Bible Strands
1 Samuel 23:7
When Saul was told that David had gone to Keilah, he said, “God has delivered him into my hand, for he has trapped himself by entering a town with gates and bars.”
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Saul is informed by a messenger that David has fled to Keilah and declares this movement as divine delivery, immediately before mobilizing his forces to besiege the city (1 Samuel 23:6–8).
The words — וַ/יֻּגַּ֣ד (va/i.yu.Gad) translates literally as "it was told," and בָ֥א (va') means "he had gone," recording the rapid transmission of David’s location and Saul’s immediate tactical assumption.
The thread — The theme of God delivering an enemy into Saul’s or David’s hand appears in 1 Samuel 24:4, 1 Samuel 23:14, and 1 Samuel 26:8.
Why it lands — The text records Saul’s claim that geographical entrapment guarantees victory, requiring the reader to observe how human confidence in physical barriers precedes repeated divine overruling.
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
And it was told Saul that David was come to Keilah. And Saul said, God hath delivered him into mine hand; for he is shut in, by entering into a town that hath gates and bars.
Cross-references
- 1 Samuel 24:4 So David’s men said to him, “This is the day about which the LORD said to you, ‘Behold, I will deliver your enemy into your hand, that you may do with him as you wish.’” Then David crept up and stealthily cut off a corner of Saul’s robe.
- 1 Samuel 23:14 And David stayed in the wilderness strongholds and in the hill country of the Wilderness of Ziph. Day after day Saul searched for him, but God would not deliver David into his hand.
- 1 Samuel 26:8 Abishai said to David, “Today God has delivered your enemy into your hand. Now, therefore, please let me thrust the spear through him into the ground with one stroke. I will not need to strike him twice!”
- Job 20:5 the triumph of the wicked has been brief and the joy of the godless momentary?
- Psalms 71:10 For my enemies speak against me, and those who lie in wait for my life conspire,
- Exodus 14:3 For Pharaoh will say of the Israelites, ‘They are wandering the land in confusion; the wilderness has boxed them in.’
- Exodus 15:9 The enemy declared, ‘I will pursue, I will overtake. I will divide the spoils; I will gorge myself on them. I will draw my sword; my hand will destroy them.’
- Judges 16:2 When the Gazites heard that Samson was there, they surrounded that place and lay in wait for him all night at the city gate. They were quiet throughout the night, saying, “Let us wait until dawn; then we will kill him.”
- Luke 19:43 For the days will come upon you when your enemies will barricade you and surround you and hem you in on every side.