(8) Getteth up to the gutter.--The sense of this passage is obscure, partly from the difficulty of the Hebrew construction, partly from the uncertainty of the meaning of the word translated gutter. This word occurs elsewhere only in Psalm 42:7, where it is translated waterspouts. The ancient versions differ in their interpretations, but the most probable sense is watercourses, such as were connected with the precipices around Mount Zion. The two clauses also are unnecessarily transposed in our version, and the word getteth, by a very slight change in the Masoretic vowels, becomes cast or hurl. The whole clause will then read, "Whosoever smites the Jebusites, let him hurl into the watercourses (i.e., down the precipice) the lame and the blind." David thus applies to all the Jebusites the expression they had just used of those who would suffice to resist his attack. The clause "that are hated of David's soul," shows that in this siege no quarter was to be given; the Jebusites were under the old ban resting upon all the Canaanites, and were to be destroyed. The English version inserts the clause, "he shall be chief and captain," which is not in the original, and is here obscure. In 1Chronicles 11:6, however, the same statement is made more fully and is important: "David said, Whosoever smiteth the Jebusites first shall be chief and captain. So Joab the son of Zeruiah went first up and was chief." It thus appears that David promised the command of his army to the man who should successfully lead the forlorn hope; Joab did this, and won the place in the armies of all Israel which he had hitherto filled in that of Judah. This fact helps to explain the sense of obligation and restraint which David afterwards felt towards Joab.

Wherefore they said.--Rather, they say. This became a proverbial expression: no intercourse is to be had with such people as the Jebusites, here again called "the blind and the lame."

Verse 8. - Whosoever getteth up to the gutter. The word rendered "gutter" occurs elsewhere only in Psalm 42:7, where it is translated "waterspout." Josephus thinks that it was an underground passage or drain. Ewald argues that it was a precipice, and others that it was a dent or hollow in the rocky face of the ravine, which David had noticed and thought practicable. The view of Josephus, suggested to him probably by his knowledge of the way in which the site of Jerusalem is honeycombed by tunnels, has been wonderfully confirmed by the discoveries made by Sir C. Warren ('Recovery of Jerusalem,' pp. 240, sqq.). At the northern end of the Pool of Siloam he found an arched passage gradually narrowing down from a considerable height, till finally there was a passage of only fourteen inches, and as there was a depth of ten inches of water, there were left but four inches of space for breathing. But through this his men struggled, and, at the end of four hours' labour, they reached the light of day at the spring called the Virgin's Fount. Beginning here on a subsequent day, they went along a passage sixty-seven feet in length, and came to a perpendicular shaft leading up through the solid stone of the hill; and, having scaled this, they next came upon a sloping passage, which finally conducted them to a spot on the hill of Ophel within the fortifications. Now, there are reasons for believing that this passage is older than the wall built by Solomon, and through it, or some such tunnel, Joab and a few men may have worked their way, and so have effected an entrance into the city, which otherwise was impregnable. It was probably the entrance near the Virgin's Fountain which they had observed, and David's words mean, "Whoever will undertake this dangerous enterprise, let him try this underground passage, and when he has entered the fortifications by its means, let him smite the lame and the blind, that are hated of David's soul," because of the boast of the Jebusites, that their cripples were a match for his heroes. It must be noticed, however, that the K'tib, or written text, has "who hate David's soul;" and as this is what the Jewish Massorites found in the manuscripts, it has more authority than their correction. These Jebusites had probably, in their boastful insult, spoken of David with contempt, and even said, like Goliath, that they would give his flesh to the vultures (1 Samuel 17:44). We learn from 1 Chronicles 11:6 that David promised the office of commander of the host to the man who undertook this exploit; and when Joab had volunteered and succeeded, he regained thereby the post which he had forfeited by the murder of Abner. The blind and the lame shall not some into the house. The proverb is one of contempt for these poor cripples, and forbids the exercise of hospitality to them. Such people, if they took to mendicancy, were to meet with refusal, though at their own homes they were fit objects of charity. This way of describing tramps as "the blind and lame" arose, we are here told, from this Jebusite taunt.

