2 Samuel 4:11 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

How much more, &c. If he put the Amalekite to death for barely saying that he slew Saul, even at Saul's own command, and when his life was despaired of, how much more would he take signal vengeance on their united and aggravated treachery and murder? When wicked men have slain a righteous person For such Ish-bosheth was in respect of them. Saul might have some guilt in the Amalekite's eye from his former destruction of the Amalekites; but Ish-bosheth could have none with regard to these his murderers, to whom he had done no wrong, but had preferred them to places of trust and honour. In respect of David, however, Ish- bosheth was not righteous, because he opposed him whom he knew God had appointed to the throne. In his own house, upon his bed This aggravated their crime, and made it very different from that of the Amalekite who slew Saul. Shall I not, therefore, require his blood at your hands? As persons unworthy to live. There is no one villany which the human mind so naturally, so instinctively abhors as treachery; because it is, perhaps, the only villany from which no man living is secure; and for this reason every man must take pleasure in the punishing it. This conduct of David toward these murderers of Ish-bosheth is well worth our attention; it is a proof of his integrity and piety, and of his detestation of treachery and cruelty. And we may learn from hence, that we ought not only to do no hurt to our enemies, but that we ought not even to rejoice at the hurt which may happen to them without our contributing any thing to it, nor to countenance injustice and vice in any degree, how great advantage soever we may reap from them.