1 Samuel 18:17 Commentary and Bible Study

Saul is scheming in his heart and his thoughts turn to his daughter. He will use her as a weapon to ensnare David. ‘And Saul said to David, Behold my elder daughter Merab, her will I give thee to wife: only be thou valiant for me, and fight the LORD'S battles.’ Get on with doing something; go on the offensive; engaged the Philistines; do the most daring things, and you shall have Merab as your wife. There are those whose hearts are nothing but deceit and the believer has to be on his guard. Our natural tendency may be to trust people, and we may find it hard to attribute cunning and malice to them, but David needed to do so here. The offer of marriage was apparently so genuine, and the real aim was well hidden. The Scripture tells us what was really going on in Saul’s heart, but you would not easily have known this from his outward manner and speech. He dressed up this offer as something noble, and of course he hoped that his real intention was out of sight. He hoped that David would take him at his word and not question it too deeply. He attached to the marriage a condition that sounded as if he was zealous for the cause of God and the advance of Israel, but it was all phony. The deceiver knows how to disguise his purpose, and he knows the sort of things he needs to say to sound plausible. Saul was good at this. But the Scripture lays bare what he would not have wanted anyone to see. ‘For Saul said, Let not mine hand be upon him, but let the hand of the Philistines be upon him.’ How naked we stand before the Lord. Scripture here exposes what he really was ahead of the day of judgment. As the reader reads these words, he is shown what was really going on. What was really in Saul’s heart was murder. He wanted to be rid of his enemy. But let not his hand be upon David; that would reveal him as a murderer. Let cunning cover over his sin, and let him clothe it in the garments of gracious indulgence to a subject.But David saw through all this, and the block of verses gives us an instance of the wisdom we have read about, at work. ‘Who am I? and what is my life, or my father's family in Israel, that I should be son in law to the king?’ He must conduct himself with the utmost discretion. He could not say what he thought Saul was really doing; he had to continue to be subject to him, and to serve him with respect. Saul was king until God removed him; he must continue to work in his sovereign’s interest. But when he receives the message about the king’s offer of his daughter’s hand in marriage, his answer is a model of prudence. There is nothing in it to cause offence. He acknowledges the privilege offered to him. He counts himself as unworthy of it, and that is sincerely meant. He does not reveal that he has seen through the king’s duplicity, and he will go ahead and comply with the request even though it is false, because at the same time he sees that it is the will of God that he does this. We are aware that Saul's daughter, presumably the very same Merab, had already been promised to the man who would kill Goliath, which David had done, and the pledge had not been kept. Saul doesn't keep his pledges. Merab is promised again, and a new condition is attached: David must go out and the kill more Philistines. Saul does not expect David to survive, and has no serious intention of giving Merab to him. When therefore David succeeds and lives, Saul, whose word counts for little, gives her to another. David was cheated again, but he continues to serve Saul.