19 When all the kings who were servants to Hadadezer saw that they were defeated before Israel, they made peace with Israel, and served them. So the Syrians feared to help the children of Ammon any more.
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
Servants to Hadarezer - This gives us an idea of the great power of Hadarezer, and consequently of the strength of Israel in David's victorious reign.
Made peace with Israel - They made this peace separately, and were obliged to pay tribute to the Israelites. Some copies of the Vulgate add here after the word Israel, Expaverunt et fugerunt quinquaginta et octo millia coram Israel; "and they were panic-struck, and fled fifty-eight thousand of them before Israel." This reading is nowhere else to be found. "Thus," observes Dr. Delaney, "the arms of David were blessed; and God accomplished the promises which he had made to Abraham, Genesis 15:18, and renewed to Joshua, Joshua 1:2, Joshua 1:4." And thus, in the space of nineteen or twenty years, David had the good fortune to finish gloriously eight wars, all righteously undertaken, and all honourably terminated; viz.
1. The civil war with Ish-bosheth.
2. The war against the Jebusites.
3. The war against the Philistines and their allies.
4. The war against the Philistines alone.
5. The war against the Moabites.
6. The war against Hadadezer.
7. The war against the Idumeans.
8. The war against the Ammonites and Syrians.
This last victory was soon followed by the complete conquest of the kingdom of the Ammonites, abandoned by their allies. What glory to the monarch of Israel, had not the splendor of this illustrious epoch been obscured by a complication of crimes, of which one could never have even suspected him capable!
We have now done with the first part of this book, in which we find David great, glorious, and pious: we come to the second part, in which we shall have the pain to observe him fallen from God, and his horn defiled in the dust by crimes of the most flagitious nature. Let him that most assuredly standeth take heed lest he fall.
And when all the kings that were servants to Hadarezer,.... That were subject to him, and at his beck and command, at least were hired by him into his service:
saw that they were smitten before Israel; could not stand their ground against them, being too powerful for them:
they made peace with Israel, and served them; became tributaries to them, whereby the promise of the land of Canaan made to Abraham and his seed, as reaching to the river Euphrates, had its accomplishment, Genesis 15:18,
so the Syrians feared to help the children of Ammon any more; who standing by themselves, they were soon and easily conquered by David's forces, as recorded in the following chapters.
"And when all the kings, the vassals of Hadarezer, saw that they were smitten before Israel, they made peace with Israel, and became subject to them; and Aram was afraid to render any further help to the Ammonites." It might appear from the first half of this verse, that it was only the vassals of Hadarezer who made peace with Israel, and became subject to it, and that Hadarezer himself did not. But the last clause, "and the Aramaeans were afraid," etc., shows very clearly that Hadarezer also made peace with the Israelites, and submitted to their rule; so that the expression in the first half of the verse is not a very exact one.
And served them - And thus at length was fulfilled the promise made to Abraham, and repeated to Joshua, that the borders of Israel should extend as far as the river Euphrates. The son of David sent his ambassadors, his apostles and ministers, to the Jewish church and nation. But they intreated them shamefully, as Hanun did David's, mocked them, abused them, slew them. And this it was that filled the measure of their iniquity, and brought upon them ruin without remedy.
*More commentary available at chapter level.