2 Samuel 4:2,3 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

2 Samuel 4:2-3. (For Beeroth also was reckoned to Benjamin— Beeroth was a city formerly belonging to the Gibeonites, within the lot of Benjamin, but most certainly not inhabited by them, when the Beerothites fled to Gittaim, after the defeat of Gilboa; for Gittaim was a Benjamite city, and had those Beerothites been Gibeonites, they would have fled to any region of the earth, rather than to the protection of the tribe of Benjamin, the tribe of Saul, the mortal enemy to their race. What then are we to infer from the flight of the Beerothites to a Benjamite city at that time, but that they themselves were Benjamites? And how could this city be then inhabited by Benjamites, otherwise than by the expulsion and eradication of the Gibeonites, when Saul destroyed them? And what reason was there for Saul's destroying them, but to give their possessions to his friends, the Benjamites? And certainly there can be no doubt upon the point, when we find them in fact possessed of that city. Here then the divine justice is very remarkable. Saul cut off the Gibeonites, to make way for his Benjamites; and two of these very Benjamites, the sons of a Benjamite of Beeroth, cut off his posterity, the chief stay and hope of his house; and did this against all the dictates of duty, gratitude, and natural affection. How adorable and how dreadful are the divine retributions of vengeance!