What Does 1 Samuel 19:1 Mean?
And Saul spoke to Jonathan his son, and to all his servants, that they should kill David. But Jonathan, Saul's son, delighted much in David.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And Saul spake to Jonathan his son, and to all his servants, that they should kill David.THE KEY
Saul’s order names killing as causing David to die, exposing the lethal act inside the speech before any blow falls.
THE MEANING
The verse puts a murderous order in plain words: Saul directs his son and servants to bring about David’s death. The violence is already present in the decision and the command, before it reaches David’s body.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that violence begins only when someone physically strikes another; here, the decision and command already carry lethal intent.
THE ROOT
לְהָמִית
ləhamît
GROWS FROM
מות
m-w-t
To die; in the causative form here, to cause someone to die.
English “kill” compresses the Hebrew causative of “die”: Saul’s command is to make death happen to David. The same root names dying and death itself, making the line’s violence exact: this is deliberate causation, not a vague threat.
ALSO GROWS
mût: To die
מוּת
This is the root’s basic action; the command takes that death and makes it something Saul directs others to cause.
māvet: Death
מָוֶת
The branch names the outcome contained in Saul’s order.
mēt: Dead; deceased
מֵת
This branch names the state the command intends to bring about.
דָּוִד
Dāwīd
GROWS FROM
דוד
d-w-d
Beloved; David’s name is associated with this sense.
The name David carries the beloved association of דוד (dōd). Here, that is the name of the person Saul orders others to kill, sharpening the violence without making the name an explanation for the order.
ALSO GROWS
dōd: Beloved; uncle
דּוֹד
The name David is traditionally linked to this word, so its sense of belovedness is present in the name of Saul’s target.
dōdîm: Loves; endearments
דּוֹדִים
This related form extends the root into expressions of affection, intensifying the contrast with the death order.
THE PATTERN
A death plot takes shape when speech recruits others to make another person die.
And set two men, sons of Belial, before him, to bear witness against him, saying, You have blessed God and the king. Then bring him out, and stone him, that he may die.Then from that day forward they took counsel together to put him to death.When day came, certain of the Jews twisted themselves together and bound themselves under a curse, saying that they would neither eat nor drink until they had lifted Paul out of the way.THE THREAD
But from the tree of knowing good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you shall surely die.Genesis uses the same root מות in “thou shalt surely die” (מוֹת תָּמוּת, mot tamut); Samuel uses its causative form, “to cause to die.” The connection joins death undergone to death deliberately inflicted, which English’s “die” and “kill” can obscure.
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