His armour-bearer— The literal rendering of the original word כלים נשׂא nose kelim is, bearer of the instruments or weapons. Of these there were three different sorts; the shield, the spear, and the sword. Of these bearers of arms, princes and generals had many: Joab had ten, Saul seems to have had two thousand, chap. 1 Samuel 13:2. And David's being made armour-bearer to Saul, implies no more than that he was constituted one of his guards; to bear what instrument, is not particularly said. Chandler's Review, &c. p. 95.
REFLECTIONS.—Behold,
1. Saul a miserable spectacle, forsaken of God, deprived of his wonted wisdom and courage, and haunted by an evil spirit; terrified with the gnawings of remorse; gloomy, timorous, cruel, raving; distracted with suspicion and envy, and mad with despair. Note; How like a devil may man become in this world, when the restraints of God's spirit are taken from him, and he is given up to an evil conscience and the power of Satan!
2. His servants, perhaps his physicians, beholding his strange disease, knew that medicine was vain; they tell him their apprehension of his case, and prescribe a palliative, to soothe the ruffled passions of his mind, and lull his troubled bosom to repose. Music has magic powers, and melody might harmonize the jarring discord of his soul; a cunning player on the harp would be his best physician. Saul resolves to try the prescription, and commands such an one to be procured: one of his servants, hearing his order, recommends the son of Jesse, a man eminent for every endowment of mind and person, handsome, wise, valiant, and, for musical skill and execution, peerless. Him, therefore, Saul instantly sends for to court. Note; (1.) It is to be lamented, that so divine a science as music should ever, by lewd sonnets, be prostituted to inflame those passions which it was designed to calm and suppress. (2.) It is fatally dangerous for the soul to seek ease in sensual delights, instead of carrying a troubled conscience to a pardoning God. (3.) When God is pleased to distinguish a soul by his gifts and graces, obscurity cannot hide the lustre.
3. No sooner is he sent for, than he comes. His father, according to the custom of the times, sends a present by him to testify his dutiful subjection, and Saul is charmed with his behaviour, makes him his armour-bearer, and desires his father's leave to keep him continually about his person; for soon he experienced the efficacy of David's music. The evil spirit seizing him as usual, his melancholy reflections returned; then David took the harp, and in sounds melodious soothed his sorrows, and, as Josephus says, joined to his melting lyre a voice seraphic as the song: at this the ravings of the king subside, the evil spirit leaves him, and he regains his usual serenity. Note; (1.) Music hath power over some souls, which only they who feel can describe. (2.) It once was found successful to drive the evil spirit from the soul: Satan perceived the good, and listed music in his cause; and how has it served since to convey to the enchanted mind, with deeper poison, the sentiments of lust, revelling, and creature-idolatry, and to drive from the soul, not the evil spirit, but the good.