10. Moreover I will appoint] It is probably best to take the verbs here as perfects: And I have appointed … and have planted them, and they dwell in their own place. For the metaphor of planting, comp. Exodus 15:17; Psalm 44:2.

and move no more] Better, and shall not be disturbed any more.

the children of wickedness] Sons of wickedness = wicked men. Cp. Psalm 89:22.

10, 11. as beforetime, and as since the time] It is best to connect the first clause of 2 Samuel 7:11 with 2 Samuel 7:10. Beforetime refers to the beginning of the nation’s history in Egypt; since, &c. to the various oppressions they had suffered from the beginning of the period of the Judges down to the present.

and have caused thee to rest] And have given thee rest, as in 2 Samuel 7:1; to be connected with the verbs at the beginning of 2 Samuel 7:10, I have appointed … and have planted them.

Also, &c.] Or, And the Lord hath told thee, referring to the communications made to David by Samuel. Cp. 1 Samuel 25:28.

Verses 10, 11. - Moreover I will appoint... will plant. For "moreover," the Hebrew has "and." The tenses also continue the same: "And I have appointed... and have planted." It is all part of the same act. As regards the second verb, the past tense alone makes sense. Jehovah was not about to plant Israel in a place of their own, but had just done so completely. For David's kingdom had given them security, and with it the power of doing for God that duty which was Israel's special office in the world. Had the anarchy of the times of the judges continued, and the energies of the nation been spent in a hard struggle for existence, that rapid advance in literature which followed upon the institution of Samuel's schools, and which filled David's court with poets and chroniclers, never could have existed, and prophecy would have been impossible. The age of Hezekiah was apparently the culminating period of Hebrew civilization, after which came the depressing influences of the Assyrian invasions, and then long exile, followed by a second weary struggle for existence. If writing was at first a mystery and an art known only to priests, it became throughout the monarchy the possession especially of the prophets, who were Israel's learned men. At the head of their roll stands the matchless Isaiah, and to render it possible for his genius to display itself, not only Samuel's schools, but the security of David's era of conquest, and the long peace and magnificence of Solomon's reign, were all necessary. When "God had given David rest from his enemies round about," he had thereby finally appointed a place for Israel and had planted them there. There is, perhaps, some difficulty in the verb forms at the end of ver. 11, but none in the meaning. The reign of David marks an era in the national life. Under him Israel obtained secure possession of the place appointed for it; and now, having no longer to waste its energies in perpetual fighting, the national life grows upwards, and attains to culture, to thought, and civilization. Canaan is now their own, and instead of being mere warriors, they develop national institutions and a national character. What could men do that belongs to a higher and nobler life who were in daily fear of being swept away by Canaanites and Midianites, by Philistines and Ammonites? This miserable period is described as "beforetime," and as "since the day that I commanded judges to be over my people Israel." And here a colon should be placed; and the Hebrew will then proceed, "But now I have caused thee to rest from thine enemies, the anarchy and its attendant weakness is over; "and Jehovah telleth thee that Jehovah will make thee a house." Rest has been given; the establishment of David's family as the Messianic lineage is to follow (see on this promise, 1 Samuel 2:35). 2 Samuel 7:10After thus declining his proposal, the Lord made known His gracious purpose to David: "Thus saith Jehovah of hosts" (not only Jehovah, as in 2 Samuel 7:5, but Jehovah Sebaoth, because He manifests himself in the following revelation as the God of the universe): "I have taken thee from the pasturage (grass-plat), behind the flock, to be prince over my people Israel; and was with thee whithersoever thou wentest, and exterminated all thine enemies before thee, and so made thee, ועשׂיתי (perfect with vav consec.), a great name, ... and created a place for my people Israel, and planted them, so that they dwell in their place, and do not tremble any more (before their oppressors); and the sons of wickedness do not oppress them any further, as at the beginning, and from the day when I appointed judges over my people Israel: and I create thee rest from all thine enemies. And Jehovah proclaims to thee, that Jehovah will make thee a house." The words ישׂ עמּי ... היּום למן are to be joined to בּראשׁונה, "as in the beginning," i.e., in Egypt, and from the time of the judges; that is to say, during the rule of the judges, when the surrounding nations constantly oppressed and subjugated Israel. The plan usually adopted, of connecting the words with והניחתי, does not yield any suitable thought at all, as God had not given David rest from the very beginning of the times of the judges; but the period of the judges was long antecedent to the time of David, and was not a period of rest for the Israelites. Again, והניחתי does not resume what is stated in 2 Samuel 7:9, and is not to be rendered as a preterite in the sense of "I have procured thee rest," but as a perfect with vav consec., "and I procure thee rest" from what is now about to come to pass. And והגּיד is to be taken in the same way: the Lord shows thee, first of all through His promise (which follows), and then through the fact itself, the realization of His word. והניחתי refers to the future, as well as the building of David's house, and therefore not to the rest from all his enemies, which God had already secured for David, but to that which He would still further secure for him, that is to say, to the maintenance and establishment of that rest. The commentary upon this is to be found in Psalm 89:22-24. In the Chronicles (1 Chronicles 17:10) there is a somewhat different turn given to the last clauses: "and I bend down all thine enemies, and make it (the bending-down) known to thee (by the fact), and a house will Jehovah build for thee." The thought is not essentially changed by this; consequently there is no ground for any emendation of the text, which is not even apparently necessary, unless, like Bertheau, we misinterpret the words, and connect והכנעתּי erroneously with the previous clause.