5:6-10 The enemies of God's people are often very confident of their own strength, and most secure when their day to fall draws nigh. But the pride and insolence of the Jebusites animated David, and the Lord God of hosts was with him. Thus in the day of God's power, Satan's strong-hold, the human heart, is changed into a habitation of God through the Spirit, and into a throne on which the Son of David rules, and brings every thought into obedience to himself. May He thus come, and claim, and cleanse, each of our hearts; and, destroying every idol, may he reign there for ever!And David said on that day,.... On which he took the strong hold of Zion:

whosoever getteth up to the gutter; where it is generally supposed the blind and lame were, whether images or real men: but what is meant by "Tzinnur", we render "gutter", is not easy to say; we follow some of the Jewish writers, who take it to be a canal, or water spout, used to carry off the water from roofs of houses into cisterns, as the word is rendered in Psalm 42:7; which is the only place besides this in which it is used in Scripture; but R. Isaiah takes it to be the bar or bolt of the gate, and the sense to be, whoever got up to the gate, and got in at that, unbolting it, or breaking through it; the Targum interprets it of the tower of the city, or strong fortress, and so Abarbinel; but Jarchi says it was a ditch, agreeably to which Bochart (h) translates the words, and indeed more agreeably to the order of them;"whosoever smites the Jebusites, let him cast into the ditch (next the wall) both the blind and the lame, extremely hated by David.''But a learned modern writer (i) gives a more ingenious and probable interpretation of these words thus;"whosoever (first) smiteth the Jebusites, and through the subterraneous passages reaches the lame and the blind, &c.''and which seems to be favoured by Josephus, as he observes; who says (k), the king promised the command of the whole army to him who should , "through the subterraneous cavities", go up to the citadel, and take it: to which I would add that the word is used in the Chaldee paraphrase of Ecclesiastes 1:7, of the several subterraneous passages, through which the rivers flow out of and reflow into the ocean: remarkable is the note of Theodoret,

"a certain Hebrew says, Aquila renders it "through a pipe"; on which, he observes, David being willing to spare the walls of the city, ordered the citizens should enter into the city by an aqueduct;''according to the Jews, there, was a cave underground, which reached from the king's house in Jerusalem to Jericho, when it was taken by Nebuchadnezzar; See Gill on Jeremiah 39:4; in which story there may be a mixture of fable; yet it is not improbable that there was such a subterraneous passage; since Dio Cassius (l) speaks of several such, through which the Jews made their escape in the last siege of the city:

and smiteth the Jebusites, and the lame and the blind; or even the lame and the blind men the Jebusites had placed to mock David; and therefore it follows:

that are hated of David's soul: because he was despised and jeered at by them, and through them: if these could be understood of their idols and images, the phrase would be easily accounted for, nothing being more abominable to David than idolatry:

he shall be chief and captain; these words are not in the original text here, but are supplied from 1 Chronicles 11:6; that is, he shall be chief commander of the army, as Joab became, who was the first that went up and smote them:

wherefore they said, the blind and the lame shall not come into the house; that is, either the Jebusites said this, that their images, called in derision by David the blind and the lame, if these did not keep David out, they should never be intrusted with the safety of their fort any more (m); or rather because the blind and the lame men said this of David, he shall not come into the house, the fort, or citadel, therefore David hated them; which is the sense of the above learned writer (n).

(h) Phaleg. l. 4. c. 36. col. 304. (i) Dr. Kennicott's Dissert. 1. p. 35. (k) Ut supra. (Antiqu. l. 7. c. 3. sect. 1.) (l) Hist. l. 66. (m) Gregory, ut supra. (Notes and Observations, &c. ch. 7.) (n) Dr. Kennicott, ut supra. (Dissert. 1. p. 35.)