Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary

Adam Clarke Commentary

Twenty thousand men - Whether these were slain on the field of battle, or whether they were reckoned with those slain in the wood of Ephraim, we know not.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

Where the people of Israel were slain before the servants of David,.... That is, the people of Israel that were under Absalom, these were beaten by David's army:

and there was a great slaughter that day of twenty thousand men; including both those that fell in the field of battle, and that were slain in the pursuit; and this is to be understood only of Absalom's party.

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

the people of Israel were slain — This designation, together with the immense slaughter mentioned later, shows the large extent to which the people were enlisted in this unhappy civil contest.

John Trapp Complete Commentary

2 Samuel 18:7 Where the people of Israel were slain before the servants of David, and there was there a great slaughter that day of twenty thousand [men].

Ver. 7. Where the people of Israel were slain.] For a just reward of their unjust rebellion: besides a great sort of them who having tasted of the sweetness of war, dulce bellum inexpertis, threw down their arms, and ran home ad beatos rastros, benedictura aratrum, sanctamque stivam, (a) as the divine chronologer saith of the seditious boors of Germany beaten by the princes, together with Munzer, their general, who was taken and executed according to his deserts.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible

The people of Israel, i.e. the soldiers of Absalom; so called, partly to note that all Israel (some few excepted) were engaged in this rebellion, which made David’s deliverance more glorious and remarkable; and partly in opposition to David’s men, who, as to the main body, or most considerable part, were of the tribe of Judah, or had followed him from Judah.

Whedon's Commentary on the Bible

7.Twenty thousand — Surely the multitude that followed Absalom must have been like the sand of the sea. 2 Samuel 17:11.

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible - Unabridged

Where the people of Israel were slain before the servants of David, and there was there a great slaughter that day of twenty thousand men.

The people of Israel were slain. This designation, together with the immense slaughter mentioned later, shows the large extent to which the people were enlisted in this unhappy civil contest. The army of Absalom would be, as in all Eastern wars, an immense heterogeneous mass of people; and the first shock, the spilt blood of a few, generally decides the fate of the day.

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(7) Twenty Thousand.—This number seems large, but we really know nothing of the size of the forces engaged on either side; and if the phrase “that day” be taken, as often, with sufficient latitude to include the whole campaign of which this battle was the culmination, there is nothing surprising in the destruction of 20,000 men. Of the human causes of the victory nothing is told. We may assume that the advantage of thorough military organisation and generalship was on David’s side; but, in addition to this, was the vast power of the right, the prestige of law and authority.

Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

the people

2:17; 15:6; 19:41-43

a great

Proverbs 11:21; 24:21

twenty thousand men

2:26,31; 2 Chronicles 13:16,17; 28:6