Bible Strands
1 Samuel 20:24
So David hid in the field, and when the New Moon had come, the king sat down to eat.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The narrator reports David concealing himself in a field while King Saul prepares for the New Moon feast. This moment follows David and Jonathan’s covenant and their appeal to the LORD as their perpetual witness.
The words — The Hebrew verb וַיִּסָּתֵר (va/yi.ssa.Ter) literally means "and he hid himself," and חֹדֶשׁ (Cho.desh) denotes the "new moon." These terms mark the exact point of David’s withdrawal and the resumption of the royal calendar.
The thread — The New Moon meal recurs in 1 Samuel 20:5 and 24, while the danger of dining under hostility parallels Proverbs 15:17 and the warning against pious hypocrisy in Psalm 50:16.
Why it lands — The text requires acknowledging that covenant fidelity sometimes demands physical removal when a ruler’s table becomes a threat. It asks the reader to honor divine witness without conflating it with immediate human safety.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
So David hid himself in the field: and when the new moon was come, the king sat him down to eat meat.
Cross-references
- Psalms 50:16 To the wicked, however, God says, “What right have you to recite My statutes and to bear My covenant on your lips?
- Proverbs 4:17 For they eat the bread of wickedness and drink the wine of violence.
- Proverbs 15:17 Better a dish of vegetables where there is love than a fattened ox with hatred.
- Proverbs 17:1 Better a dry morsel in quietness than a house full of feasting with strife.
- Proverbs 21:3 To do righteousness and justice is more desirable to the LORD than sacrifice.
- Isaiah 1:11 “What good to Me is your multitude of sacrifices?” says the LORD. “I am full from the burnt offerings of rams and the fat of well-fed cattle; I take no delight in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.
- Proverbs 21:27 The sacrifice of the wicked is detestable—how much more so when brought with ill intent!
- Zechariah 7:6 And when you were eating and drinking, were you not doing so simply for yourselves?
- John 18:28 Then they led Jesus away from Caiaphas into the Praetorium. By now it was early morning, and the Jews did not enter the Praetorium, to avoid being defiled and unable to eat the Passover.