And David said in his heart. — David’s position seems to have grown more and more untenable during the latter days of Saul’s reign. Probably the paroxysms of the king’s fatal malady grew sharper and more frequent, and his chieftains and favourites, whom, as we have already seen (1 Samuel 26), he had chosen mostly out of the one small tribe of Benjamin, feared — and with good reason — the advent of David to the throne, which they saw was imminent in the event of Saul’s dying or being permanently disqualified to rule. These men, whose bitter hostility to David is more than hinted at in several places, doubtless taking advantage of the king’s state of mind, incited him against David. The words and persuasions of such men as Cush the Benjamite (see Psalms 7), Doeg the Edomite, probably Abner the captain of the host, the men of Ziph, and others, quickly erased from the memory of Saul such scenes as we have witnessed in the En-gedi cave, and, still more recently, in the hill of Hachilah, and more than counterbalanced the devotion and powerful friendship of true warriors like Jonathan, who loved and admired David. In David’s words, after he had taken the spear and cruse from the side of the sleeping Saul, we see something of what was passing in his mind — his constant fear of a violent death; his knowledge that powerful and wicked men were constantly plotting against him; and his determination to seek a home in another land, where, however, he expected to find a grave far away from the chosen race, among the idolators and enemies of Jehovah of Israel. He now realises a part of these sorrowful forebodings. But in this determination of the son of Jesse we never hear of prayer, or of consultation with prophet or with priest. A dull despair seems to have at this time deprived David at once of faith and hope.
Into the land of the Philistines. — David chose to seek a refuge among these warlike people, for he believed he would be in greater security there than among his friendly kinsfolk, the Moabites, where, in former days, he had found such a kindly welcome for his family in the first period of Saul’s enmity. He probably doubted the power of Moab to protect him.