2 Samuel 7:8-11

The connection between 2 Samuel 7:5-7 and 2 Samuel 7:8-16 has been correctly indicated by Thenius as follows: Thou shalt not build a house for Me; but I, who have from the very beginning glorified myself in thee and my people (2 Samuel 7:8-11), will build a house for thee; and thy son shall erect a house for me (2 Samuel 7:13). This thought is not merely "a play upon words entirely in the spirit of prophecy," but contains the deep general truth that God must first of all build a man's house, before the man can build God's house, and applies it especially to the kingdom of God in Israel. As long as the quiet and full possession of the land of Canaan, which had been promised by the Lord to the people of God for their inheritance, was disputed by their enemies round about, even the dwelling-place of their God could not assume any other form than that of a wanderer's tent. The kingdom of God in Israel first acquired its rest and consolation through the efforts of David, when God had made all his foes subject to him and established his throne firmly, i.e., had assured to his descendants the possession of the kingdom for all future time. And it was this which ushered in the time for the building of a stationary house as a dwelling for the name of the Lord, i.e., for the visible manifestation of the presence of God in the midst of His people. The conquest of the citadel of Zion and the elevation of this fortress into the palace of the king, whom the Lord had given to His people, formed the commencement of the establishment of the kingdom of God. But this commencement received its first pledge of perpetuity from the divine assurance that the throne of David should be established for all future time. And this the Lord was about to accomplish: He would build David a house, and then his seed should build the house of the Lord. No definite reason is assigned why David himself was not to build the temple. We learn this first of all from David's last words (1 Chronicles 28:3), in which he says to the assembled heads of the nation, "God said to me, Thou shalt not build a house for my name, because thou art a man of wars, and hast shed blood." Compare with this the similar words of David to Solomon in 1 Chronicles 22:8, and Solomon's statement in his message to Hiram, that David had been prevented from building the temple in consequence of his many wars. It was probably not till afterwards that David was informed by Nathan what the true reason was. As Hengstenberg has correctly observed, the fact that David was not permitted to build the temple on account of his own personal unworthiness, did not involve any blame for what he had done; for David stood in a closer relation to the Lord than Solomon did, and the wars which he waged were wars of the Lord (1 Samuel 25:28) for the maintenance and defence of the kingdom of God. But inasmuch as these wars were necessary and inevitable, they were practical proofs that David's kingdom and government were not yet established, and therefore that the time for the building of the temple had not yet come, and the rest of peace was not yet secured. The temple, as the symbolical representation of the kingdom of God, as also to correspond to the nature of that kingdom, and shadow forth the peace of the kingdom of God. For this reason, David, the man of war, was not to build the temple; but that was to be reserved for Solomon, the man of peace, the type of the Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:5).

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