentary

David - besought God for the child - How could he do so, after the solemn assurance that he had from God that the child should die? The justice of God absolutely required that the penalty of the law should be exacted; either the father or the son shall die. This could not be reversed.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

David therefore besought God for the child,.... Perhaps went into the tabernacle he had built for the ark, and prayed to the Lord to restore the child, and spare its life; for though the Lord had said it should die, he might hope that that was a conditional threatening, and that the Lord might be gracious and reverse it, 2 Samuel 12:22,

and David fasted: all that day:

and went in; to his own house from the house of God:

and lay all night upon the earth; would neither go into, nor lie upon a bed, but lay on the floor all night, weeping and praying for the child's life, and especially for its eternal welfare: he having through sin been the means of its coming into a sinful and afflicted state.

Geneva Study Bible

(i) That is, to his private chamber.

Wesley's Explanatory Notes

David therefore besought God for the child; and David fasted, and went in, and lay all night upon the earth.

Besought — Supposing the threatening might be conditional, and so the execution of it prevented by prayer.

Went — Into his closet.

John Trapp Complete Commentary

2 Samuel 12:16 David therefore besought God for the child; and David fasted, and went in, and lay all night upon the earth.

Ver. 16. David therefore besought God.] As knowing that God doth sometimes threaten, that he may not punish: with humble submission therefore to his goodwill and pleasure he supplicateth for the sick child: wherein also he showeth his good assurance of the pardon of his own sin, by taking the humble boldness to sue for his sick child.

And lay all night upon the earth.] By this χαμευνια, humi-cubatio, lying on the ground, joined with his fasting and prayer, David doth both evidence his affection and edge his devotion. It was in the time of this humiliation, it is thought by some, that David uttered the fifty-first Psalm: which he afterwards published.

Thomas Coke Commentary on the Holy Bible

2 Samuel 12:16. David therefore besought God for the child— It may be thought surprising to see so wise a man as David fasting and mourning in this extraordinary manner for a child, who, being yet an infant, could not possibly have been endeared to him by any of those blandishments which so strongly fix the parental affections to their offspring; and who must moreover, if he should live, be a perpetual brand of infamy upon his parents. The true way of accounting for it is by ascribing it, as Le Clerc does, to David's excess of passion for Bath-sheba, which so strongly attached him to every offspring of hers, and made him forget every thing in this child but that motive of endearment. Besides this, there is something in human nature which prompts us to rate things after a manner seemingly unaccountable, and to estimate them, not according to their real worth, but according to the expence, or trouble, or even distress, that they have cost us.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

David besought God for the child; supposing the threatening might be conditional, and so the execution of it prevented by prayer.

Went in, to wit, into his closet, as Matthew 6:6, to pray solitarily and earnestly, as he had done with others. Or this word may only note his progress and continuance in the actions here expressed.

Whedon's Commentary on the Bible

16.Besought God for the child — For, according to 2 Samuel 12:22, he entertained some hope that God might yet spare him.

Went in — Into some private apartment of his own house.

Lay all night upon the earth — Evidence of profoundest anguish and grief. Compare 2 Samuel 13:31.

George Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary

A fast, (jejunavit jejunio) denotes, with more than ordinary rigour. (Salien) --- By himself. Hebrew, "he went in, and lay all night upon the ground." (Haydock)

E.W. Bullinger's Companion Bible Notes

and. Note the Figure of speech Polysyndeton in this verse. App-6.

fasted. Hebrew. fasted a fast = made a strict fast. Figure of speech Polyptoton. App-6.

lay all night upon the earth: as a penitent, with Psa 51 for his utterance. Note his sitting before Jehovah as a worshipper, and his utterance (2 Samuel 7:18-29); and his standing as a servant (1 Chronicles 28:2), and his utterance and service (1 Chronicles 28:3 - 2 Samuel 29:21).

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(16) Besought God for the child.—It can hardly be necessary to say that this does not imply any want of submissiveness to God’s will on David’s part, nor an inordinate love for the child of his guilt. “In the case of a man whose penitence was so earnest and so deep, the prayer for the preservation of his child must have sprung from some other source than excessive love of any created object. His great desire was to avert the stroke as a sign of the wrath of God, in the hope that he might be able to discern, in the preservation of the child, a proof of Divine favour consequent upon the restoration of his fellowship with God. But when the child was dead, he humbled himself under the mighty hand of God, and rested satisfied with His grace, without giving himself up to fruitless pain” (O. von Gerlach, quoted by Keil). Yet David’s deep love for the child is not to be overlooked altogether.

Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

besought

22; Psalms 50:15; Isaiah 26:16; Joel 2:12-14; Jonah 3:9

fasted

Heb. fasted a fast.

Esther 4:16; Psalms 69:10; Isaiah 22:12; Acts 9:9

lay all night

13:31; Job 20:12-14