(6) And all his men.--We must not interpret this statement quite literally; 1Chronicles 10:6 explains it by "all his house." Ishbosheth, his son, for instance, and Abner, the captain of the host, we know were not among the slain on that fatal day. The meaning is that all his "fideles," his personal staff, as we should say, with his three sons fell fighting round him. The lines of the chivalrous Scottish ballad writer who with rare skill describes the devoted followers of King James V. falling round him at Flodden, well paints what took place on the stricken field of Gilboa round the hero king Saul:--

"No one failed him! He is keeping

Royal state and semblance still,

Knight and noble lie around him,

Cold, on Flodden's fatal hill.

"Of the brave and gallant-hearted

Whom you sent with prayers away,

Not a single man departed

From his monarch yesterday." AYTOUN.

31:1-7 We cannot judge of the spiritual or eternal state of any by the manner of their death; for in that, there is one event to the righteous and to the wicked. Saul, when sorely wounded, and unable to resist or to flee, expressed no concern about his never-dying soul; but only desired that the Philistines might not insult over him, or put him to pain, and he became his own murderer. As it is the grand deceit of the devil, to persuade sinners, under great difficulties, to fly to this last act of desperation, it is well to fortify the mind against it, by a serious consideration of its sinfulness before God, and its miserable consequences in society. But our security is not in ourselves. Let us seek protection from Him who keepeth Israel. Let us watch and pray; and take unto us the whole armour of God, that we may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.So Saul died, and his three sons, and his armourbearer,.... Only with this difference, his three sons died honourably in the field of battle, but he and his armourbearer destroyed themselves. Josephus says (e) he reigned eighteen years in the life of Samuel, and after his death twenty two years, which make the forty years the apostle ascribes to him, Acts 13:21; Eupolemus (f), an Heathen writer, makes him to reign twenty one years; but of the years of his reign, both before and after the death of Samuel, chronologers are not agreed, see 1 Samuel 25:1; and See Gill on Acts 13:21,

and all his men that same day together; not all the soldiers in his army; for many of them fled and escaped, and even Abner the general of the army, but his household servants, or those that were near his person, his bodyguards.

(e) Antiqu. l. 6. c. 14. sect. 9. (f) Apud Euseb. Praepar. Evangel. l. 9. c. 3. p. 447.